Crimson Need
A Novel of Vampires from the Dark Side
by Andy Nunez

Prologue

It Begins—the Prophetess

Darkness had completely enveloped Mary Copeland’s house.  She carefully removed her powder blue suit and pillbox hat with veil.  Her prayer meeting had been long and exhausting.  Next, she took off her white ruffled blouse.  It was stained with sweat and would need cleaning.  “Mom Mary”, as she was better known to her fellow church members, was a devout woman whose main excitement at the age of sixty-seven was the joy she experienced from her relationship with God.  She put on her night clothes, then sat in her favorite easy chair to read the Bible in order to relax before going to bed.

She opened the window a bit because it was getting stuffy in the oncoming summer weather.  Then she opened her leather-bound Bible to find a comforting passage.  As she did, a chill ran through her, emanating from the open window.  Her gauzy curtains rustled like restless snakes, and the pages of her Bible fluttered, causing her to struggle to hold them down.  The lights flickered, then went out for a few heartbeats before coming back on.  Mom Mary shut the window with a nervous quickness, then went back to her Bible.  She found it turned to the Book of Daniel, Seventh Chapter, Seventh Verse: “After this I saw in the night visions, and behold a fourth beast, dreadful and terrible, and strong exceedingly; and it had great iron teeth: it devoured and broke in pieces, and stamped the residue with the feet of it.”

Fear sent its chilling probes into her soul.  She looked up to God, pulse throbbing.

“The Beast is coming!”  She wailed.  “Dreadful and terrible!  Help us Lord!”

From somewhere in the dark thickness of the woods came the howl of an animal.  It was not the mournful howl of a dog, but the heralding call of a hungry predator, its stomach empty, warning its competition.  Mom Mary hurriedly checked all the doors and windows to make sure they were secure, then turned out the lights and went to bed.

Sleep eluded her.  She filled the scary voids between nightmares of stalking, red-eyed creatures by praying to God.  The Beast was coming.

CHAPTER ONE

Police Sergeant Junior Gale hadn’t puked in a long time, and certainly not since he had gotten this position after his stint as a deputy sheriff over in neighboring Somerset County, Maryland.  There, Junior had been a big fish in a little pond, and when he helped break the Miguel Ramirez case, dubbed the “Migrant Mutilator” by media hacks, he had also garnered enough notice to land a cushier berth in Salisbury’s larger, more efficient force.

Salisbury wasn’t a bad place in Junior’s opinion.  It was growing rapidly, but still kept its small-town charm.  Recently, it had earned its nickname: Hub of Delmarva.  Salisbury was a crossroads for all traffic, commercial, recreational, and criminal.  Luckily for Junior, though, criminal had, until now, not caught up with those other sorts, and big-city ills seldom plagued Salisburians.

Murder of course, was becoming more familiar.  Crimes of passion, they were usually called by a still unsophisticated local media.  A man found his wife in the arms of another, etc.—this was the usual case of murder on “the good old Eastern Shore.”

Dawn turned Salisbury’s cloudy sky ashen, shot through with orange and white streaks.  Occasional drizzle pelted Junior’s windshield, just enough to make him use his wipers and have them annoy him with their squeaking.  Added to the strobe effects of his warning lights, the situation was giving him a colossal headache.

Garbage men had discovered a body in an alley behind the medical center on Riverside.  Evidently it had been there a couple of hours, and Junior had been instructed to coordinate with the medical examiner upon his arrival at the scene.  An ambulance had also been dispatched.  He arrived to find all the pieces in place: an orange-striped white ambulance with another damn blinking light, and the M.E.’s car nearby, a beat-up 1980’s Chevy with oil dripping through worn-out gaskets.

Junior got out, slipped his nightstick into its loop and snatched up his Stetson.  He paused to check its rakish angle in his side mirror, then sauntered past the other vehicles and into the alley.  It was a narrow passage, sided not only by the medical center, but several abandoned waterfront warehouses that were home to colonies of rats, mice, and seagulls, not to mention their predators.  Junior had been here before, rousting out drunks and crack-heads.

The alley was still dim and shadow-draped, except for one pool of glaring white light projecting from a hand lantern held by an assistant to the medical examiner.  The M.E., Amos Gantry, knelt like a votary within that pool.  Beyond him, partially hidden by Gantry’s ample body, was the corpse.  From Junior’s vantage, it looked like a twisted wad of cloth.

