Drowning of Stephan Jones (5 page)

Frank strolled leisurely into the living room, brushing some imaginary lint from the sleeve of his well-tailored pin-striped suit. “Hear ye, hear ye, all you women and girls of Atkins County, Arkansas,” he chanted. “Be prepared on this bright Christmas morning to eat your heart out because neither Mr.
Jones nor Mr. Montgomery is available.”

For six years prior to coming to Parson Springs last May. Stephan Jones and Frank Montgomery had been co-owners of a tiny antique shop on Boston’s famous Beacon Hill. Every year their profits increased by a reassuring fifteen to twenty percent, and they thought they could go on forever. If it hadn’t been for the new lease their landlord sent demanding double the rent, they probably would have, too.

Since they had no choice but to move, they decided to change things completely. They decided to move to a place where the rent would be cheap, the climate would be agreeable, and the people, long known for their Southern hospitality, would be friendly.

Although Frank was born, raised, educated, and finally even employed in Boston, he had in recent years begun to itch to experience life in another corner of the country. For Stephan, who had come to the city when he was eighteen burning with the desire to become a Jesuit priest and lead men to Christ, Boston would always be the scene of his failure. For the thirty months that he had studied at the Weston School of Theology, he had tried to work from inside the church to help Catholics teach a kinder, more open, and less fearful vision of the homosexual.

But little by little, the closet homosexual with his equally closeted agenda began to grow steadily more and more discouraged. So much that he woke on the morning of his twenty-first birthday with the stark realization that if he wanted to hold onto his faith, he had to leave divinity school. And he had to leave it at once!

More than eight years after that decision, Stephan and his partner spent weeks discussing, arguing, and researching the painful but still exciting prospect of finding another more suitable home for themselves and their antique business. Finally all cities and towns were eliminated from consideration except
one: Parson Springs, the artsy-craftsy town on Arkansas’s famed tourist trail.

Stephan sighed as he remembered the first person they met on arrival—Billy Saul Baxter, the town’s only real estate man. He had stuck a pudgy finger toward the crest of the mountain where a seven-hundred foot high concrete Jesus was visible for miles in any direction. “Our mountain town is known far and wide as the crown jewel,” Billy Saul enthused. “On the glittering buckle known as the Bible Belt!”

On this Christmas morning Stephan drove the only vehicle they owned—an oversized RV down the highway toward the next town of Ratchetville. He was gambling that the live wire of a preacher over at the First Baptist Church of Ratchetville would hold Frank’s interest better than the monotone priest had over at Our Lady of the Mountain Chapel. For Stephan, denomination was nothing, what meant everything was seeing his life partner accept Jesus as his Lord and Savior.

Stephan prepared to turn their RV into the parking lot of the Rachetville Baptist Church. “Oh, no! Would you look at that, Frank. There’s not a space anywhere! See, didn’t I tell you? Would it have hurt if we’d have left fifteen minutes earlier?”

“Keep on heading down Main Street, Stevie, there’s another church at the end of the block, surrounded by a parking lot.”

“But I don’t want any other church,” Stephan objected, guiding the motorized behemoth onto a yellow striped section of asphalt where a standing sign solemnly announced: THOU SHALT NOT PARK. “It’s not as though we don’t have a Baptist church in Parson Springs,” Frank remarked. “Why did we have to come over here?”

Pointing dramatically at the majestic spire of the imposing red-brick, Colonial-style church, Stephan answered, “Well, open your eyes and look at it! Just look at it, would you? Can’t you just tell that here at last is a church that will embrace us?”

Frank gazed up at the bell tower, squinting against the morning
sun. “No, I can’t honestly say that I can.”

Stephan’s eyes scanned the church. He shrugged. “You don’t suppose it reminds me of the Baptist church that I used to attend with the Protestant side of my family back in Arlington, Massachusetts? Those were good old days.”

They hurried up the granite steps, passing without taking much notice of the glass window whose purpose was to advertise to all those on the outside what went on inside.

THE RACHETVILLE BAPTIST CHURCH

Welcomes You to Fellowship in Christ

Reverend Roland B. Wheelwright

Special Christmas Sermon:

“What Did You Give Jesus on His Day?”

