Miss Julia Meets Her Match (4 page)

A smile crinkled his face, although there were a gracious plenty of wrinkles on it already. I couldn’t figure out his age, fiftyish maybe, or a little more, although I knew that hard work could age a man. But when he started talking, his words came out in the cadence of Lillian’s radio preachers. I moved back a step.

“The Lord has called me to proclaim his holy name, and he has led me right to your property. It’s near to town, it’s here to stay, it’s got room to spare. If I could only find the words to open up my vision to you, Mrs. Springer, why, you’d jump at the chance to be a part of what the Lord has put in my heart to do. I didn’t want to at first, I’ll be honest about it. I kept arguing with him, but he worked on my heart and since he’s the boss, I’m doing what he wants. The Lord’s working on your heart, too. I can see it in the kindness of your face.”

Lillian poked her head around the kitchen door, attracted by the sound of preaching so early in the morning.

“Mr. Dooley!” I said, right sharply. “I’m a businesswoman, not a charitable foundation, so don’t count on any trace of kindness you might see in my face. If you want to lease that property, I suggest you see my attorney, Binkie Enloe Bates, whose husband is Deputy Coleman Bates of the sheriff ’s department.” I always liked to make my connections clear, in case anyone was thinking of taking advantage of me.

He shifted from one foot to the other, giving off a whiff of woodsmoke, or maybe tobacco smoke. “Well, I might of got ahead of myself a little, begging your pardon, but I already had a lawyer draw up a lease agreement. Just to save time and trouble, you understand.” He reached into an inside pocket and pulled out two copies of a long, legal-size document. As he handed them to me, I recognized the wording of a standard lease, having seen many similar forms before.

“Now, see, Mrs. Springer,” Mr. Dooley went on, pointing with a thick finger, “I took the liberty of making it a five-year lease with options to extend. But I left some places for you to fill in, like the amount you’re willing to lease it for. I guess I might as well be honest and say I hope you’ll see your way clear to giving a Christian enterprise a little break on what you’ll take for it. But wait now.” He held up his hand as I opened my mouth to assure him that I wasn’t interested in giving breaks to any kind of enterprise, Christian or otherwise.

“I’m not here as a beggar,” he earnestly assured me. “I got good people supporting me, so if it’s not unreasonable, I can afford to pay a decent price. See, Mrs. Springer, the Lord’s laid this on my heart some few years ago, and I been making my plans and savin’ up for it.”

“Just what do you plan to do out there, Mr. Dooley? I need to know that before I sign anything.”

“I’m aiming to build a religious theme park, Mrs. Springer, one that’ll bring Christian folk from far and wide to walk where Jesus walked. And that’s what I’ll call it—it come to me one night in a dream—The Walk Where Jesus Walked Christian Theme Park. See, first off, you’ll come to the manger and it’ll be all set up with real animals and hay and so forth. Then there’ll be his earthly daddy’s carpenter’s shop in a real-live village. And a temple, which’ll be the hardest to set up right, seein’ as how I’m not right sure what it looked like. Then the streets of Jerusalem of course. One of the highlights is gonna be the cave where Lazarus was buried. Can’t you see it now, ma’am? The man who’ll play Jesus will yell, ‘Lazarus, come forth!’ and out he’ll come all wrapped up in his burial clothes. I’m thinking of having some kinda sulfur mixture in the cave with him, so all the folks’ll get the stench of the tomb, just like the Bible says. Then I’ll have the Lord fishing in a boat on the pond, and we’ll rig up something that’ll make a lot of lashing waves, with thunder booming out over the loudspeakers, so that folks’ll feel like they’re really there. Then we’ll have the hill called Golgotha with the three crosses and . . .”

“Don’t tell me you’re going to hang somebody!”

“Oh, no’m, not exactly, just tied up, with lots of fake blood running down. It’ll be like a outdoor play but, see, people can walk along the highways and byways that Jesus walked and pretend like it’s all happening in the present day. I tell you, Mrs. Springer, it’ll be just like being there, and, with your permission, I’m gonna put in some trailer hookups—it’s all there in the lease. That way, whole families can come and spend a day or two getting close to the Lord. We’re all living in trailers, ourselves, so it’d be mighty convenient for us, too.”