Amos Gantry half-turned.  He was drawing the familiar chalk line around his discovery.

“Kinda reminds me of one of those sorcerers when they draw chalk figures and circles to call up devils and demons and such,” Junior said.

Amos grunted, but his jowly face didn’t change.  He had grizzled hair that matched his metallic eyes, flat and shiny.  He shoved his chalk into a wide coat pocket and wobbled to his feet.  His gangling assistant continued to bathe the corpse with light.

“Well, what do we have here?”  Junior asked.

“Take a real good look before I explain, so you’ll be sure and believe me.”

Junior stood beside Amos with hands on his wide hips and stared at the corpse.  It was a man, that was for sure, and somebody that looked like he could handle himself in a fight.  Junior wished he was in so good a shape.  Junior didn’t see any obvious marks on the corpse, and he didn’t see any blood or torn clothes.  Harsh lighting gave the body an even paler bleaching, so that its flesh looked paper white.  The man had been handsome in a rugged sort of way, with short, curly black hair over wide olive-tinted eyes.  His expression was what got to Junior the most.  The man’s face seemed permanently set with joy.

Junior shook his head.  “What can you tell me?”

“He’s been dead for about three hours, and he was killed right here by the car.”  Amos gestured at a black‘99 Dodge Prowler about twenty feet away.

“Nice set of wheels,” Junior said.  “Way out of my budget.”

He went over and glanced inside the car, admiring its many options.

Junior turned back to Amos.  “This doesn’t make sense.  It can’t be robbery.  Nobody would mug somebody and leave a car like this lying around.”

“His wallet is intact,” Amos said.  “This is a Mister Ian Carter.  Lives in a nice condo by the park.”

“That limits the jealous husband theory.  If he had a condo, he probably would have taken care of business there, or would have been caught at his lover’s bedchamber and killed there.  Cause of death?”  Junior looked around again.

“Loss of blood,” Amos said.

“I don’t see any.  You said he was killed here?”

“Oh, he died here, all right.  His footprints are perfect from his car to here.  I found a set of footprints coming from that warehouse to meet him.  I think they might be a woman’s, but I’m not sure.”

“Leave that stuff for forensics.  I’ll get their report later.  You explain to me how he could die of loss of blood and there not be any on him, or any wound that I can see.”

“Wound’s on his neck.  Look here.”

Amos stooped over the corpse and indicated its pale throat with a stubby forefinger.  Junior could see two tiny slits, as if somebody had made two incisions only an eighth of an inch long with a razor blade.  Junior removed his Stetson, smoothed back his uneven blonde hair and put his hat back in place.

“Okay, his throat was cut, right?” Junior asked.

“Well, technically his carotid artery was punctured and his blood was withdrawn, or at least enough of it to kill him.”

“You mean it was sucked out of him?”

“Possibly,” Amos said.

“That doesn’t make a damn bit of sense.  Next you’ll be telling me that Dracula’s loose in Salisbury.”

Amos said nothing, dropping his eyes back to the corpse.  Junior followed his gaze to the frozen look of satisfaction on the corpse’s face.  It made Junior shiver.

“He almost looks like he was happy about having his blood sucked out of him,” Junior said.

Amos coughed a couple of times and seemed to take an interest in his shoe-tips.  “He was happy.  Matter of fact, he was ecstatic.”

Amos then directed Junior’s direction to the corpse’s pants.  Dark against their khaki cotton fabric was a pear-shaped stain at the crotch.

“Looks like he pissed himself,” Junior said.

“Ain’t piss.  He had himself an orgasm.”

“Christ on the Cross.”

The thought of somebody having an orgasm while dying was too much for Junior to take.  He backed away and reeled along the warehouse’s sagging side and stopped at the river’s uneven pilings.  He gripped one of the galvanized-steel capped poles and looked into the gray, filmy water.  He found a choppy, colorless reflection staring back at him, as gray and cold-looking as the corpse in the alley.  Junior thought about the bizarre death of Ian Carter and then puked heartily into the Wicomico River’s turgid waters.

* * *

Beverly Dupree luxuriated in her marble tub, half-aware of the droning of a local newsperson that emitted from her wall-mounted television’s tiny speaker.  A heavy layer of sparkling foam half-concealed her lithe body, leaving only Beverly’s head and ivory shoulders to protrude.  Beverly was still tingling from her recent tryst.

