Showdown (24 page)

She grabbed some
paper towels and wiped the blood from her chin, not bothering with the shirt for the moment. She had just broken into Claude's store, for heaven's sake. Getting out quickly wouldn't be such a stupid idea.

She snatched up some toilet paper and stuffed two little bullets of it into her nostrils. As long as the blood didn't flood her nasal cavities and drown her, she would be fine. The two red spikes sticking out of her nose didn't look too glamorous, but she was here for food, not a beauty contest.

Nancy hustled from the toilet and entered the store. The stocked shelves beckoned in the dim light. She smiled absently and scanned the goodies sitting faithfully in their little shiny wrappers.

So much food, so little time. Saliva began to gather in her jowls and she swallowed.

Nancy grabbed a bag from the counter and filled it with a single sweep of her arm. The paper sack tore and the goodies crashed to the floor. She swore and snatched up a plastic bag.

Nancy filled six of the bags before reluctantly deciding to retreat to the church to sort through her spoil. It had been a good trip.

She exited through the back without closing the door.

A good trip indeed.

WHILE NANCY was robbing Claude blind to feed her food lust, Katie waited impatiently in her beauty salon, fixing her hair, dreaming of a rendezvous with the preacher. No, not the preacher—for her it was Marsuvees. To others he may be
the minister
or
the preacher
, but she had stepped past that point, gaining access to the inner man.

Marsuvees, darling, could you hand me my dress?

She had this effect on most if not all men, of course. They all wanted her. And she never blamed a single one of them. If she'd been born male, she too would choose a woman with her body rather than one of those pudges like Paula.

Now there was a case. Paula. She recalled an image of Claude sitting in the third pew once, ogling Paula as she gave her annual Sunday-school report. She knew he'd been ogling and not just looking because when she elbowed him he jerked his eyes from the woman—guilty as sin. At the time, she thought the whole incident was rather silly.

But sometime between then and now, the memory had soured in her mind like week-old milk. Not that she cared much whether Claude eyed a woman or two now and then. But she just couldn't believe that he found Paula sexy, of all women. She was the Sunday-school coordinator, for goodness' sake, and you couldn't play Sunday-school coordinator and strut your stuff up there while talking about how many kids were participating in the Easter play. Sunday school and sexy didn't mix.

Katie glanced at her watch. One thirty. Marsuvees said he would meet her here at one.

Wanna trip like I do, Katie? Wanna trip with me?

His words burned in her ears. She closed her eyes and leaned against the wall, savoring the heat. The door opened and she jerked off the wall. She softened her look, cocked her head just a tad, and turned to the front.

Paula stood in the door frame, frowning. Katie's heart fell and she dropped the kiss-me look.

“What in blazes are you doing here?” she demanded, surprised at the revulsion that ripped through her throat. The white strip in the pudge's hair looked ridiculous!

“What am I doing here? What are you yelling at me for?”

“I'm not yelling at you. I'm just asking you what you're doing here. Last time I checked this shop did have my name on it. What do you want?”

Katie grabbed a pack of smokes from the counter and lit one up. Paula's response was coming slow. Marsuvees could show up at any moment, and she certainly didn't want Goody Two-shoes standing here looking so prissy when he walked in.

She blew a smoke ring. “So?”

Paula rested a hand on her waist and cocked her hips. “So I'll be leaving, that's what's
so.
Have you seen Marsuvees?”

Marsuvees? Not
the preacher
or
the minister
, but
Marsuvees
?

Katie raised an eyebrow. “Marsuvees? We're calling him Marsuvees now, are we?” She noticed Paula's black skirt and wondered when Miss Pudge had taken up wearing tight, short skirts. Certainly not while planning Sunday-school lessons.

“So what if I am?”

Heat began to warm Katie's face. A sickening heat, the kind that sometimes builds to fury. But there was no way Marsuvees and Paula were anything like her and Marsuvees. Not intimate and close and ready to take things to the moon.

