One Was a Soldier by Julia Spencer-Fleming

Author:Julia Spencer-Fleming
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: St. Martin’s Press

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 7

Clare hadn’t taken a sleeping pill the night before, and she hadn’t had a nightmare, but she was still sodden with fatigue when she rolled out of bed at 6:30 A.M. for the 7:00 Eucharist. She debated taking an upper for twenty seconds before popping one in her mouth. By the time she closed the rectory door behind her, she was feeling bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, congratulating herself for making a smart choice.

She wrapped up the Eucharist in thirty-five minutes and was standing by the great double doors, bidding farewell to the communicants—all seven of them—when Russ wedged his way past Mrs. Mairs into the narthex.

“I didn’t expect to see you today. What are you doing here?” Clare asked.

Mrs. Mairs tittered. “Can’t wait to see the bride-to-be. That’s a good sign.”

Russ smiled patiently at the octogenarian before turning to Clare. “You said we had to go to the Stuyvesant Inn, remember? To okay the napkins or mints or whatever?”

Clare waited until the last of the congregation left the narthex. She kicked away the stand and let the heavy double-braced door glide slowly closed on its hydraulic hinges. “I said I have to go. I didn’t mean to drag you into this.” She headed up the aisle. Russ fell into step beside her. “If I hadn’t been sure my mother never would have spoken to me again, I would have just asked Julie McPartlin to do the deed in her office.” She opened the door to the hallway. “It’s still awfully tempting.”

He laughed. “You may be the only southern woman in existence who prefers elopements to white weddings.”

She went into the sacristy. “Me and every other clergywoman. Do you know how many weddings I’ve officiated at? And I haven’t been ordained five years yet.” She stripped her alb over her head and snapped it to get the wrinkles out. “Another five years and I’ll run screaming when I hear the opening strains of Pachelbel’s Canon.” She slid the alb onto a wooden hanger and replaced it in the closet. “Which reminds me. If you have any musical preferences, speak now or forever hold your peace, because Betsy Young has announced she and the choir will be providing the wedding music as a gift to us.” She removed the stole from around her neck, kissed it, and draped it over a padded dowel with the others.

“Hmn. I was thinking you could walk up the aisle to ‘She Drives Me Crazy.’”

She gave him a look.

“Then we could come back down to “Goody Two Shoes.’” He swiveled his hips in a surprisingly agile figure eight. “Don’t drink, don’t smoke, what do you do?”

“I drink.”

“Who says the song is about you?”

She shoved him. “I’ll tell Betsy we’d like ‘Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring’ and ‘Come Down, O Love Divine.’”

He laughed. “Chicken.”

She grabbed her keys and her coat from the hook inside the sacristy closet and ushered him out. “Seriously. You don’t have to do this. I know you’re flat out with Tally McNabb’s murder investigation.

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