Yes, it had been delicious, she considered, relishing the memories of his virile, piston-like style.  Coral-pink nipples suddenly began to ache with sensation at her reminiscing.  The sensation traveled down her body in sensuous waves making her squirm with delight.  Her hands and fingers wandered in response to the thrills racing through her.  Fantasies fluttered through her mind as her head lolled back dreamily.

What a stud!  She thought. Young, strong, handsome, and clean—what more could a girl want?  I must call him sometime.  What was his name?

“—Ian Carter,” the newsperson said, “a resident of Salisbury’s East Side.  No motive for the murder has been established, and the cause of death is said to have been loss of blood.”

Beverly bolted upright to stare at the tiny image behind its waterproof cover.  Behind the newsperson was a graphic with Ian’s face on it.  They cut next to video clips, a stretcher with a covered body was seen being loaded into an ambulance.  Beverly crossed her forearms over her proud breasts and clasped her shoulders.

A city policeman, identified on the screen as Sgt. Clark G. Gale, Jr., explained in a lower shore dialect the main points of the crime.  The facts, coupled with the video images, shocked Beverly.  She sat there dumbly for at least five minutes after the broadcast had moved on.

 Beverly grabbed at a huge purple towel and clambered out of her tub, absently pulling the gold-plated drain lever with her free hand, thinking  How could this have happened?  Why would Ian be so senselessly killed?  Kurt!   Beverly stopped her hurried dressing and stood with panties halfway past her knees.  Could it have been her husband of the last five years?  Impossible.  How could he have found out?

How?  He wasn’t home, didn’t come home last night until two hours after Ian had left (had died, she amended), and had comported himself with his usual cold, efficient manner.  Could he have found out, then murdered Ian, and been so composed that his deed was undetectable?  Was he that good an actor?  Was he really that cold?  He was in bed.  She would find out at dinner.

Kurt was to make a rare appearance just before sundown for dinner, then he was off to another business meeting.  Beverly would see at that time if she could break through his icy shell, to probe for a sign that he had murdered Ian.  Murdered him and drained him like one of his beef-cattle.

What if he intends to murder me, also?  She thought.

She fumbled around in her vanity drawer, and fished about until she found a bottle of Valium.

* * *

“You need some sleep,” Chief Drake said as Junior handed him the preliminary crime scene report. “Double shift will do that to you,” Junior said.  “You make up the schedule.”

Drake arched a bit at that.  “The necessities of policing this city make up the schedule.  Tell me what’s in this.  You know your handwriting is lousy.  You should have been a doctor.”

Junior quickly filled him in.  “Forensics should have something else later today.   I’ll check with them when I get back on shift tonight.  Maybe we’ll have some leads.  Right now, we have nothing but a corpse.”

Junior finished up at the station and got into his ‘89 Thunderbird.  He took Route 50 and headed east for his trailer, hoping along the way for some uninterrupted sleep when he got there.

Along the way, he saw a clearing across the highway from the new baseball stadium.  Usually, it was empty, but today, he saw a huge expanse of blue- and white-striped canvas bulging and flapping as a crew of men attempted to pull it into a tent shape.  Trucks ringed the proceedings, and Junior could see benches stacked up on their flat beds.  On one corner of the clearing, he saw a large white-painted sign, at least thirty feet high, being lettered by a man on a scaffold.

His wide brush had already filled in the words: Old Time Revival Meeting.  Reverend Evangeline Winston.  God’s Own Angel on Earth.  Junior shook his head, thinking that if she was an angel, then he had to be the Pope.  Then he berated himself for judging the woman without meeting her and drove on, hoping desperately that the killer would confess by the time he got up for the next shift.

* * *

Beverly Dupree cursed as her shaking right hand refused to make a clean stroke with her eyeliner.  Finally, she gave up and settled for a touch of blue eye shadow.   Then, she swabbed on some blush to her still pale cheeks.  Taking one last look at her exquisitely styled hair, she gave it an obligatory fluff.  Now dressed in a shimmering blue lounging outfit, she turned from her sallow mirror-image and trotted to the kitchen.

As she turned the last corner, her microwave solemnly beeped.  A smell of roasting beef filled her nostrils, and for an instant she forgot her trepidation.  Vegetables simmered in saucepans, and a bottle of wine sat chilling in an ice-filled chrome bucket.  Mechanically, she set the table, lit tapers in the silver candelabrum, and began to drain her saucepans.

