Fallen Angels (12 page)

I don’t know how long Sister Emmanuel would
have continued praying if Mrs. Pinkney hadn’t let out a
pained-sounding moan.

“Amen!” shouted Sister Emmanuel. Then she
reached for Mrs. Pinkney and lifted her head into her lap.

Did you understand those pronouns? The
English language suffers from severe pronominal deficiencies in my
opinion. Not that my opinion matters. What I meant was that Sister
Emmanuel lifted Mrs. Pinkney’s head and placed it on Sister
Emmanuel’s lap. I thought that was quite a generous and democratic
thing for her to do. Yet another difference between Sister Emmanuel
and my mother, who wasn’t democratic about anything at all.
Dictatorial is what she was. And she wasn’t even a preacher. My
mother, I mean, not Sister Emmanuel. Pronouns. They can be
so
confusing.

But enough of that. Mrs. Pinkney was
beginning to come around. She blinked once or twice, and her eyes
looked kind of blank for a moment, and then she caught sight of me.
I was still on the floor, kneeling, confused about what to do since
I wasn’t sure it would be polite to stand before Sister Emmanuel
did—kind of like you wouldn’t stand in the presence of a queen if
she were sitting or, as in this case, kneeling. When Mrs. Pinkney
saw me, she snapped to attention, cried, “Oh, my goodness
gracious!” and fainted again.

I was beginning to think I’d never get out of
that place.

But I did. Eventually.

“Please lift our fallen sister, Brother
Everett,” said Sister Emmanuel, achieving remarkable results with a
sugar-and-honey voice. This points out another reason one needn’t
be impolite to get one’s meaning across. If I dared, I’d have
mentioned this salient tip to my mother. “You may take her to my
office and lay her on the sofa there until she’s feeling better. I
believe I have some smelling salts in the desk drawer. And I’m sure
a strong, sweet cup of tea won’t be amiss.”

“I will, Sister Emmanuel,” said Mr.
Everett.

He was kind of a scrawny fellow, but he was
certainly obedient. He lifted Mrs. Pinkney right up off the floor
and staggered up the central aisle of the sanctuary, where he made
a right turn and disappeared from sight.

Sister Emmanuel turned to me and I stiffened,
expecting some sort of rebuke for having caused a ruckus in her
sanctuary. But I’d underestimated Adelaide Burkhard Emmanuel. She
held out her hand and said, “My poor dear woman. I’m so very sorry
you had to bring us this distressing news. Won’t you please come
with me to my office and take a cup of tea?”

My goodness, I was actually going to be
allowed into the inner sanctum! This turn of events was a far
better one than I’d hoped for. In fact, there had been times during
Sister Emmanuel’s fervent sermon when I’d considered trying to
sneak out of the place. No longer. By gum, this was my chance to do
some honest-to-goodness sleuthing. I hoped. I followed in her regal
wake as she walked in the same direction Mr. Everett had carried
Mrs. Pinkney, turned right down another hallway, and made another
right turn into an office.

Sister Emmanuel’s office was fairly large,
which didn’t surprise me, as the Angelica Gospel Hall itself was an
immense structure. She hadn’t gone overboard on the furnishings,
though, which comported with the message she tried to impart to her
congregation, which was one of cheerful service to the Lord and not
the accumulation of personal wealth. It was pleasant to discover
that the woman practiced what she preached, in her case literally.
There was a desk, a telephone, a couple of easy chairs and a sofa,
upon which resided poor Mrs. Pinkney, who was stirring and looking
as if she were embarrassed about that faint. I mean those
faints.

“Brother Everett,” said Sister Emmanuel when
she ushered me into her office, “will you please ask Sister Everett
to bring some tea here? I believe these two ladies could use a
brace-up, as can I.”

“I certainly will,” said Brother Everett,
ever helpful, and he bustled off.

“Please, my dear,” said Sister Emmanuel to
me. “Won’t you please tell me who you are and what you know about
this terrible business regarding Sister Chalmers? I was surprised
when I didn’t see her face in the congregation this morning.”

She was? Shoot, the place was so big and so
crammed with people, I didn’t know how she’d ever keep track of one
smallish woman. However, if she’d just told me the truth, and I had
no real reason to doubt her, her words impressed me. You know, she
being the shepherd and the congregation being her lambs, it was her
duty to look out for them and know where each one was. In a way. It
seemed a pretty large task to shepherd a flock of several hundred
human beings who might occasionally behave like sheep, but not so
often that you’d notice if the people I knew were any example.

