Ties That Bind. Marie Bostwick
available candidates? Ted’s inspired comments on the qualities of a true minister made me think we shouldn’t rush this.” Miranda smiled sweetly. Ted ducked his head in a sort of “oh, it was nothing” way.
Abigail’s eyes darted from Miranda’s face, to Ted’s, and back to Miranda’s. “Is she flirting with him?” she whispered.
I shrugged. It was possible. Ted was a widower and Miranda was divorced. It was hard for me to imagine anyone being attracted to Ted romantically, but they say everybody is right for somebody—a rule that seems to apply to everyone but me.
“Miranda makes a good point,” Ted said, flashing a wide smile in her direction. “We could bring in a guest pastor over the holidays. Reverend Flatwell is avail—”
Ted was interrupted by a collective groan.
Floyd Flatwell is a retired minister who is always willing to fill in for a pastor who is sick or away on vacation. Before he’d retired from ministry, Floyd had retired from a career as a golfer. He never won a major tournament, but he had played on the professional circuit. If you’re looking for someone to preach for one Sunday, possibly two, Reverend Flatwell is a fine choice. But more than that? Uh-uh.
Four years previously the church gave Reverend Tucker a two-week trip to Israel as a gift to celebrate his fortieth year in ministry. He caught pneumonia on the flight home, so the congregation got to listen to Floyd Flatwell preach sermons about spiritual insights he’d gained on the links—lots of references to following through, keeping your eye on the ball, and heaven as the ultimate nineteenth hole—for four weeks in a row.
Abigail said what everyone else was thinking. “Absolutely not. We have more visitors on Christmas than on any other day of the year. Do you think a sermon comparing the journey of the three wise men to the rigors of tackling the back nine at Augusta—with descriptions of every hole—is going to convince them to come back?”
Glancing at Miranda, who was looking at her lap, Ted shifted his shoulders. “If that’s how everyone feels, we’d better look at the candidates on hand.” Ted picked up the first résumé and started telling us what we could have read for ourselves.
“Anthony Ferrari graduated from seminary last spring. He’s done volunteer work with at-risk youth and served as a chaplain for a police department in Worcester—”
Waldo Smitherton interrupted with a raspy bark. “Ferrari! Sounds like a pricey sports car. We don’t want a minister who drives a fancy car. Wouldn’t look right.”
“He doesn’t drive a Ferrari,” Ted said. “It’s his name. He’s of Italian descent.”
“What?” Waldo cupped his hand to his ear. “He climbed the Martian Crescent?”
Ted raised his voice a couple of notches. “He’s Italian!”
Waldo frowned. “I don’t know about that. My brother’s wife was Eye-talian. Nice girl, but too fertile. They had nine kids. Drove my brother to the poorhouse.”
Squinting his birdlike eyes, Waldo addressed the group. “We just spent good money repainting the parsonage. If some family with a buncha kids moves in there, we’ll have to redo the whole job. Is this fella married? How many children they got?”
“Four,” Ted admitted. “With another due to arrive in April.”
There was a murmuring among the group.
“Moving on,” Ted said wearily. “Philip A. Clarkson also graduated from seminary in the spring. He is forty and unmarried.”
Abigail kicked me under the table. “Unmarried,” she mouthed.
“Stop it,” I mouthed back, just as clearly.
“In addition to a Divinity degree,” Ted continued, “Reverend Clarkson has a Master of Social Work. He spent sixteen years working in the field, first in a home for senior citizens, then a rural hospital, and finally in a large metropolitan high school.”
“Philip A. Clarkson,” Deirdre mused. “He wouldn’t happen to be related to Philip R. Clarkson, would he? My sister is a member of his congregation in Boston, one of the largest churches in the denomination. He’s a wonderful speaker!”
Ted beamed. “Yes, I believe this is his son. My phone connection to Reverend Oswald was poor, but before we were cut off he said this is Reverend Clarkson’s only child. If he’s half the orator his father is, we’d be very fortunate to hire him.”
There were murmurs of approval as the board took in this information.
“It’s too bad we don’t have time to bring him in for an interview,” Miranda said. “But imagine! Having the son of such a famous pastor here in New Bern! I think Ted did an amazing job, finding such a well-qualified candidate in less than a day.”
Adam Kingsbury, who is in his fourth year of what was to be a two-year term as church treasurer, no one else being willing to take on the job, was chewing nervously on his thumbnail.
“Ted, we haven’t discussed finances. How are we going to get money to pay an additional salary? What about insurance?”
Ted held up his hands. “It’s all going to work out. We’ll be able to put our new pastor on the Conference’s insurance plan. As far as his salary,” Ted drew his bushy gray eyebrows together, “I think we’re going to have to put off plans for a new furnace.”
“Oh, no!”
“Not again! We barely got through last winter.”
“I know, but I don’t see another alternative. Do you?” Ted let his gaze rest on Abigail, who ignored him.
“That’s it, then. We’ll just have to make do with the old furnace and pray that God makes it last another year. Now,” he said, clasping his hands together, “it sounds like we’ve settled on our candidate. We just need someone to make a motion. Margot?”
I looked around at the others, surprised that Ted would call on me to make the motion and more than a little annoyed to see the wide smile on Abigail’s face. I knew what she was thinking, and I was having none of it. Single I am and single I will remain. I have accepted this, so why can’t everybody else?
I felt a kick under the table and jumped. Abigail, still smiling that irritating smile, tipped her head to one side, urging me to get on with it.
“I move that we call the Reverend Philip A. Clarkson as interim pastor of the New Bern Community Church.”
“Second!” Abigail chirped so loudly that she startled the again-dozing Waldo, who jerked his head up and shouted, “Aye!”
4
Margot
Abigail flipped down the visor and peered intently into the narrow mirror while she applied her lipstick. “Watch out for potholes, Margot. You’re making me smear it.”
I kept driving, keeping the wheel exactly where it was, saying nothing.
“I don’t see what you’re so upset about,” she said, running her fingernail around the edge of her lips. “All I did was suggest that you’d be the perfect person to welcome Reverend Clarkson. You’re so hospitable. Everyone knows that. Besides, you were the natural choice. Everyone else has families. They’re all busy getting ready for the holidays.”
“And I suppose I’m not!”
Abigail jerked in her seat, surprised by my outburst.
“Just because I’m single doesn’t mean I have nothing to do! And I do have a family! They’re all coming for Christmas! So I’ve got plenty of things on my plate already—especially since I’m single! I don’t have a husband to help me with the preparations. And I don’t have time to be a one-woman welcome wagon! And even if I did, you only volunteered me because you’re trying to set me up with the new minister.”
Abigail