Beverly then put out the vegetables in covered bowls.  Kurt had promised her he would be on time, but she knew from experience that it was better if she were prepared for a long wait.  Next, she removed the roast and put it on a large platter.  She covered this, also, getting another whiff before it disappeared.

Smells good.  I wish I could have roasted it longer, but Kurt enjoys his rare.

Lastly, she put out a pair of glasses.  Candlelight flickered in the smooth reflection of the crystal stemware as she set them down, and she felt she was ready.  Turning to the sink, she opened the drawer that contained her odd tools.

Kurt’s .38 revolver lay nestled there along with her Amazing Ginsu knife and her Ronco potato peeler.

She looked at it, as if it were some icon from which she would glean a blessing, but it remained what it was:  a black, innocuous and oddly shaped device which could deal death instantly and impersonally.  Hearing a key rattling in the front door, Beverly shut the drawer and Kurt’s revolver was again sentenced to dwell in darkness.

Hands clutched against the bar’s lip to prevent their shaking, Beverly waited in her bright, almost surrealistically lit kitchen.  After the front door was opened, she heard it being shut, then a crackling noise as Kurt undoubtedly put down his evening paper and briefcase.  His movements were otherwise silent, and he swung into view without warning.  Tube lighting made his hairless skull glow pinkly, and his mustache bristled like trimmed straw.

Beverly searched for some sign in his eyes, but she found annoyance in their blue depths, not hatred or loathing.  Moving from her stand at the bar she kissed him quickly upon his cheek.  During that instant she found his flesh cool, something that matched his demeanor.  His mustache twitched slightly as one corner of his thin-lipped mouth jerked upward in a half-smile.  Looking at her sideways, he turned on the tap and began to wash his hands.

“I have newspaper ink all over my hands, or I would hug you, my dear,” he told her in flat tones.  “You look very beautiful tonight, and your outfit is nice.  Could you hand me a towel?”

He pointed a dripping finger at the towel rack and she snatched up a towel, almost dropping it as she handed it to him.  She looked for any sign, any hint.  His gray business suit was impeccable, his shirt a good match.  His tie was well-knotted and his collar bar was not lopsided.  Even his shoes were highly polished and unscuffed!

Damn! she thought.  It’s like trying to analyze a statue.  Does he know or not?  Did he kill Ian, or did he hire someone?

Beverly uncovered the dishes and they sat down.  Kurt uncorked the wine bottle with ease and poured its sparkling contents with a steady hand.  Her heart fluttered as he took up the long carving knife.  She saw his glacial eyes reflected in its polished surface for an instant, then its blade plunged into the roast.  Kurt made several slices, then selected the pinkest ones from the center and placed them on his plate.

Beverly handed over hers in zombie fashion and he served up a pair of slices to her.  She dished up her own vegetables as did Kurt, and they ate in silence.  Kurt cleaned his plate, dabbed at his mouth with a napkin, and pushed back from the table slightly.

“You know, I am very upset,” he stated, picking up his glass and turning it in his hand to watch the bubbles detach and float upward.

Beverly’s chewing stopped abruptly, and her violet eyes snapped upward to stare at Kurt.  His annoyed look changed to one of perplexity.  Then he smiled a rare smile and released a short laugh.

“Oh, not with you, my darling!” he admitted quickly.  “It is probably you that should be upset with me, with all my meetings and lack of presence both at the dinner table and in the bedroom.  Still, I am upset, and it is with one who is very close to me.”

Beverly resumed her mastication, and began to allow herself to feel some relief.  Now, if only she could be sure he wasn’t lying.

“You know Frank Mabel; of course you do,” Kurt continued, taking a sip from his glass.  “I sent him to accomplish a very simple task for me, then report to me when he finished, and he has not even so much as called me to explain his lateness!  If he were not my right hand man, I would fire him.  Still, I will get an accounting from him, and he will not do such a thing to me again.”

“I’m sure he had a good reason, dear,” Beverly commented.  “Frank has been with you ten years, and that’s seven years longer than I have.  He’ll probably be waiting for you whenever you get to whatever plant you have to go to tonight.”

At her words, Kurt lifted his left arm and shot his cuff.  He glanced at his Rolex out of the corner of his eye while he drained his glass.  He shrugged his coat sleeve back down, and pushed farther away from the table and rose.