After church social—refreshments

Rec Room

As the newcomers entered, people nodded and smiled. One woman who looked as though she might have come into this world past middle age called out, “Welcome, strangers! Smile and be happy, you hear, ’cause you’re with God’s people now.” All this friendly and benign attention by all these well-scrubbed and sweet-sounding people was so pleasant, it didn’t take Frank and Stephan long to begin to feel as though maybe they really did belong after all.

At a pew toward the center rear of the church sat Carla, thrilled at actually having maneuvered her mother into a place of worship. Anyone seeing Judith for the first time would likely be surprised. She had lustrous auburn hair, eyes that glowed with compassion, and a delicate facial structure, but then so did her daughter. What was most surprising was that the larger-than-life librarian was really small of stature.

During the singing of the opening hymn, “O Little Town of Bethlehem,” Carla whispered to her mother, “Well, Mom, isn’t it nice? Aren’t you glad I made you come?”

“It
is
architecturally appealing,” admitted Judith. “And the
music’s surprisingly good. Nice choir.”

“Oh, do you think we could become members?” the girl asked.

Although Judith realized that she had been manipulated into coming to Andy’s church, she was goodnatured about it. “Oh, come on now, Carla, asking me to join a congregation just because you fancy one of its members is not really the soundest of reasons. At any rate, could we at least table this discussion until
after
Reverend Wheelwright’s sermon?”

When the last note of the hymn was sung a hush that said something important was coming fell over the worshipers. Then the Reverend Roland B. Wheelwright, a handsome man with a full head of white hair, strode purposefully toward the raised pulpit. He wore a dramatic black robe with vibrant maroon trim that had been custom-made by a Jewish designer of liturgical wear on New York City’s Seventh Avenue. Before uttering a single word, he paused as though to heighten the dramatic effect while allowing an expression of supreme beatitude to play across his manly features. Finally, he intoned, “Brothers and sisters in Christ, my sermon for this Christmas morning is: ‘What did you give Our Savior on his birthday?’ ”

The preacher started his sermon like a mild-mannered holy man, but he didn’t stay mild for very long. “The Bible teaches us to plant the seed, to sow the seed. You want to prosper? Then you give to the Lord’s church! Give all you can! Give until it hurts and then give some more! Do that and watch how Jesus will return your gift a hundredfold—nay, a thousandfold!”

“Inspiring,” Frank whispered, amid a yawn. “Truly inspiring.”

With his elbow, Stephan gave him a behave-yourself nudge and Frank struggled to keep his eyes open.

“We Christian soldiers have got to offer up our lives to fight on the front line with Jesus’ army! Because, and make no mistake
about it ...” His voice calmed down and became lower and almost intimate. “Oh, my dear, dear brothers and sisters in Christ, how can I warn you? How can I let you know?” Now his voice began to rise. “Satan is all the time getting bolder!”

His face flushed red, and Frank thought it looked close to the color of the center of a medium-rare filet mignon. Staring transfixed at the ornate church ceiling above, the minister banged his bare fist on the ornate hand-carved pulpit, then clasped both hands together. “Oh, Lord Jesus, teach us that we can do a hundred good deeds, and still not enter the kingdom of heaven. Or a hundred thousand good deeds and it will be as nothing in your eyes if we are not washed in your sanctifying blood. In the blood of Our Savior, Jesus Christ. Glory! Glory! Thank you Jesus! Thank you Jesus!” He swabbed his sweating face with an oversized handkerchief, but he continued without pause. “Oh, God, wash us sinners in the cleansing blood of Jesus Christ who died for our sins on Calvary. And then send us out in glory to join your army. Jesus’ army! Hallelujah! Hallelujah!

“Wearing the cross of Jesus, we will be fighters against Satan, and it matters not in which guise he appears. Take warning all you pornographers!” he shouted, lunging with an imaginary sword against an imaginary enemy. “Take warning all you child molesters!” He lunged a second time. “Take warning all you homosexuals!” And this time his lunge was the most violent lunge of all. “We Christian soldiers are going to smite you! Are you listening to me, Satan?! I’m telling you! I’m warning you! ’Cause we’re going to up and
smite you dead
!”

“What do you suppose ever happened to the Prince of Peace?” Judith whispered with obvious disdain to her daughter. Carla was so preoccupied with staring at the back of Andy Harris’s well-proportioned head and daydreaming that she hardly paid enough attention to the preaching to comment.

