Deacon King Kong(115)

It’s hard to say if the cheese, or Clemens and his Volkswagen, or Elefante’s presence caused more of a dustup in the church core group that stayed into the night, discussing matters, arguing and joking and regaling into the wee hours, accusing one another of the treachery of knowing Sportcoat’s whereabouts and the circumstances of his mysterious death. No one seemed to know. No one had ever seen anything like it before in the Cause. But at seven p.m., after the tables had been cleared, the dishes washed and the last of the cheese distributed, the church swept clean, and the remaining leftover moonflowers given away because there were so many, the outside neighbors peeled away, leaving only the hard-core souls of Five Ends Baptist: Sister Gee, Hot Sausage, Sister Bibb, and Bum-Bum, along with two visitors, Miss Izi and Soup. The last two were not church members but were allowed special attendance as representatives of their various institutions: Miss Izi as the newly elected president of the Puerto Rican Statehood Society, and Soup, who no longer went by the name Soup but rather carried the moniker Rick X, a proud member of the Nation of Islam and also the top seller in the Brooklyn Mosque #34 sales division, having sold the most bean pies and newspapers in that mosque’s storied history. He was also wanted in Kansas for false imprisonment related to a domestic squabble and robbery, but that, he assured the group, was a long story.

The six talked late into the night.

The conversation danced up and down, draping the walls with conjecture as they pushed various theories into play, then oblivion, and then back again. Where did Sportcoat go for the last fourteen months? Did Sportcoat drink at the end? How did he die? Why did the Elephant show up? And where did all that cheese come from?

The cheese business burned them most of all. “After all these years,” Miss Izi said. “Nobody still knows. That’s just stupid.”

“I grabbed the driver of the truck,” Bum-Bum said proudly. “I saw the truck coming around three thirty and ran out and caught him before he pulled off. There were two of them. One had just got in the truck. The other one, the driver, was coming out of the church. I grabbed him by the arm before he could get in his truck. I asked him, ‘Who are you?’ He didn’t say much. He had an Italian accent. I think he was a gangster.”

“Why you say that?” Miss Izi asked.

“He had a lot of pockmarks on his face.”

“That’s nothing,” Miss Izi said. “That could be from learning to use a fork.”

That caused a flurry of laughter and comment.

No one seemed to know much more than that.

Then they turned the heat on Hot Sausage. For the better part of an hour, they grilled Sportcoat’s best friend. Hot Sausage pleaded ignorance. “The man went to jail,” he said. “It was in the paper.”

“It was not in the paper,” Miss Izi said. “The man was supposed to go to jail. He was supposed to go to trial. That was in the paper. Sportcoat didn’t go no place.”

“Well, he wasn’t here!” Sausage said.

“Where was he then?”

“What am I, a Ouija board? I don’t know,” Hot Sausage said. “The man is dead. He did a lot of good in his life. What you worried about?”

The argument sallied forth until midnight. Where did Sportcoat go? When was he sighted? No one seemed to know.

At last, around one a.m. they got up to leave, more dissatisfied than ever.

“After twenty years of guessing how the old coot would depart this world, this is too much,” Bum-Bum said, glaring at Sausage as she left. “I can’t stand it when somebody who got a reputation for blasting hot air suddenly grows cold when they know something you don’t.”

Hot Sausage paid her no mind. He was busy keeping an eye on Sister Bibb, his secret lover, who was making ready to leave. He had watched glumly for the last hour, waiting for the wink, the nod, the head shake, some sign that all was okay and that the coast would be clear to follow her home for a bit of humpty dumpty in Sportcoat’s honor. But Sister Bibb offered no sign. Instead, as the clock struck the hour, she grabbed her purse and made for the door. Then as she reached the door and silently turned the door handle, she nodded at him. Hot Sausage leaped to his feet, but Sister Gee put a hand on his arm.

“Sausage, can you stay a minute? I need a private word.”

Sausage glanced at Sister Bibb, who was halfway out the door. “Do it have to be now?” he asked.

“Just a minute. It won’t take long.”

Sister Bibb, standing at the open door, moved her eyebrows up and down twice in a quick motion, which sent Sausage’s heart soaring, then he watched as she slipped out. He sank dejectedly into a folding chair.

Sister Gee stood before him, hands on her hips. Sausage looked up at her like a guilty puppy.

“All right. Out with it,” she said.

“Out with what?”

Sister Gee pulled another folding chair and sat backward on it facing him, her forearms pressed against the chair, her legs straddling it, her dress pushed down to cover her upper thighs. Her long brown face stared at his, and her bottom lip pressed against her lower teeth. She thought a moment, nodded slowly, then rocked back and forth calmly.

“Man is a curious creature, don’t you think?” she said casually.

Sausage looked at her suspiciously. “I reckon.”

She stopped rocking and leaned forward, smiling. Her smile was disarming, and Hot Sausage felt nervous.