God hates a coward, sonny
May 8, 2017 11:33:00 GMT -5
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Nathan Saniti, The Anarchist, and 2 more like this
Post by Grimm on May 8, 2017 11:33:00 GMT -5
The step was just a thick slab of rock. Briars wound around it, and across the threshold, but they unfurled to let him through. Phinehas stood inside the doorway to let his ancient ice-eyes adjust to the gloom. Wasps flitted about in a buzz when they weren’t tending to their paper nests. Their dauber cousins clung to their mud tunnels. All kept a respectful distance.
Phinehas Dillinger stood in the old church. A church built from wood harvested and milled in the surrounding hills. It rested on a foundation of unhewn stones pulled from creek beds, or turned over during the clearing for Hangtown and its outlying homesteads. It remained a building of the land, given freely from the land.
He walked to the right side of the church, to a middle pew, and eased down. The pews looked as if they would collapse at a touch, if not for the moss and vines holding them together. Phinehas pulled an old hymnal out of the back of the pew in front of him and thumbed through the pages. Dried and brittle, they flaked off and dusted his hands and his lap. A puff of old book smell hit him and then so did the memories.
Memories of those resting just outside in the churchyard, below the tombstones worn to an illegible patina by time and wind and rain. Then again, some things were more than just memories. The sap in the wood grains and the minerals in the stones had recorded moments of high tension, of high emotion – you should have been there for the revivals – and sometimes that stored energy could be released in a great awakening when those magnetic fields were adjusted just so.
Phinehas heard aspects of the residual. They did not frighten him. Nothing more than footsteps or faint voices. The “amen,” “preach it, brother,” click of a heel or stomp of a boot rising and swirling among the beams, before drifting down on him like manna.
But then there was one voice that was not so faint. A voice speaking of weights and measures. Snow and hail. Battle and war. Leviathan. Behemoth.
Thus spoke Brother Enoch.
They look for something to cling to. To fill up that big hole right in the center of them. They hide behind masks of their own design. Oh, you might fool your friends and your family. You might even fool yourself. But you won’t fool him.
Phinehas could see him, even now, there up front. Spectacled, in a button-up short-sleeved shirt, with his tie (in some shade of brown) all askew. Calm yet as intense as anyone Phinehas had ever seen. Sweating and pacing from one side of the sanctuary to the other. Preaching on one of a handful of subjects that he liked to visit over and over.
For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ, and shall deceive many…and Jesus answered and said unto them, Take heed that no man deceive you…for many false prophets shall rise.
These are the beginning of sorrows.
Some of the windows had been broken but no cross breeze cut the oppression of the river valley’s humidity. Fortunately, Phinehas felt the occasional kiss of wind from one of the old ladies waving a paper fan from Boneyfiddle Mortuary, or those with a folded-up bulletin. It wasn’t much but they made do. Enoch had always seemed to pay no mind to either hot or cold.
And then if any man shall say to you, Lo, here is Christ. Or, lo, he is there. Either way, don’t believe him. For false Christs and false prophets shall rise, and shall show signs and wonders to seduce, if it were possible, even the elect.
Even the elect (Well, hello there, Rick Majors)! One would think it would be easy to spot a charlatan spouting unclean spirits like so many toads spewing out of his mouth. If not, what hope did any of us have?
But even as disturbing as his proclamations could be, once Enoch found his rhythm he spoke like those age-old melodies coming down from the mountains. Phinehas tapped his foot along to the cadence of the pastor as he shifted gears to one of his favorite lists.
There shall not be found among you any one that uses divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch. Or a charmer, or a consulter with familiar spirits, or a wizard, or a necromancer. For all that do these things are an abomination unto the Lord, and because of these abominations the Lord your God will drive them out from before you.
It may seem like an odd topic to most, but this was Hangtown, after all. Don’t go consulting after wizards or their ilk, or, well, bad things would happen to you.
But what about Granny and Ruth, you ask? I’m glad you did. They’ve been provided special dispensation. You see…they’re Dillingers. They don’t use vain repetitions like those other heathens do. Those false diviners. They’re not like some, all full of subtleties and mischief and whatnot. Waving their fancy hats and walking sticks around like some dandy magician while they perverted everything right in the world.
Well. Anyway.
As disparate as the topics could be, Enoch strived to tie everything together. Regulars in the congregation could tell when the end of a sermon was near.
They provoke a disorder. They seduce and deceive. But their days are but a shadow, and their kingdoms are built on sand. The crows will feast on their flesh, and they’ll both be cast alive into that lake of fire. Nothing but sulfur and brimstone shall be their reward.
But don’t fret. Even the stones shall cry out to a power greater than those false prophets. Those sorcerers. Nature is party to all of our deals and decisions, and it has more votes, a longer memory, and a sterner sense of justice than we do.
At that, Phinehas was greeted with a full manifestation of the very reverend Enoch O’Connor. As he stood before him, Phinehas knew what was coming. Enoch took up a mason jar and unscrewed the lid. He tipped it up and helped himself to a swig of something clear and without odor. Phinehas would never forget the flicker of bitterness that passed over his face as he did so. And Phinehas muttered to himself. “If they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them.”
Enoch set down the jar and moved to reach into a wooden box, from which he pulled out two short, thick, ruddy snakes, one in each hand. He raised them overhead and Phinehas said, “They shall take up serpents.”
