“Can I help you?” he called into the dark entrance of the church as he rose from his chair, voice echoing back from the rafters.
“There was a sign outside,” came the hesitant reply.
“Ah yes, ‘futures given, demons driven, all your sins forgiven’,” he quoted the charming advert, though his voice faltered in the empty chamber. “You were right to enter when you read it.”
The Mariner stepped out of the dark and into the light cast by McConnell’s candles, exhausted and dazed. Smoke still rose from his clothes, despite them being quite cool.
“Is this a holy place?”
“Yes, yes it is. Do you like it? I built the structure myself. When I arrived in Sighisoara I found all the old churches destroyed and I said to myself, this must change. A place needs a mouthpiece through which to hear God’s word. Build a Church and write the book. So I did and so I am.”
“You are?”
“Writing a book.” McConnell indicated a large transcript laid out on a well-lit table. “It’s called the Shattered Testament.”
“What’s it about?”
“Everything,” McConnell smiled, the earnestness in his face betraying his youth, a vigour well hidden behind clipped beard, glasses and worry lines. Altogether his face seemed far too crowded for the slender skull on which it sat. “God, Jesus, good and evil. Have you heard of Jesus Haych Christ?”
Before an answer could be given, the Mariner swayed on his feet like a nudged bowling pin and crashed to the floor. McConnell ran over to him and after placing a hand under each arm, managed to hoist the larger man onto one of the pews. McConnell collapsed next to him, breathing deeply from the exertion. His visitor was a wreck, clothes stained and singed, dark red stains that could only be blood spread liberally about his body.
“You look like a cooked rat,” said McConnell. “I’ll get some food. Do me a favour and don’t steal anything.”
The Mariner opened a wry slit of an eye. “You think I’m a thief?”
“Bluntly? Yes. I think you’ve been a thief and many worse things. But that’s fine, we’ll get into that. First, do you understand that I can offer you something far more valuable than any object you can lay a finger upon within this church?”
The Mariner nodded.
“Good, I shall be back shortly.”
McConnell left the Mariner sitting alone in the large hall and dashed into his private kitchen. He gathered bread, cheese and a glass of wine. When he returned, the Mariner ate and drank greedily.
“Who are you?” he asked once the Mariner had finished the meagre meal.
“I don’t know. The doctor says I’ve forgotten because of problems in my past.”
“The doctor? You must mean Tetrazzini. You’re a patient of his?”
The Mariner confirmed whilst scooping up crumbs with his fingers and pouring them into his mouth.
“How, may I ask, is your treatment going?”
He thought for a moment, unsure. “I think it’s going well. He’s got some strange ideas.”
“That he has,” McConnell agreed. “I remember talking to him when he and his daughter first arrived. He specialises in addiction doesn’t he? Well I know a few things about addiction myself.”
“Like what?”
“Ginger biscuits,” he confessed, the mirth a tad too defensive. “They’re my sin and I indulge myself whenever I can. Sadly there isn’t much ginger spice left in Sighisoara so I’m having to wean myself off.”
The Mariner looked at the reverend blankly.
“I suppose that’s not funny to a recovering… drug addict?”
“Alcoholic.”
“Ah, of course. I see a lot of people come and go from Tetrazzini’s rehab centre. Do you want to know what they all have in common when they leave?”
“Sure.”
“They all have their symptoms cured, but not their illness. They are still desperately unhappy people.”
“Then I suppose you’re about to tell me that you can fight the illness?”
McConnell smiled at the cynical challenge. “No, but Jesus can.”
“I’ve already found one cure, I don’t need another.”
“Nonsense!” snapped McConnell. “You saw the sign and you entered. You could have easily gone to Tetrazzini, you can’t miss his place, just keep climbing up! No, instead you came here, because you know you need something else!”
The Mariner didn’t answer, but instead rose and walked to a small box jutting from the wall. It had a small slit with an arrow pointing inside. Next to it was a drawing of a pair of eyes. He had to stoop to look, but not by much.
Inside was an amateurish tableau of a man and a woman walking across a beach so wide that the sand stretched into the distant horizon. The wife was heavily pregnant and riding a donkey with her bearded husband leading the wretched beast by the nose. A placard beneath explained, ‘Joseph and Mary make their way to Bethlehem’.
“The birth of Jesus,” said McConnell. “I built the miniature theatre to tell the story. The box you’re looking through slides to the right.”
Still keeping his eyes level with the box, the Mariner slid it as instructed and the small wooden frame juddered along a fixed track. One tableau was replaced with another, this time the pair sitting in a wooden barn lined with straw whilst their loyal donkey watched on.
“It changed!”
“It’s a series of compartments arranged in order. Nothing has changed, you’re just moving the viewing piece along to see the next set-piece. I use it to tell the story of Jesus’ birth to children. I remembered how effective films were and wanted to recreate the effect.”
“Films?”
“Moving pictures.”
“Moving pictures?”
“Never-mind.”
The Mariner moved the box further, sliding it four foot across the wall, every six inches or so revealing a different scene from their hidden stage.
“Very clever,” he said, finished.
“You like that, huh?”
“I do. It was lucky that Father Christmas guy turned up and saved them from King Heron.”
McConnell nodded gravely. “Yes it was.”
The Mariner walked back to the pews and sat on the one in front of McConnell, staring at the focal point: an alter built from odd bits of wood and crafted about a central spherical stone. “I don’t know where to begin,” he whispered.
“Start with tonight. How did you arrive at my door?”
“I was warned my ship was the target of an arsonist; one of the patients at the rehab centre likes to burn things. I guess the Neptune was too big a temptation.”
“The Neptune? The ancient ship?”
“Yes, she’s mine.”
“You’re a lucky man, she’s a fine vessel. The largest I’ve seen since the Shattering.”
“The Shattering?”
“We’ll get to that. You say this woman was tempted by the Neptune. Surely if she was being treated for a compulsion to commit arson, she should be prevented from doing so? Watched at all times if necessary.”
“That’s not how Tetrazzini’s theory works. He encourages—” A puzzle-piece fell into place as he suddenly remembered the fire that introduced the doctor. “He believes in curing through medication rather than behaviour.”
“I see.” McConnell said, although it sounded as if he had severe reservations.