I stood and stared at him, wondering if the man had good sense. “You certainly have some expansive plans, Mr. Dooley.”

“Yessum, I do,” he said with evident pride. “But when you’re working for the King of Kings, you can afford to. Ask and it shall be given you, he says, and that’s what I’m doing. Coming here and asking you about leasing to us.”

“Well, I appreciate that, but my attorney usually makes these decisions for me,” I said, and watched his face fall.

He shuffled his mud-caked boots and said, “Then I thank you, ma’am, for hearing me out.” He reached for the lease in my hand. “Your property was our first choice, but there’s another tract that’ll probably do as well. I’ll run on and talk to that owner.”

I held on to the papers, not wanting to lose an eager lessee and the income he represented. “However, since you’ve already gone to the trouble,” I said, indicating the lease, “I don’t know that I have any objection. Especially since that land has been setting there doing nothing but costing me tax money.”

I took the copies of the lease to a table and looked them over carefully. “I assume the area you’ve mapped out here is correct? There’s a lot of undeveloped land out there, you know, and not all of it belongs to me. I hope you know which is which, because I sure don’t.”

“Oh, yes ma’am,” he said. “Walked it myself, from stake to stake, every step of the way. Now here’s what I hope you’ll let me have it for.” He wrote a figure down on a scrap of paper again taken from his pocket. I frowned at it and wrote another one beside it. After a little more back and forth, we came to an agreement that pleased me since it would cover the taxes and a little more. And I’d be getting some improvements on the land, although the way he was proposing to improve it wouldn’t have been my first choice.

I was, in fact, feeling quite pleased with how I was handling the negotiations. Business dealings were not all that complicated and difficult to understand, even if Binkie, and Wesley Lloyd before her, thought I needed my hand held before signing anything. This would prove I knew how to manage a simple lease agreement to my advantage.

“One other thing you might consider,” I said, as I signed and dated both copies of the lease and handed the pen to him for his signature. “What will the local churches think of this plan of yours? If you’re going to do any preaching out there, especially on Sundays, you might have a problem on your hands.”

“Oh, we’ll work with the locals, don’t worry about that. I already been going around to a lot of the churches in the county, letting them know what’s gonna come along and help fill their pews. We don’t aim to set up as a competition, ’cause we want to be a help and a support to all those who’re laboring in the Lord’s vineyard.”

“You keep saying
we,
Mr. Dooley. Who all is working with you?”

“A small group of brothers and a few sisters who’ve dedicated theirselves to taking the word of the Lord to those who need it, and we’ve got us a sponsor that’s behind us every step of the way. See, we could preach and we could hold revivals and we could have conferences, but when I had this dream of walking where Jesus walked, every one of us saw it was something that would be mighty special to a lot of folks. So we give up our jobs and set ourselves to making that dream come true.”

Then to my astonishment, he pulled out a wad of cash and peeled off enough hundred-dollar bills to cover the first six months. “Hope you don’t mind cash,” he said. “I like to pay as I go.”

“Why, not at all,” I murmured, taken aback at the curling bills he counted out in my hand.

“Well, Mr. Dooley, I wish you all the luck in the world,” I said, pleased to be doing business with a man who paid up front, but wondering how he expected to build the land of Galilee on twenty acres of scrub land. “I expect you’ll need it.”

He smiled broadly, so much so that his eyes squinched together. “The Lord provides, Mrs. Springer, as he’s proved time and time again. Now, I’ll let you get on with your day, and may the Lord bless and keep you for the good deed you done for us.” He folded his copy of the lease and put it in his pocket. Then he pulled his hood up before heading out into the rain again.

“Thank you, Mr. Dooley,” I responded, quite satisfied with the morning’s business. I figured that the property was so far out of town that I wouldn’t have to see whatever mishmash he erected on it. And if I could realize a little profit on land I wasn’t using anyway, then all the better.

I closed the door behind him and continued on my way to the kitchen.

“Lillian,” I said, as I headed for the coffee pot, patting Little Lloyd’s shoulder as I passed. “Looks as if this county’s going to get exactly what it’s been needing—another preacher with something to sell.”

I recognized the resonant voice as soon as I answered the phone a few days later.

