Parishioner by Walter Mosley Read Free Book Online

Xavier said.
    “Excuse me?”
    “Everything’s fine, Dodo,” Sedra said. “Leave us alone, would you, dear?”
    “Are you okay?” Doris asked.
    “Fine. Fine. I just want to speak privately to Mr. Knowles.”
    “Noland,” Xavier corrected.
    “Yes,” Sedra agreed.
    “I’ll be in the den knitting,” Doris said, but she didn’t move.
    “Go on,” her aunt urged. “I’ll be just fine.”
    Niece and aunt exchanged glances.
    Xavier took a sip of the green cocktail to show that he wasn’t bothered by their concern. The drink was sweet, tart, and very strong.
    As he put the glass down on the table Doris was leaving once more and Sedra tried to smile again.
    “I don’t know who you are,” the spinster said, “but I will not be threatened in my own house.”
    “I’m looking for the boy,” Xavier said easily. “I don’t care about you or Benol or anybody else. The Van Dams hired me to do the work that the police failed to do.”
    He considered taking another sip but decided against it. Drinking had its place but that wasn’t in the middle of a showdown between villains.
    “I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Sedra said in a metered tone that seemed to be saying, or at least meaning, something else.
    “All I have to do is give the police what I have,” he said. “Just give them your name and let the pieces fall where they will.”
    Sedra opened her mouth but no words came out. A confused look came over her face. This artificial expression, added to the sound of a deep bass gong going off in Xavier’s head, tipped him to the unspoken narrative of his predicament.
    He stood up suddenly and turned. Doris was standing there with a Louisville Slugger grasped in both hands.
    “Hit him!” Sedra yelled.
    Another deep vibration detonated behind Xavier’s eyes. He knew that he couldn’t avoid the young woman’s bat for too long and so he went on the offensive.
    The bat arced down, glancing off the left side of his head.
    “Hit him!” Sedra was screaming.
    He was aiming for her jaw, but Xavier’s fist hit Doris over the heart. She grunted in a decidedly unfeminine manner and fell on her bottom.
    When Xavier was stepping over her she grabbed at his ankle. If he hadn’t taken that sip her grip wouldn’t have fazed him. As it was he tripped, pulling away from her and staggering forward. He would have tumbled to the bricks if there weren’t a house there to catch his fall.
    Sedra was screaming without words now and the living room seemed even more menacing as he plunged ahead. He made it to the foyer and out the front door.
    Ecks felt clumsy. It was as if his body had somehow duplicated itself while neglecting to double the motor skills. He’d become two men with four legs but still could move only one foot at a time.
    “That wasn’t just no knockout powder,” the Ecks running behind himself said. “That girlwas trying to kill us with that drink.”
    The Parishioner almost turned around to catch a glimpse of himself muttering.
    “Run, fool!” the voice shouted, strangely echoing the desperation in Sedra’s screams.
    By then Xavier was in the front yard and on his way to the sidewalk. He knew that his car was somewhere near, but this intelligence was useless to him. He started running in one direction with all the strength his four spaghetti legs could muster. The world before his eyes was reduced to snatches of scenes like blurry snapshots taken from a speeding car—through a tinted window.
    He was running, almost falling, going straight ahead, away from people who were trying to destroy him. Xavier didn’t bother with any logic more complex than this. He didn’t worry about arrest or the discovery of his past. There was no later if he didn’t run right now.
    There arose a sound like music, like jazz … no, a car’s horn. There was a red light overhead, a hard shove, then someone, not Sedra or the other him, shouting. At that point gravity decided to take over and he