So once again Pastor Enoch choked down the strychnine. He presented the copperheads to his flock. Then, after he had put it all away, he placed his hands on the end of the pew and leaned into Phinehas’s face. He smelled of aftershave and stale coffee.
Ye shall beat swords into ploughshares.
But not yet.
God hates a coward, sonny.
Phinehas Dillinger stood in the old church. A church built from wood harvested and milled in the surrounding hills. It rested on a foundation of unhewn stones pulled from creek beds, or turned over during the clearing for Hangtown and its outlying homesteads. It remained a building of the land, given freely from the land.
He walked to the right side of the church, to a middle pew, and eased down. The pews looked as if they would collapse at a touch, if not for the moss and vines holding them together. Phinehas pulled an old hymnal out of the back of the pew in front of him and thumbed through the pages. Dried and brittle, they flaked off and dusted his hands and his lap. A puff of old book smell hit him and then so did the memories.
Memories of those resting just outside in the churchyard, below the tombstones worn to an illegible patina by time and wind and rain. Then again, some things were more than just memories. The sap in the wood grains and the minerals in the stones had recorded moments of high tension, of high emotion – you should have been there for the revivals – and sometimes that stored energy could be released in a great awakening when those magnetic fields were adjusted just so.
Phinehas heard aspects of the residual. They did not frighten him. Nothing more than footsteps or faint voices. The “amen,” “preach it, brother,” click of a heel or stomp of a boot rising and swirling among the beams, before drifting down on him like manna.
But then there was one voice that was not so faint. A voice speaking of weights and measures. Snow and hail. Battle and war. Leviathan. Behemoth.
Thus spoke Brother Enoch.
They look for something to cling to. To fill up that big hole right in the center of them. They hide behind masks of their own design. Oh, you might fool your friends and your family. You might even fool yourself. But you won’t fool him.
Phinehas could see him, even now, there up front. Spectacled, in a button-up short-sleeved shirt, with his tie (in some shade of brown) all askew. Calm yet as intense as anyone Phinehas had ever seen. Sweating and pacing from one side of the sanctuary to the other. Preaching on one of a handful of subjects that he liked to visit over and over.
For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ, and shall deceive many…and Jesus answered and said unto them, Take heed that no man deceive you…for many false prophets shall rise.
These are the beginning of sorrows.
Some of the windows had been broken but no cross breeze cut the oppression of the river valley’s humidity. Fortunately, Phinehas felt the occasional kiss of wind from one of the old ladies waving a paper fan from Boneyfiddle Mortuary, or those with a folded-up bulletin. It wasn’t much but they made do. Enoch had always seemed to pay no mind to either hot or cold.
And then if any man shall say to you, Lo, here is Christ. Or, lo, he is there. Either way, don’t believe him. For false Christs and false prophets shall rise, and shall show signs and wonders to seduce, if it were possible, even the elect.
Even the elect (Well, hello there, Rick Majors)! One would think it would be easy to spot a charlatan spouting unclean spirits like so many toads spewing out of his mouth. If not, what hope did any of us have?
But even as disturbing as his proclamations could be, once Enoch found his rhythm he spoke like those age-old melodies coming down from the mountains. Phinehas tapped his foot along to the cadence of the pastor as he shifted gears to one of his favorite lists.
There shall not be found among you any one that uses divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch. Or a charmer, or a consulter with familiar spirits, or a wizard, or a necromancer. For all that do these things are an abomination unto the Lord, and because of these abominations the Lord your God will drive them out from before you.
It may seem like an odd topic to most, but this was Hangtown, after all. Don’t go consulting after wizards or their ilk, or, well, bad things would happen to you.
But what about Granny and Ruth, you ask? I’m glad you did. They’ve been provided special dispensation. You see…they’re Dillingers. They don’t use vain repetitions like those other heathens do. Those false diviners. They’re not like some, all full of subtleties and mischief and whatnot. Waving their fancy hats and walking sticks around like some dandy magician while they perverted everything right in the world.
Well. Anyway.
As disparate as the topics could be, Enoch strived to tie everything together. Regulars in the congregation could tell when the end of a sermon was near.
They provoke a disorder. They seduce and deceive. But their days are but a shadow, and their kingdoms are built on sand. The crows will feast on their flesh, and they’ll both be cast alive into that lake of fire. Nothing but sulfur and brimstone shall be their reward.
But don’t fret. Even the stones shall cry out to a power greater than those false prophets. Those sorcerers. Nature is party to all of our deals and decisions, and it has more votes, a longer memory, and a sterner sense of justice than we do.
At that, Phinehas was greeted with a full manifestation of the very reverend Enoch O’Connor. As he stood before him, Phinehas knew what was coming. Enoch took up a mason jar and unscrewed the lid. He tipped it up and helped himself to a swig of something clear and without odor. Phinehas would never forget the flicker of bitterness that passed over his face as he did so. And Phinehas muttered to himself. “If they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them.”
Enoch set down the jar and moved to reach into a wooden box, from which he pulled out two short, thick, ruddy snakes, one in each hand. He raised them overhead and Phinehas said, “They shall take up serpents.”
So once again Pastor Enoch choked down the strychnine. He presented the copperheads to his flock. Then, after he had put it all away, he placed his hands on the end of the pew and leaned into Phinehas’s face. He smelled of aftershave and stale coffee.
Ye shall beat swords into ploughshares.
But not yet.
God hates a coward, sonny.