I cleared my throat and glanced at Mrs.
Pinkney, thinking Sister Emmanuel should be spending her time
comforting her rather than questioning me. But that was the Boston
in me thinking. I was here on investigatorial duties, and Sister
Emmanuel had just given me an opportunity to practice the few
skills I’d learned from Ernie.

“Yes. My name is Miss Mercedes Allcutt, Mrs.
. . . er, Sister Emmanuel.”

She bestowed a sweet smile upon me. “We don’t
care to use earthly titles here, Sister Allcutt. We’re all equal in
God’s eyes and, therefore, in our own eyes. You’ll become
accustomed to our ways if you join our flock. And I most earnestly
pray that you will.”

“Um . . . thank you, ma’am. Sister Emmanuel,
I mean.” Oh, boy. This was going to be tougher than I’d expected.
“To get back to Mrs.—I mean Sister Chalmers. I paid a call on her
on Thursday afternoon, around three or three-thirty, I believe it
was. No one answered the door, which I thought was rather odd,
since—”

“You mean Mrs. Hanratty wasn’t there?”

It was Mrs. Pinkney who’d interrupted my
narrative. When I glanced at the sofa, I saw that she’d managed to
sit up, although she was rubbing the back of her head. I imagine
that part of her anatomy hurt a good deal, having come into sudden
and painful contact with a tile floor not once, but twice, in the
recent past.

Before I continued my narrative, I asked,
“Are you feeling better now, Mrs. Pinkney? I’m awfully sorry to
have caused you such distress. I shouldn’t have broken the news to
you so abruptly.”

Sister Emmanuel took over. I guess she didn’t
like losing the limelight for too long at any given moment.

“Yes, Sister Pinkney. Sister Everett will be
bringing some tea for us in a moment. I’m sure that will perk you
right up.”

“Yes. Thank you.” Mrs. Pinkney’s voice
sounded weak. Shock and pain will do that to a person.

“Please, Sister Allcutt, continue with your
story.”

“Very well.” I cleared my throat again.
“Anyhow, I rang the doorbell and no one answered my ring.” Deciding
I might as well throw another name into the room to make these
women think I knew Mrs. Chalmers better than I did—and, anyhow,
Mrs. Pinkney had asked—I added, “Neither Mrs. Hanratty nor Susan
was there. I thought that odd, as I’d believed Mrs. Chalmers was
expecting me.” There it was: a bald-faced lie right there in the
middle of a church. Oh, well. I’d ask forgiveness later. “For some
reason—I know it was bold of me, but I was beginning to worry a
bit—I turned the doorknob, and discovered the door was unlocked. I
thought that was strange, too.”

“Goodness, yes,” said Mrs. Pinkney, whose
voice, while still a trifle breathy, was stronger now. “Especially
now, since she’s been having so much trouble.”

I managed to keep my eyebrows from soaring.
“Oh, my, I didn’t know about that. What kind of trouble?”

“What? You mean she didn’t tell you?”

Mrs. Pinkney squinted at me. I think the
squint was from pain and not suspicion, but I decided I’d better
make myself clear. “Well, I knew she’d lost some jewelry—”

“She’d had some jewelry
stolen
,” declared Mrs. Pinkney. “And
then there were the threatening letters.”

“Oh, my,” I said, my own voice a trifle weak
at this news. “I didn’t know about any threatening letters.”

Mrs. Pinkney nodded once vigorously, then
grabbed her head again and stopped doing that. I grimaced in
sympathy.

“How many threatening letters did she get?” I
asked, feeling as though I might have finally stumbled upon a real,
honest-to-goodness detectival trail for once in my life as a P.I.’s
assistant . . . I mean secretary.

“Two or three, I think.”

“Goodness gracious,” I said, hoping Sister
Emmanuel wouldn’t butt in any time soon. “What did they say? The
letters, I mean.”

“That she’d better stop throwing her money at
the Angelica Gospel Hall, or she’d regret it.”

“Throwing
her
money at the Angelica Gospel Hall?”

I couldn’t honestly blame Sister Emmanuel for
hopping into the conversation at that point.

“Oh, dear,” I said, hoping to mitigate Sister
Emmanuel’s rage.