“You're on a first-name basis with the preacher now? I'll bet Steve would be tickled to hear that.”

Katie said it casually, with the intent of dousing any misplaced flames licking at Paula's heart, but she felt like jumping over there and sticking her cigarette into the woman's eyes.

Ordinarily the veiled threat would have earned a gasp of feigned disapproval. Maybe an about-face and a grand exit as an encore for good measure.

Ordinarily.

Things weren't so ordinary in Paradise these days.

Paula lowered her head like a cat intent on guarding her territory. “Stuff it, Katie! You think you're such a hot number? I've got news for you, honey. You're not the only one men find attractive around here. Just because Marsuvees has the hots for me doesn't mean you have to play jealous bimbo, you slug!”

Katie felt her jaw fall, as though someone had tied a ten-pound weight to her lower teeth and shoved it from her mouth. She was having difficulty understanding all of Paula's words, but a few were crystal clear.

Like
slug
.

Paula was calling her a slug and claiming to be having something in the works with Marsuvees in the same breath. She was lying through her teeth, of course. Marsuvees would never lay a hand on that squat tub, not when he knew he could have Katie any time he wanted. She'd made that abundantly clear to him.

“In your wildest fantasy. Marsuvees can't keep his eyes off me. And you have the gall to come into
my
shop and talk about
my
man that way? I oughta rip your tongue from your throat, you Neanderthal!”

She wanted nothing more than to do just that, maybe rip that head off while she was at it. She stuffed the cigarette between her lips and sucked hard.

Paula's face was turning beet red, and a thought dawned on Katie.
She
means it. She's actually got something going with Black!

“It may be your shop,” Paula said, “but Marsuvees told me to meet him here at one thirty.”

“In your dreams!”

“And it ain't the first time we've met, honey doll.”

Katie launched herself at Paula, who took the rush head-on. They met in the center of the tiny shop, fingernails extended. Both managed to draw blood on the first pass—Katie from Paula's right shoulder, and Paula from Katie's left cheek. They attacked again, yowling like cats in heat, flailing their arms.

Within the space of thirty seconds both women looked like the victims of gang violence. The last thing Paula did was clamp her bony fist around a lock of Katie's strawberry hair and yank it cleanly from her skull before running, screaming for the door, her prize flying from her hand like a captured flag.

Katie jerked a hand to her head and pulled it down, wet with blood.

“I'll kill you, you witch! I'll kill you if it's the last thing I do!”

She collapsed to the chair and grabbed her pack of smokes.

What a trip.

WHILE KATIE and Paula were fighting, Johnny was watching the marble on his dresser.

Just watching.

CHAPTER
EIGHTEEN

THE MONASTERY

Saturday morning

ACCORDING TO the rules of a debate, the official announcement detailing Billy's debate with Christine could not be made until the same morning. It was simply posted on the announcement board in the breakfast hall:

An Official Debate has been issued
and will be heard at
10:00 a.m. in the main lecture hall.
All students must be present.

The intention was to let the actual debate frame the challenge, rather than a string of endless debates that would surely erupt sooner if the announcement was posted. But it would have been virtually impossible to live in the monastery during the last twenty-four hours and not know what was afoot.

The teachers wore worried looks, and the student's questions about Billy, Darcy, and Paul were answered in oblique terms. Billy and Darcy weren't so guarded, and Friday evening the halls echoed with soft whispers. Samuel huddled with Tyler and Christine, twice in the library and once in Samuel's bedroom, late at night.

By morning, a strange silence had gripped Project Showdown.

Now the students hurried to the Hall of Truth, as they called the main lecture hall, armed with the understanding that something profound was about to alter their lives.

Samuel had questioned his father at length about the rules of debate, and the minute he stepped into the auditorium he saw they were being followed to the letter.

