Murdering Ministers (6 page)

“But they had no alternative. Over time, those early communities grew into the churches we have today. Why start all over again? Doesn't this contribute to the further fragmentation of the Christian Church?”

Tapster idly picked up one of the wooden carvings on his desk, an ebony paca that looked alarmingly like the pictures of Finsbury in Oliver's books. “Are you familiar with homeopathy, Mr. Swithin? Heather became adept with homeopathic medicine in Brazil, it spared her from the tragedy of worms—a diet of worms, so to speak. As you may know, when you practice homeopathy, you dilute and dilute and dilute the toxin until, mathematically, there should be no molecule left of the original. And yet it works, because the
essence
of the substance is still there. I think we can apply this metaphor to the Christian Church. No matter how much we divide the church, the essence of God, which we call the Holy Spirit, will still surface among the fragments. Some of them, anyway,” he added slightly caustically. “I prefer to take my instruction directly from that essence rather than through self-appointed, self-interested intermediaries, such as priests and theologians.”

“Doesn't that make you an intermediary too? Why should the children of Plumley listen to your interpretation of God's will instead of the minister's?”

Oliver was despairing of finding any angle for his story. Could Tapster be trapped into denouncing Paul Piltdown, a man who, nominally at least, was supposed to be singing from the same Diaconalist hymnal?

“I have no quarrel with the church here in Plumley,” Tapster said cautiously. “By the grace of God, I'm standing as a deacon at tomorrow night's meeting. Heather plays the piano for the church services. Why would we do that if we wanted to create a barrier between the church and my fellowship? My desire is to do what I can to help the whole community find strength and comfort in the presence of the living God.”

“Does that include speaking in tongues, casting out demons, and the other activities that are rumored to take place here?” Oliver pressed. “These somewhat medieval practices don't seem to tie in with mainstream Diaconalist thought.” Although Oliver had wondered if demonic possession accounted for Dougie Dock. Tapster looked pained, as if disagreeing with Oliver caused bodily distress. He dropped the carving on his blotter.

“Pardon me, Mr. Swithin, but I don't possess the arrogance to dismiss these phenomena as medieval. As our Lord says, in the Gospel according to Mark, ‘These signs shall follow them that believe: In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues; they shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them.'”

Oliver started to interrupt, but Tapster held up a hand. “I know what you're going to say,” he declared, closing his eyes. “These evidences of spiritual activity can easily be confused with well-documented psychological phenomena. But to call something ‘glossolalia' rather than ‘speaking in tongues' doesn't alter the fact that it brings us the word of the Lord. Whether I drive out a demon or heal a dissociative disorder, it's still a miraculous cure, thanks be to God.”

Blast him
, thought Oliver,
he did know what I was going to say.
I bet he wouldn't be so sympathetic to modern psychology in front of his more impressionable acolytes.

“But these are children at your meetings, Nigel,” he riposted heatedly. “Susceptible children, easily convinced that they're in the presence of something transcendent when they may only be having an emotional reaction. Can you be sure you're not taking advantage of their innocence, inadvertently I'm sure? Why—”

“Why do you people always reject emotion?” Tapster interrupted suddenly, as if he had been waiting for the topic to arise. He had thrown himself forward in his seat and was now staring intently at Oliver. “Intelligence and common sense, though God-given, aren't always going to lead you back to Him. You may just have to stop thinking and let your emotions lead you instead, Oliver!”

Oliver was almost mesmerized by the intensity of Tapster's expression. Was this the moment when an enthralled teenager, trapped in that precise, seductive gaze, would be commanded to prophesy and would instantly find the nonsense syllables rising through her throat and babbling from her mouth, seemingly beyond her control?