“Now, I really must be going,” he said.  “Always something pressing.  If I could do without any sleep at all, I still would not be able to complete all that would be necessary.  Perhaps I wronged you by marrying you.”

“Of course not,” Beverly said, standing also; and going to him, she put her arms about his neck.  She felt reassured by his strength, as if it were a measure of his love.  Then she released her hold and stepped back.  “If you were not so busy and successful, you would not be the man I admired and grew to love.  Can I talk you into coming home early tonight?”  She ran one hand lightly over his chest, slender fingers ever so teasingly brushing one of his nipples.

“Ah, well, I will see,” he said.  “I have much to do.”

“Well, you be careful.”  Her expression became serious.  “You heard about the murder?”

“No.”  Beverly saw no sign of anything except genuine curiosity.

“A man was killed by the warehouse down by the waterfront.  You know, the one behind the medical center.”

“What!”  Kurt’s blue eyes blossomed and his handsome face became a mixture of surprise and anger.   “You know, I pay too damn much for this townhouse to allow people to be murdered on my doorstep.  I am going to the manager and demand he increase the security around this building, or I will skin him and mount his hide on the wall.  Well, I will be late.  Goodbye, my darling.”  His sudden violence both thrilled and frightened her.

He kissed her quickly on her cheek and vanished with ghostlike silence back out the door.  Beverly stood for a moment, then looked at her glass and wondered if she would have to worry about dying if she took a Valium with her wine.

Well, it’s not him. She thought.   I’m convinced of it.  He seemed genuinely surprised and upset over the murder.  At least now I can sleep safely without worrying about him cutting my throat in the dark.

Still, if it wasn’t him, then who did kill Ian, and why?

Trembling again, she decided to risk the wine/Valium combination.

* * *

“Glad I caught you at home.”  It was Chief Drake calling.

“You woke me up, Chief,” Junior said.  “What’s up?”

If Junior had expected Drake to apologize, he didn’t.  “I know you aren’t due to come on yet, but I got a little work for you.”

“That’s a paradox.  I can’t be off and work at the same time.”

“You’ve been off as long as I’ve known you.  Did you have plans, or something?”

“Well, yeah.”  Junior didn’t, but Drake didn’t know that.

“Too bad.  Cancel them.  I want you to do a little bit of undercover work for me,” Drake said.

The son of a bitch knows that I want to make detective, so he dangles a carrot I can’t refuse.  Sneaky bastard.  “What kind of undercover work, and why can’t the regular detectives handle it?”

“They’re busy doing important stuff like vice and dope.  All I want you to do is go get a little religion.”

“The hell you say.”  Junior sat up, taking a glance at his clock radio.  The LED readout said it was just past six.  He had been asleep for less than three hours.

“I got a call from Kurt Dupree just now,” Drake said.

“The beef baron himself?”  That name spelled trouble.  Dupree was the richest man in Salisbury, maybe the whole lower shore.

Drake’s nasal voice took on a bothered tone.  “He said that he sent his right hand man, Frank Mabel, over to that camp meeting that’s being set up east of town, and that Mabel didn’t come back.”

“Maybe he got transmogrified, or whatever, and he’s upstairs listening to top-forty harp music,” Junior said.

“Do you want this job?”  Drake sounded edgy now, for sure, and Junior decided not to dick around with him any longer.

“Yessir.  I get the idea you want me to go over to the revival and snoop around.”  This is just what I need, an unsolved murder, a missing beef executive, and a full bladder.  Life is so wonderful.

“Don’t be too nosy.  I mean, he’s only been missing a couple of hours, but Dupree’s riding my ass, and I don’t have to remind you how much pull he’s got in this town.”

“Okay, Chief.  I’ve seen Mabel’s picture in the papers enough to know what he looks like.  I’ll mosey on over there and see what I can dig up, that is, if I don’t fall asleep.”

“You won’t,” Drake said.  “From her flyers, this lady preacher is mighty good-looking.  Besides, you need to get some religion in your ugly ass.  You think too much about women, and they are the sure road to hell, my boy.”

Junior grimaced.  “How about skipping the sermon?  I’m going to have to listen to enough holy-rolling tonight while they are pawing for my donation.”

“You just find Mabel—if he’s there,” Drake said.

“No sweat, Chief.”