The room sloped like a theater to a large platform, accommodating long wooden pews that faced the stage. A single aisle divided the seating into two sections of fifteen pews each. Behind the stage, long maroon curtains hung from a domed ceiling, where indirect lighting cast a yellow hue throughout the room. Seven golden lamp stands stood on the platform, set in a semicircle behind ten high-back chairs. The overseers had seated themselves in the chairs. Two wood podiums, slightly angled toward each other, waited for the debaters. A single large chair was centered behind the podiums. His father's chair.

Samuel scanned the auditorium and took a deep breath. The monastery was about to see its first debate. More important, his father was about to watch Billy openly refute him in an attempt to undermine his life's aim. And by all Samuel could see, his father wasn't taking it well.

They spent an hour alone in his father's study the previous evening. He could still see his father's drawn face, often looking away, lost in deep thought.

“Don't worry, Father. Once Billy is brought to his senses, everything will change.”

His father smiled. “You know, you and Billy used to play together often when you were young. Billy was the mischievous one. He would sneak up behind you and stick a thin blade of grass in your ear and then run away, squealing. You always overtook him, of course; no one could ever run like you. You would end up rolling around laughing on the grass with him.”

“I'd forgotten,” Samuel said. “You're right. We were always together, weren't we? What happened?”

“Project Showdown happened. It's always been about this moment.”

They prayed for God's wisdom and above all the power of Christ to open the eyes of Billy's heart. But they both knew that the choice was Billy's alone.

Most of the children had taken their seats. They wore their customary uniforms—blue shorts and white shirts—most neatly groomed and giving the left side of the auditorium both a wide berth and numerous stares.

Darcy sat on the left, near the back, shifting on her pew. A red rash covered her face. Paul's as well. Stevie sat with them . . .

Stevie had gone down as well? So Billy had found three converts in just over one day. Samuel felt bumps rise on his neck. But the rules were clear—a two-thirds majority was required to prevail. Twenty-four students would have to vote against Christine for Billy's debate to succeed.

Samuel eased into a seat near the back, across the room from Darcy. Murmurs filled the hall. The monks whispered one to the other. Two dusty shafts of light descended from skylights, highlighting the podiums.

The curtain to the stage's left moved, and the room quieted. The heavy maroon cloth parted and his father walked into the light. Samuel's heart jumped at the sight.
That's my father! To them he is the director, but to me he
is Father.
He felt like standing up and yelling,
Hey, Billy, that's my father and
you'd better do what he says!

Of course that would be out of order, but Samuel let the pride swell unchecked.

David walked to the center of the platform wearing a long black robe with a white collar, like a schoolmaster might wear at graduation ceremonies. He looked over the children for a moment. Stillness descended on the auditorium. The overseers sat, rigid; the children stared at David, scarcely breathing. Samuel's father had the air of authority that insisted on stillness.

And then his father's voice filled the auditorium. He spoke without a microphone. None was required in the hall. “Good morning, scholars, teachers. Thank you for coming. As you know, we are gathered for a debate.”

He measured each of the students as he spoke, showing no visible reaction to the division in the class, but Samuel knew his father's heart was pained.

“This is our first debate. It's the first time a student has openly questioned my authority and rejected the rules. Some of you are wondering why we don't just put these dissidents out. Why not expel them, you ask? That's how it works in the world. When a man commits a crime, he is put away. When a child is disobedient, he is reprimanded. But here, we groom children not to follow the world's systems, but to change the world.”

He cleared his throat.“The power each of you wield is beyond your comprehension. Within this room we indeed have the power to turn this world upside down. It's a great dream I have given everything for.”

He raised a finger into the air. “But one rule of Project Showdown supersedes even that desire of mine, and that is the rule that you yourselves be given the complete freedom to choose your own ways. And this,my friends, brings us to today's debate.”

He paused and scanned the room. “Billy has questioned the integrity of the third rule and will now debate the matter with Christine. You, my young scholars, will decide today whose argument you will follow. Listen carefully. Remember your lessons well. Think of your purpose. Measure all that you hear against the standard of truth you have always known. The future of this monastery is in your hands.”