And then what? More spiritual conjuring tricks, more vacuous arguments, more analysis of prophetic writings until the disciples were convinced—if they even needed to be—that across the vast landscape of Mankind's history, the truth about God had been revealed to only one human being, and by the strangest quirk of fate, they were fortunate enough to be in his charismatic presence? You are the chosen. Follow me, step into this world of unconditional love, and you'll never have the burden of exercising your free will again. Now win more disciples for me, leave your family, sleep with me, give me the money for another Rolls-Royce, but don't dare try to escape from us, from our community, from our fenced-off compound. For I am the way, I am the only way, and my obscure, simplistic banalities about the Light and the Force and Love are all you need to understand the Universe. And by the way, the Great Spaceship is just behind the next comet, ready to take us to our home world on the Planet Ultra. Now, cut off your balls and drink this drink. Don't worry that it tastes funny.

Oliver ran his tongue over suddenly dry lips. “I'm English,” he replied at last. “I try to keep my emotions out of everything.”

Tapster relaxed and laughed. “I can see I'm not going to win you to my point of view,” he said cheerily. “Not yet. But why don't you stay and worship with us? There's a group coming over tonight for fellowship and praise.”

But Oliver knew he needed to escape Tapster's presence. The brief interview had polarized his opinions: Tapster was either very genuine or very fraudulent indeed. If the former, Oliver had no quarrel—and, decidedly, no article. Every time he came close to losing all patience with organized religion—usually after reading about the private lives of American televangelists—he remembered the many, many people who had led exemplary lives of sacrifice, or even given up those lives, in the name of their God. Whatever he chose to believe or not believe for his own life, Oliver felt it was impolite to challenge another person's faith, and he refused to toss his tiny satirical pebbles at the vast bulk of Christianity for fear of hitting Dietrich Bonhoeffer or Mother Teresa.

But if Tapster was a humbug, and he could prove it, then a right good Ferreting would seem to be in order. Perhaps Paul Piltdown could be coaxed out of his diplomacy this evening?

As Oliver came down the stairs, he was surprised to see Paul waiting with Heather Tapster in the entrance hall. Heather glanced up at him and then hurried toward the kitchen. The occasional atonal rumble from the front room suggested that Billy Coppersmith had been left alone, and was testing his abilities on the piano.

“Ah, Oliver, good,” said Piltdown quickly. “I came back because I realized you wouldn't know how to get to the manse. I've been waiting to take you away.”

“You needn't have troubled yourself,” Tapster said with some surprise at seeing the minister. He had ducked into the bathroom after the meeting to wash off the traces of honey. “I'd have been happy to give Mr. Swithin directions.”

“No trouble, I assure you, Nigel,” Piltdown continued with a weak smile, his hand on the front door latch.

Oliver collected his coat, thanked Tapster politely for his hospitality—Heather did not return—and followed Piltdown through the front door. They set off at a brisk pace along the dimly lit Plumley streets.

“You seem pretty settled here,” Oliver commented as they passed a group of carol-singers gathered on a corner around a portable harmonium.

“Oh yes, I have a perfect record. Every couple I've married in the last three years is still married. And everybody I've buried is still dead.”

“Tell me about the United Diaconalist Church.”

“Well, as a separate religious group, the Diaconalists go all the way back to the English Reformation. We started as part of the Baptist movement, but the Diaconalists formed their own church in the early eighteenth century.”

“Why?”

“It was a protest against factionalism. Fifty years later, after an argument over the need for church unity, we divided into the General Diaconalists and the Reformed Diaconalists. But then a few years later, half of the Reformed Diaconalists—the New Reformed Diaconalists, that would be—united with the General Diaconalists to become—”

“The United Diaconalists. I see.”

“No, the Particular Diaconalists. We didn't become the United Diaconalists until earlier this century. That was when the Particulars—or, by then, the Reformed Particulars—joined up with the New Independent Diaconalists. They were an offshoot of the Strict Reformed Diaconalists, who were left over from the Reformed Diaconalists when the New Reformed Diaconalists split.”

“So the United Diaconalists are now everybody?”

“Well, there are still some members of the Strict Reformed Diaconalists who were not part of the Independent Diaconalist movement. All that's left of them is a family of evangelical nudists in Hartlepool. So I think you can say we're united.”