Six rows behind them, Frank spoke directly into Stephan’s
ear. “What you said a while back about this church
embracing
us. Didn’t you get your verbs mixed up, old buddy? Didn’t you mean to say
impaling
us?”

At the conclusion of the services, Mrs. Wheelwright, a big woman with a seemingly baked-on smile, stood just inside the front door with her husband exchanging Christmas greetings with the departing parishioners. Since new faces are the most obvious sign that a church is growing in strength and prestige, the minister enthusiastically pumped Frank’s and Stephan’s hands before inquiring if they weren’t newcomers to Rachetville.

The men explained that they were former Bostonians who lived in the next town over, in Parson Springs, where they had opened the Forgotten Treasures Antique Shop. Mr. Wheelwright smiled even more broadly as he muttered something about “businessmen being the backbone of any community. Yes sir, they’re the very backbone of this country!” He became, if possible, even more enthusiastic than before.

“We’re honored that you fine Christian gentlemen saw fit to pray with us today.” He chuckled a little—a little this-is-just-between-us-guys chuckle—before continuing. “Now I know you must know that there’s a fine, gospel-preaching Baptist church right in your own community?” The minister paused expectantly, clearly trying to extract a much-hoped-for compliment, which Stephan politely supplied. “Well, yes of course, we did know about the Johnson Memorial Baptist Church, and I’ve been there to services, too, but frankly I guess we were seeking something different. Something more dynamic.”

Reverend Wheelwright accepted what he
thought
was a compliment amid his ongoing nods and broad smiles. “Well, glad you could make it, really am—well, now, let me introduce you fellows to another one of our fine Rachetville businessmen and his lovely family. Larry! Larry and Elna Jean Harris!” the preacher shouted, and then vigorously beckoned to them amid
the exiting throng. “You and your handsome family march yourselves right on over here!” When Elna heard their minister ringing out their names, her face lit up with an unspoken but unmistakable pride.

By the time the entire Harris family had snaked their way through the crowd to reach Reverend Wheelwright’s side, he already had one arm around Frank and the other around Stephan. It took Larry and Andy a glance, and then a second much longer stare, before it struck them, even before the preacher had concluded his introduction, exactly who those men in the warm embrace of their glowingly happy pastor were.

Larry and Andy could not have looked more stricken if they had been struck across the face with a two-by-four, but Elna wasn’t suffering along with them; she seemed supremely happy. Elna was blissfully unaware that the two men she was now smiling and fluttering her heavily mascaraed lashes at were the same “two queers” that her husband had come home ranting and raving about a few days before. She wasn’t even bothering to hide the fact that she was obviously much affected by the strangers, but in a way precisely the opposite from what her husband and son would have wished.

Stephan and Frank recognized the male members of the Harris family but managed to keep wearing their faintest of smiles while Elna acted as though she were giving flirting lessons. “Well, I do declare,” she confided to them. “Why, I’m going to tell you right now that we Southern women are going to be quicker and smarter than those foolish Yankee women that let you two precious fellows get away! Not even if I live to be a hundred will I ever understand how they’d let a terrible thing like that happen.”

“Mother!” said Andy, squeezing her forearm.

“Elna Jean!” spoke Larry in words that sounded as though they had been pulled screaming through clenched teeth.

“Now what has gotten into you two?” Mrs. Harris lyrically asked while quickly glancing sideways at both her son and her husband. “You just hold your horses, honey, ’cause I’m not fixing to leave this spot until I show these handsome Yankees a little of our good ol’ Southern hospitality.” She turned her full and admiring gaze back to the strangers. “Now I just happen to know two of the sweetest girls that God ever blew breath into—from good Christian homes too—who’d jump at the chance to meet such precious fellows as you all.”

Frank’s eyes caught and then held Elna’s eyes, and surprisingly that seemed to noticeably wind down her chatter, at least long enough for him to speak. “Stephan and I appreciate your kind offer, we really do, but we must decline. Now if you’ll excuse us, Mrs. Harris, we really must be going.”

Outside Judith and Carla were walking together toward the church’s parking lot as Carla was attempting to infuse her mother with her own enthusiasm for the largest and most talked-about church in town. “Oh, I loved it, Mother, I really did—the flowers, the music, everything! And did you see everybody who was there? Just like the Who’s Who of Atkins County.”