Hallowed Ground Read Online Free

bent down to pick it up and slipped it into his pocket.   It was a curious thing to do; he knew that even as he did it but something felt right about claiming the crow’s feather for his own.   Boone’s superstitions were wearing off on him.   He chuckled at that and pushed back the tent flaps.
    Strategically placed oil lamps lit the interior.   Four lines of two dozen wooden benches formed an arc around the central stage.   There was little in the way of ostentation about the set up, no painted banners or racks of medicinal compounds lined up to be purchased.   There was an upright piano off to one side and a central podium.   The sides of the stage were curtained off with thick drapes, the cloth backdrop adorned with a single simple cross dyed into it.
    He heard the bustle of movement behind the curtain.
    "Hello?" Creed walked down the central aisle toward the stage.   Shadow shapes flickered and danced along the cloth walls, matching pace with him.   For a moment the shadows seemed to form the silhouette of a vast black winged bird, then the light guttered and the illusion was broken.   Creed shivered, as though someone had walked across his grave.
    "Hello back there!" he called again. "I’m looking for the Deacon?"
    "And you've found him."
    The voice was soft and sibilant.   It was so close to his ear that he thought he felt the touch of hot, moist air on his skin.   Creed flinched, and then stiffened to mask his shock.   He reached up to tilt back the brim of his hat as he turned.
    "How can I help you?"
    The man Creed faced was tall and gaunt.   His suit was black and too heavy for the heat.   His white shirt was buttoned to the neck, and he wore a plain black bow tie that drooped beneath his collar like a dark, wilted flower.   His hair was long and dark, brushed back over his collar.   His eyes glittered like chips of grey glass.
    "I'm not sure you can," Creed answered slowly. "I dropped in out of curiosity."
    "About the state of your soul?" The Deacon asked.
    "About whether or not you've been in to see the sheriff about a permit to pitch camp here," Creed replied.   "You can’t just set up on any bit of land that strikes your fancy. That’s not how we do things in Rookwood.   There’s order.   Structure.   It’s how we survive.   If you’d come into town the mayor and the sheriff could have apportioned you and your people a pitch and worked out a fair rent for the land."
    "Ah, so it's about the money then?"
    Creed turned instinctively as another midget scurried out from behind the curtain. "Give us a moment, Longman," the Deacon said.   The midget nodded and scuttled off.   It was all Creed could do not to chuckle at the irony of the name.
    "It ain't up to me to say one way or the other what you do," he said.   "I'm just tellin ' you what they're likely to say in town."
    "How can I make amends for this rather inauspicious beginning to our – friendship ?"
    "Suppose you start by telling me why you're here?   If I knew that, I'd know what to tell you."
    "Blunt and to the point; I admire clarity in a man," the Deacon said. "We travel, reaching out to communities in need of the Lord’s Word, and the Lord’s Touch." The Deacon's hand moved instinctively, as though to form the cruciform across his chest, but lingered in the center, over his heart.
    "Tell me, I heard the tolling of a bell?   It is a sound to place a chill in the heart for it seldom augers good when it is rung in the middle of the morning.   This is no hour for a service."
    "We have no services.   Our preacher passed on over a year back."
    "There is no one to spread the Word?   To tend to the spiritual well being of the flock?   That is a tragedy in its own right.   And yet, still the bell tolled.   Has someone passed on?"
    "So it would seem." Creed replied. "I rode out early this morning; if they found someone dead, it