“Was it a hard transition from the Church of England?”

Piltdown chuckled. “I took quite a ribbing when I first came, because I was trailing clouds of Anglicanism. Apparently, my predecessor—who held the post for nearly twenty years—didn't wear any clerical garb and never once set foot in the pulpit, preferring to face the congregation at eye level.”

“So you use the pulpit to assert a higher authority?” Oliver asked.

“Actually, I use it so those ladies who habitually take the back pew can see me better.”

“Until you sit down.”

“True. But I'll let you into a secret. I can still see them, even when I'm out of their sight.”

“A periscope in the pulpit, Padre?”

“No, there are all these little fretwork holes cut into the pulpit's surround. If I position myself, I can survey the entire church and see which of my flock is yawning.”

They turned a corner, and Oliver could now see the pale bulk of the mid-Victorian church, squatting behind its low crumbling wall. Only the vaguely classical frontage was stone. The side walls were old, brown brick, which clearly needed repointing. The slate roof was also in poor repair.

“But don't get me wrong, Ollie,” Piltdown said, pausing in front of the church and looking critically at a wooden notice board, which stood in the shallow forecourt like a wayside shrine. “They're all good people. They make time to do good things. And I've got to admit, it's getting better for me here, too.”

Oliver observed that his friend used the phrase “good people” with more sincerity than when he had applied it to Nigel and Heather Tapster a few days earlier. As they walked on, Oliver spotted a figure waiting by the manse's garden gate—a girl or a young woman, well wrapped against the cold, with long red hair that flowed from under a dark beret. She was too far away to make out her features, and as she caught sight of the two men hurrying toward her, she turned and walked quickly in the opposite direction. If Piltdown noticed her, he didn't comment, and he unlocked the front door without speaking.

“This is a big place for one man, living alone,” Oliver commented, as he joined Piltdown in the manse's unenticing kitchen. He had been wandering through the ground floor rooms while his friend prepared some tea. “Do you have any help?”

“The church can barely afford an unmarried minister, let alone a housekeeper as well,” he said absently. “I manage all right on my own. Clergymen are supposed to have plenty of time on their hands for cooking and cleaning—we only work on Sundays, after all.”

Oliver saw that the dirty cups and plates from the previous Sunday were still waiting in the sink, supplemented now by several plates and breakfast bowls. Ignoring Piltdown's faint protests, Oliver filled a plastic washing-up bowl with water and added a generous amount of Fairy Liquid.

“No sign of someone to share your life?” he said, tossing a tea towel to Piltdown.

“Not unless you're still available,” said the minister, with a lopsided grin. “No, things are a little uneventful on the romance front. Just as well, given my vocation.”

“So the love that dare not speak its name…?”

“Had better hold its tongue as far as the Diaconalist Church is concerned. One whiff of my extracurricular interests and I'm out on the street. No, I'm applying my own ‘Don't ask, don't tell' policy.”

“Does it worry you to be alone?”

“I've accepted it for now. The old dog collar's a bit of a turn-off at the local disco, and there aren't many who'd look forward to being carried over this particular threshold.”

“So why did you step over it?” Oliver asked, handing Piltdown a slippery dish. “The last time I saw you, you were so keen on the Church of England that I thought of using my pocket money to buy you a pair of gaiters for Christmas. What's a nice vicar like you doing in a church like this? Especially given your preferences.”

Piltdown leaned against the kitchen table and adopted the same expression he had used when stalking through the church after his sermon.

“A man's spiritual journey lasts his lifetime,” he said. “I wanted a deeper knowledge of God than I could find in the tired rituals and dusty theology books. So I explored other denominations, found the stripped-down worship and plain man's faith of the United Diaconalist Church to my taste, and when I graduated from Cambridge three years ago, I immediately applied for the position here as minister.”

Oliver wiped his hands on a tea towel and tipped the soapy water from the bowl into the huge, square sink, where it seemed to want to stay for the night.