But I’d wronged the woman. She wasn’t
enraged. In fact, when I glanced at her, I saw genuine grief on her
countenance and tears in her eyes. “Oh, my dear, sweet Lord, I
can’t believe that anyone could take our message and twist it so
horribly that they’d threaten a lovely woman for supporting such
important work. If our work played any role whatsoever in her death
. . .”

I decided to plop something into the
conversation that might cheer her up some. “You never know what the
devil will do next. Satan is right here among us, twisting people’s
minds and souls.” I’d read that Sister Emmanuel believed Satan was
real and did stuff like that.

It had been the right thing to say. Although
she still appeared horrified that someone might have been harmed
because of an affiliation with her church, Sister Emmanuel did
bestow a nod and a smile upon me. “You’re very wise for someone so
young, Sister Allcutt.”

Fortunately for me, who doesn’t accept
compliments very well from sources I don’t know, Mrs. Pinkney spoke
next. “I wonder if the person who wrote the letters is the one who
killed her.”

“How did the poor woman die?” asked Sister
Emmanuel.

We were interrupted by Sister Everett, who
didn’t look at all like Brother Everett, so I assumed they were
husband and wife and not literally brother and sister. Much more
heavily built than her husband, she was a good deal taller than he,
and had a face that reminded me of a withered peach, perhaps
because it was wrinkled and she had yellowish-gray hair. She looked
as though she might heave a good-sized cow over a fence if she’d
been of a mind to, and it was difficult for me to imagine the
couple as . . . well, as a couple. You know. Because her husband
was such a weedy-looking fellow. Ah, well. There’s no accounting
for when and where love will strike, I reckon. I also reckon she
didn’t believe in using bluing to whiten her hair. She laid a tray
on Sister Emmanuel’s desk. I expected her to pour tea and hand
teacups around, but she didn’t. It was Sister Emmanuel herself who
said, “Thank you so much, Sister Everett. You may go on about your
duties and I’ll pour. These poor ladies have suffered a severe
shock.”

Sister Everett shook her head in sympathy,
although her face didn’t betray the same emotion. She sounded
sincere, though, when she said, “Brother Everett told me about
Sister Chalmers. I’m so sorry.” And she backed out of the room like
a trained maid. My mother would have approved.

As she poured and handed out teacups—they
were pretty although not, I could tell, anything out of the
ordinary, but probably purchased at a five-and-dime somewhere,
which constituted prudent use of the church’s funds to my
mind—Sister Emmanuel said, “Please continue your story, Sister
Allcutt. You say you found poor Sister Chalmers yourself? That must
have been a terrible shock for you.”

I nodded and said with real feeling, “It
was.” I took a sip of tea and continued my interrupted story. “I
spoke her name when I entered the vestibule, but the house was
strangely silent.” Might as well put a little drama into my story,
after all. Besides, it had been an eerie experience, so why not say
so? “Everything was so quiet. I learned later that Mrs. Hanratty
and Susan—the hired help—had gone out, which explains the silence,
but I didn’t know that at the time. I didn’t know what to do, but I
was feeling rather ill at ease by that time, so I . . . well, I
tiptoed from room to room. There wasn’t a single soul there. That
much I could tell, and I wondered where the servants were. Then I
got to the hallway, and . . .”

And I couldn’t go on for a moment. The memory
of that huddle of filmy cloth at the foot of the staircase stopped
my tongue. I swallowed another sip of tea, and then another one,
and cleared my throat.

“I’m sorry, my dear. I can tell this
recitation is difficult for you.”

Chalk up another point for Sister Emmanuel.
She knew what to say to people. I was impressed anew. “Thank
you.”

“Can you go on now?” she asked kindly.

I nodded. “Yes, I think so. Anyhow, I finally
walked into the big hallway—” I shot a look at Mrs. Pinkney and
said, “You know the one I mean? The one where the staircase comes
down?”

She nodded mutely, staring at me in what I
presumed was horror or dread or some similar emotion.

“Well, there I found her. Mrs. Chalmers. At
the foot of the stairs. I . . . at first I thought she must have
tumbled down the stairs, but then I . . .”

Boy, I hadn’t realized how difficult it was
going to be to relate this string of events to strangers. At the
time, when I’d been talking to Phil and Ernie, I was so caught up
in the moment that I just blurted it all out. But a couple of days
had passed since then, the memories were coming back, and I didn’t
like them one little bit.