* * *

Junior Gale was wide awake now, thanks to a cold shower and some hot coffee he had picked up at a convenience store near Walston Switch.  He was outside the huge revival tent now, feeling like a salmon swimming in a human tide to spawn, or a lemming on his way to a cliff, he wasn’t sure which.

Pretty young ladies in their early twenties flanked the entrance, smiling while they diligently handed out programs.  On his left was a brunette, while on his right was a platinum blonde.  Junior glanced back at the brunette and found his gaze met by her own.  Her emerald eyes were large, and she hastily looked away.

Shy are we?  Or perhaps we feel the temptation of Satan tugging at us?  Maybe this won’t be a total waste of time after all.

Junior shuffled slightly left, drinking in the woman’s well-proportioned figure.  She was dressed in a simple shift, enhanced only by a wide white collar with lace trim.  Very little of her bosom was revealed about that pristine rim, and what was appeared to be of a smooth, ivory color.  Her light brown hair was spread halfway down her back like a broom, and it was styled with a series of tight waves about three-quarters down its length.

Junior was beside her, and she did not look away this time, baring her even white teeth.  Junior returned her smile with a good-natured grin.

“Good evening, brother,” she said, holding forth a pink handout from her pile.

“Good evening.  I’m afraid I can’t call you sister, because I can’t bring myself to think of you quite that way, miss.  Besides, you’re way too pretty to be any kin of mine.  I’m Junior

Gale.”  He took the program and nodded.

“Melody Freeman.  Brother.  It’s never too late to repent,” she said.

“I was about to give thanks for being here.  I hope I don’t have to repent the matter, at least not yet, anyway.”

“I sense mischief in you.  Now, you get on in there, before you miss your chance for salvation.”

“Verily, I feel enraptured, Miss Freeman, indeed I do.”

She slapped his arm with the remaining flyers.  “Get thee behind me, Satan.”  He noted, though, that she winked at him as he was propelled inside the tent.

Junior found the interior of the tent to be warm.  Beneath harsh, yellow lights, he found the benches he had seen earlier now arranged in three sections, movie theater style.  Raucous humanity crowded the benches, varicolored and multifaceted.  He moved among them to find a seat, noting that most were laughing and talking in nervous anticipation.  Junior snorted his derision and searched for a space near an aisle.  If the crowd started to roll on the sawdust- covered floor, Junior wanted a quick exit.

Bunch of gullible hicks.  Ain’t they had enough of these holier than thou direct conversers with God?  It didn’t take too many Jim Bakkers and Jimmy Swaggarts to convince me that the charismatic movement was in reality the cash and carry movement.  Well, where’s our Lady of the Golden Fleecers?

In front of him, the stage was empty, save for a heavily varnished wooden pulpit that fronted a purple velvet curtain.  Junior found his aisle seat and glanced at his flyer.  It contained the usual hype, and sported a nice pen and ink drawing of a pretty lady with black hair.  Junior wondered if this was God’s Own Angel on Earth.  He was wishing he was home with a cold beer snuggled up with Melody Freeman when a fanfare burst out from behind the velvet wall.

The curtain parted, causing Junior to remember one bit of scripture from his Sunday school days: “and, behold, the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom.”

A double row of men and women dressed in dazzling white robes filed out and took their places on either side of the stage.  Several individuals came out of entrances beside the stage and came forward to sit on some chairs placed at the foot of the stage, followed by a conductor, who reached the center and spread her arms until she looked angelic in her own way, white folds looking like wings.  She gestured, and the people on stage broke into a high-pitched chorus of “To God be the Glory.”

The choir fell silent after this, but the quiet was broken by a lot of coughing and foot-shuffling.  Just as Junior was beginning to become aware of how hard his bench’s seat was, the curtain parted again, and Junior got his first real vision of Reverend Evangeline Winston.

He gulped, eyes fast on her. She walked to her pulpit with the grace of a superb dancer, hips and shoulders undulating easily.  She was tall and her well-proportioned figure was accented by her softly shimmering robe, which was of a silvery-white silk.  None of her ivory flesh was revealed, save her delicate, long-fingered hands, and a swanlike throat that supported her narrow, high-cheeked face.

She held a Bible bound in cracked leather, so old that it was black.  She laid it down and opened it across her pulpit.  Her glossy black hair covered her like a hood as she bowed in a brief prayer.  She lifted her head to survey the crowd with a slow sweep of her steady gaze and cleared her throat quietly.  Junior realized he had stopped breathing.  A glance out of the corner of his eye confirmed that his bench-mates were equally awed.

