Beauty Queen by Patricia Nell Warren Read Free Book Online Page A

creakily, and his wrinkled face lit up with a big gold-toothed smile as he waved her in. At eighty-two Reverend Irving still had all his teeth—and, he was fond of reminding people, "all my marbles."
    Despite her shouted protests, he insisted on shuffling into the kitchen and making her a cup of tea. Then he sat back down and turned up his hearing aid. "Always turn it off when I write," he said. "Better concentration that way."
    Since Reverend Irving detested small talk, Jeannie came right to the point. She had made up her mind to get into politics again, she said. And she was going to launch her campaign by speaking out against the homosexual rights bill in New York City."
    I've campaigned against just about everything else," she said. "It's high time we put a stop to their progress. Believe it or not, Reverend Irving, they are making progress. It's hard to believe, but they are. Thirty cities and thirteen states now have laws like this."
    Reverend Irving was shaking his head. "Amazing that our lawmakers can be fooled by these people. But then they were fooled by Nixon, so I guess the pansies can fool them too."
    "I understand that they even have homosexual churches," said Jeannie. "I've been keeping a file on them all these years, so I know these things. The arrogance of it!"
    Reverend Irving had taken his bamboo cane in his knotted hand, and was pounding it on the floor, the way he always did when he started feeling the Word of God inside him. The thumps of the cane marked out the rhythm of the old, old words.
    "Know ye not," he intoned, "that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators {thump), nor idolators (thump), nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind (thump), nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God." Then he added, out of habit, "First Corinthians (thump), chapter six, verses nine and ten."
    Jeannie's shoulders slumped a little.
    "The discouraging thing is..she hesitated. "You know, I have campaigned against so many things, and I lost on a lot of them. Off-track betting. Try and take that away from New Yorkers. The lotteries. I worked myself to the bone on that one. New Yorkers are gamblers at heart. I had a little more luck with prostitution and massage parlors and pornography. But the forces of evil are very strong. You seize the films and the next day the theater is open again. The only area where I had any real effect, I think, was in child pornography."
    Reverend Irving was nodding.
    She went on. "New Yorkers seem to feel that, well, an adult can do what he pleases. But to use children like that ... people are disgusted by the very idea. They are protective of children where they won't be protective of themselves. And that's the key to the homosexual thing, too. Homosexuality survives because they initiate children into it. Keep the children away from them, and they will die. We could put a stop to homosexuality in this country, once and for all, if we cut them off from our children."
    Reverend Irving was still tapping with his cane.
    "How do you plan to proceed?" he said.
    "First of all, to defeat the homosexual rights bill. But that's only the beginning. Then bring back all the old laws. Make it illegal for homosexuals to appear on the street or in public places in women's dresses, or leather, or any of the other shocking costumes they wear. Make it a felony for consenting adults; give them twenty years the way they do in some other states. Make it life imprisonment for homosexual statutory rape. Make it explicitly illegal to hire them or rent housing to them, especially in situations where they will have contact with children. And so forth. New York is a bellwether state, so other states will follow. Carry my campaign to national TV if I have to."
    Her eyes were blazing as she rapped out the words.
    Reverend Irving was still tapping with his cane as he listened, as