If I'd Killed Him When I Met Him…

right of the door, pulling Bill’s sleeve to rouse him from the stupor that seemed to have struck him as he contemplated her last remark. “Come on, Bill. I was kidding about the snakes,” she said in his ear. “Probably.”

As Bill edged toward the pew he stepped on a black cylindrical shape coiled at his feet, and his mouth opened to let out a scream that would have rattled the stained glass, but before he could get his diaphragm to work, his brain realized that he was in fact standing on the cord to the ministerial microphone, which was attached to the sound system in the back corner. The mike itself, a cigar-shaped handheld instrument, was perched on a plastic stand atop a homemade pine lectern at the front of the sanctuary.

The small sanctuary was so jammed with bodies that it was difficult to make out the look of the room, but when Bill’s eyes adjusted to the dim light, he saw that a wagonwheel chandelier illumined the altar area, casting a sickly yellow glow on the lectern, but shedding very little brightness elsewhere. The walls were lined with a dark pressed-wood paneling (sold at building-supply stores for about five dollars a square mile) that seemed to absorb light, and the ceiling was low, adding to the catacomb effect of the room.

“Where’s Mrs. Morgan?” whispered Edith, elbowing Bill in the ribs.

“Which one?” he hissed back.

“Well, exactly!” said Edith. “I’ll bet most of this congregation is here for the begats instead of the amens.”

There was a shuffling of feet and a murmur of voices, and then a slender, middle-aged woman in a crimson robe made her way up the aisle and sat down at the upright piano to the right of the lectern. She pounded out a few bars of “Come to the Church in the Wildwood” to announce the start of the service, and the congregation struggled to its feet.

“All rise,” muttered Edith. “The honorable rooster is about to crow.”

“Behave!” Bill whispered back. “This crowd might believe in stoning unbelievers.”

No one was paying any attention to them, though, because the Reverend Chevry Morgan had chosen that moment to make his grand entrance. A side door at the front of the room opened, and Chevry Morgan sauntered in, wearing an unmistakable smirk of satisfaction. Trailing behind him were two women. The dowdy, middle-aged one stared at the floor, and the ferret-faced teenager tossed her head and smiled at the crowd like a beauty-pageant contestant.

Bill craned his neck to get a better look at the man he thought of as the defendant. Even with his shiny pompadour hair, Chevry Morgan did not make it to six feet in height, but he was big-boned and burly, with a ruddy complexion and a toothy grin. He was wearing an old tweed sport jacket over a teal-blue work shirt and khaki pants. He had on a bolo tie. Bill decided that his own coat and tie probably qualified him to be a bishop in this laid- back crowd.

Morgan walked to the podium, threw back his head so that his dark hair whipped back from his face, and hoisted the microphone into the air as if he was displaying a trophy. “Hallelujah!” he shouted.

“Hallelujah!” the crowd roared back.

Bill was still watching the two Mrs. Morgans. They stood together for a moment on the left side of the podium; then the minister set the microphone back on its plastic stand and motioned for them to join him. As they stood on either side of him he took their hands and held them up, shouting “Hallelujah!” above a chorus of applause and whistles from the audience.

Edith began flipping through a hymnal. “Looking for airsickness bags,” she murmured in answer to Bill’s look of inquiry.

Bill turned his attention back to the family tableau at the altar. Donna Morgan looked mortified to be the center of such raucous attention. She kept her eyes fixed on the carpeted floor and tried to smile, wincing a little when her husband dropped her hand and wrapped his arm around her for a bear hug. Tanya Faith Morgan seemed much more at ease. She grinned out at the applauding darkness and stood up on tiptoes to give her husband a peck on the cheek. She was a scrawny sixteen-year-old, trying hard to appear grown-up with a sophisticated hairdo, a white sheath dress, and two-inch heels, but she certainly didn’t look like someone who had been sold into bondage. Bill wondered which of the people in the audience were her parents and how they really felt about the matter.

After a few more moments of applause, the congregation sat down, and Bill could see Donna and Tanya Faith making their way to front-row seats. Apparently, they sat together at the services. Now Chevry Morgan had the stage to himself, obviously the way he wanted it.

He stepped up to the podium and gripped it with both hands. His wide-legged stance reminded Bill of a rock star. “Good evening, believers!” he roared at the crowd.

Most of them hailed back. Bill took out his pen and a small notepad to take notes on Morgan’s sermon.

“Are you strong in the faith, tonight?”

A louder roar answered him.

“It’s not easy, you know,” he said, picking up the microphone as if he were about to break into song. “It’s not easy being a believer, when what you know is right differs from the opinion of the majority.”

There were murmurs of assent from the congregation.

“People don’t believe that we can speak with the tongues of angels when the spirit moves us. Don’t believe that I had a revelation from the Almighty.”

Bill heard Edith mutter, “Amen!”

“But I did,” said Chevry Morgan, raising his voice to preaching pitch. “The Lord told me that man wasn’t any different from the rest of His creatures. He said, ‘Chevry, look at the rooster. There’s one rooster strutting around that barnyard, being husband to a couple dozen hens. And there’s one stallion presiding over an entire herd of mares, is there not?’”

Edith snatched Bill’s pen, and wrote Animal Husbandry? on his notepad. Bill tried to look stern so that they would not both collapse into helpless laughter. They were a definite minority, though. The rest of the audience was murmuring encouragement to the florid man, who had loosened his tie in preparation for a real harangue.

“So the Lord told me that man was meant to live like the rest of His creations.”

Edith wrote: Outdoors? Eating raw meat?

“-He told me to take another wife, to show my faith in His teachings.” He strode away from the lectern to point dramatically at Tanya Faith. “Behold the woman!” He shouted. “A gift from God!”

Tanya Faith stood up and waved solemnly to the congregation. Chevry Morgan motioned for her to sit back down.

Speaking of thinking you are God’s gift… Edith scribbled hurriedly.

The minister bowed his head, and the room filled with an electric silence. Finally he raised his head, eyes closed, and intoned, “There are those who would persecute me for my faith, believers.” His eyes blazed open, and he began to pace back and forth in front of the lectern, still clutching the microphone. “There are those who would mock my divine revelation. They call me names and laugh at my belief. They try to shake the faith of my wife Donna, and to make her think that the Lord’s chosen way is wrong. They want to lock me away in a jail cell for what I believe. In America, neighbors! Religious persecution!”

There were murmurs of protest from the crowd. Somebody shouted, “Keep the faith!”

What if you’re a devout ax murderer, and the Lord told you to do it? Edith wrote on Bill’s notepad.

Bill wrote back: Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition.

MACPHERSON & HILL ATTORNEYS-AT-LAW DANVILLE , VIRGINIA

All right… I’m calm now. I can continue writing this letter as a mature, objective adult, who is adjusting gracefully to the fact that her dowdy and probably senile old mother has just decided in the twilight of her life that