“Miss Julia?”

“Why, Pastor Ledbetter, how nice to hear from you,” I said, bypassing the truth for the sake of good manners. The pastor was not known for keeping close contact with the members of his congregation, leaving visitation up to a group of designated pastoral helpers. So to hear directly from him usually meant big trouble somewhere.

“Miss Julia,” he went on, ignoring the pleasantries, “I wonder if you’d mind stepping across the street to my office. There’re a few matters I’d like to discuss with you.”

My word, I thought, had Pastor Ledbetter already heard of my dealings with Mr. Dooley and him hardly out of my house? Of course, I could name a number of other matters that might’ve prompted a telephone call, but I didn’t know what the pastor thought I had to do with them. That hadn’t stopped him in the past, however, for he and I had crossed words and swords several times before. I wasn’t all that eager to face another counseling session.

“Well, it’s raining out there again, pastor. Wouldn’t it be just as easy for you to come over here? Lillian has made some Russian tea that I know you’d enjoy.”

There was a pause as the phone line hummed between us. “I know I shouldn’t ask you to get out in this weather,” he finally said. “But this is a matter for privacy, and you have a lot of people in and out at your house.”

Oh, Lord, I thought to myself, he’s going to ask me about Norma, and what am I going to say? But then, that didn’t make sense, for Norma would be right outside his office door, which was not exactly conducive to privacy.

My word, what if it was about Emma Sue?

“I’ll be right over,” I said, hung up and went to get my raincoat and umbrella.

After braving another spring shower, I was glad to get inside the church building, but not so glad to see Norma behind her desk in the pastor’s outer office. For once, though, she didn’t give me the third degree about my presence. She busied herself at the computer, nodded toward the door to let me know I was expected, and barely had the courtesy to speak. Which suited me fine, for I couldn’t imagine carrying on a conversation with her while images I couldn’t control danced in my mind. The mayor, of all people. Why, the man was as arrogant as only a short, fat man can be. Who’d want him? But, as I’d long noted, there’s no accounting for taste.

I nodded my head back at her and went through to the pastor’s cherry-paneled office. He immediately stood and came around his desk to see me to one of the damask-covered wing chairs facing his desk.

“Thank you for coming, Miss Julia,” he said, as solicitous as if he needed funding to meet the budget projections. But the Every-Member-Canvass was months behind us, so I didn’t think it could be that. Besides, my pledge had been as generous as ever, so if he needed more he’d have to wrangle it out of somebody else.

I unbuttoned my coat as I settled in the visitor’s chair and watched as he took a seat in his leather executive chair.

“One of the matters I want to discuss,” he started, as he stacked some papers together and pushed them aside, “concerns this religious theme park that I understand you have something to do with.”

That surprised me so that I couldn’t help but laugh. “
I
have something to do with it? Not at all, pastor, other than leasing some unused land to them for the purpose of erecting it. You surely don’t think I’d be actively involved in such a scheme, do you? Theme parks, in general, are hardly my cup of tea.”

“That’s what I was led to believe,” he said, leaning back in his chair so that it swayed with the movement. “Although it certainly didn’t sound like something you’d be interested in.”

“Who led you to believe such a thing?”

“Ah, let me see.” He leaned forward and searched his desk for a notepad. “I wrote it down. The man didn’t have a card. Here it is, a Dwayne Dooley. He came to see me to let me know his plans for the theme park and to ask if I’d encourage my congregation to support it. Frankly, I’m somewhat skeptical of unorthodox groups, as you know. After we prayed together, though, I realized that at least Mr. Dooley’s heart is in the right place. But when he said that he was hoping for your help, I thought I’d better caution you. You don’t want to be too closely involved until you know exactly what they’re up to.”

“I had the same feeling,” I told him, marveling at the notion that he and I could see eye to eye on anything.

“Well, then,” he said, reaching for a pencil. He began tapping the eraser end on the desk, while studying the action with an intensity that it hardly warranted. Frowning, he said again, “Well, then. I guess there’s not much we can do to stop it. It’ll be outside the town limits, so no help from zoning restrictions. It’s just that I’d hate to see gullible Christians taken in by scam artists, if that’s what they are.”