“Brothers and sisters,” she began in a voice that billowed out from her soft form and carried to the tent’s back corners, “I look out upon your varied faces, the happy, the sad, the calm, and the troubled, and I see God’s hands holding you all.  Whatever your motivation for coming here, God shepherded you inside these walls, as surely as he led the Israelites through the wilderness with his burning column of fire and pillar of smoke.”

“Amen!” This outburst came from the choir and front ranks.  A few other muffled amens filtered to Junior’s ears as well from the rear.  His eyes were riveted on Evangeline Winston, his mind barely acknowledging his auditory input.  She smiled, and Junior saw nothing but love in her large gray eyes.

“Why you are here is no matter.  You are here, and God is here to meet you.  In the heathen days of free love and communes, when the hippies weren’t saying that God was dead, they were saying that God is love.  They were only half right, brothers and sisters, for not only is God love, but you, as God’s children, are love, as well.  Whatever sins you have committed, they can be cleansed by love.”

“Amen,” flashed through the audience, louder now.

“You look upon me—all of you, as if I am some sort of paragon of virtue, but I am only a human being, just like you.  I have sinned, as we all have sinned, but I am here to tell you that the blood of Jesus Christ can wash away all that sin, and replace it with love.  Yes, brothers and sisters—love.  Listen to the message, and not the messenger.  I am no better than the ass of Balaam, who tried to warn his High One that an angel was standing before him with a drawn sword.  He tried to keep Balaam from destruction, because he loved him.  I am trying to do the same thing, turn you from destruction because I love you all.  Look into my eyes and see the love that pours from them.”

Junior looked into that translucent gray fastness and found his heart turning as he saw love glowing and burning in Reverend Winston’s eyes.  He felt his sense of self slip away, letting the sharpness of his vision become soft.  A sudden wail brought him back.

“The Devil is among us.”

Junior turned to look.  Opposite him about twenty seats an elderly black woman raised up to her full, spindly height.  Arms outstretched and waving, her seamed face was turned up to the tent’s ceiling.  Junior wasn’t sure, but he thought it was the station’s secretary, Rose’s grandmother.  She screamed out again, features twisted in agony.

“The Devil is here.  Hungry for our souls.  The ravening Beast.  Drunk on the blood of saints.”  Her body began to sway in time to her arm waving.  Men dressed in white suits rushed out of the boiling crowd toward her.  Junior saw anger on their faces.

Reverend Winston’s voice rang out.  “Do her no harm.  She is right.  The devil is among us.  He waits at every turn.  Only one thing can defeat him, and that is love.”

Junior looked at the black lady again, and this time he was certain it was Grandmom Mary.  She let out one more soul-shredding wail and then collapsed.  The men seemed relieved, then approached her to pick her up and carried her out of the tent.

“Love,” Reverend Winston said.  “It is within each and every one of you.  My gift is to be able to touch your souls, to expand the love that is inside and expand it until it blots out evil.  Listen to my words.”

Junior listened to her words.  He couldn’t remember much about the rest of her sermon until she called for a collection.

“The ushers will pass among you now,” she said.  “Give, and it shall be given unto you, knock and it shall be opened unto you.  Let not your hearts be troubled by greed, because you are not giving to a person, or an institution, but to love.  Let the love that is in your hearts flow from your purses and billfolds.  Rejoice, as your tithes make straight the way of the Lord.”

“Amen,” broke from the ranks of benches, loud and sobbing.

That shimmering curtain parted, and from it came half a dozen men, each one bearing a deep pewter plate with a wide flanged lip.  Junior dismissed them with a glance.  They all had sappy grins on their faces as they passed their plates.  Junior thought it over, then tugged his worn wallet from his hip pocket and looked inside.

Chief Drake had better reimburse me for this wild goose chase. Still, she was pretty, just like he said.  Even her ass was better looking than Balaam’s, I bet.  Maybe I can catch Sister Freeman on my way out and entice her to have a religious experience with me.

He found a five dollar bill and held it folded between the first two fingers of his right hand.  When he felt the presence of an usher, he placed his five into the battered plate, then placed his hand on its rim to pass it along.  He glanced at the usher.  His smile froze on his face as he did so.

It was Frank Mabel.