Westermann followed McIlvaine’s directions and found the church just outside town on a semipaved road that meandered up the side of the eastern hill. The church looked as if it might once have been some kind of storage facility: low, windowless, built for function not aesthetics. There was none of the architectural striving that even the humblest houses of worship in the City aspired to. Westermann parked his car between two pickups that showed the wear of hard years. The parking lot was little more than a patch of worn and yellowed grass. Westermann counted eight parked vehicles, none looking as if they had much life left.
He hesitated in front of the door, hearing muffled voices from within. Looking back toward his car, he saw the orange-tinged moon through a latticework of branches. He noticed for the first time the scream of thousands of crickets, like ringing in his ears. They were shockingly loud, and Westermann, maybe because he was at a church, thought vaguely of locust plagues. Headlights approached slowly; an ancient Ford pulled into the lot. The appearance of the car chased Westermann from his reluctance and he opened the door and entered the church.
His arrival attracted the attention of the congregation inside. Maybe fifteen or twenty people sat on folding chairs arranged in rows bisected by an aisle leading to a podium. A young woman in a formless summer dress sat between two children with wild red hair. Older women, several appallingly overweight, another two rail-thin and sinewy, sat in concentrated silence. There were older men, too, with feverish eyes, bodies hewn by a lifetime of manual labor. A plump, middle-aged man wearing a tan suit over a white shirt stood behind the podium. His wide baby’s face dwarfed the round, wireless glasses perched delicately on his nose. This man walked out from behind the podium and started down the aisle toward Westermann wearing a placid, benign smile.
“I don’t believe I know you, brother,” the man said, extending his hand.
Westermann took it, feeling tense with all these eyes on him.
“Pete West,” he said, not sure why he was lying.
“Brother West, welcome.” The man held Westermann’s hand in both of his. “I am Brother Allison. Welcome to our humble church.”
Westermann watched tiny streams of perspiration running down Allison’s temple, making a dark stain on his collar. Allison kept hold of Westermann’s hand until Westermann felt compelled to step back, the continuous physical contact making him uncomfortable. The air inside was stale and hot, smelled of sweat and something else—candles?—that seemed to seep into his pores, forcing drops of sweat to bud on his skin.
Westermann heard the door open behind him. Brother Allison looked over his shoulder, his face lighting up.
“The children have arrived,” he said, smiling.
Westermann turned to see two teenagers, probably brother and sister, both beautiful in a slightly unreal blond-haired, blue-eyed perfection. The boy had a crew cut and wore a plaid, short-sleeve shirt and jeans. His presumed sister’s blond hair cascaded down onto her shoulders and the straps of a white summer dress. Westermann noticed she was barefoot. The excitement among the rest of the crowd was palpable. The boy carried a guitar case.
“Brother West, please excuse me,” Allison said, and escorted the two teenagers to the podium. Westermann sat down in a folding chair in the same row as one of the obese women, who eyed him warily and nodded slightly, Westermann taking it as a reluctant welcome.
While the brother tuned his guitar, Westermann watched the other people in the audience, some staring blankly forward, others looking down at their clasped hands, mouthing what Westermann assumed were whispered prayers. The young mother spoke quietly to her two children, whose eyelids, Westermann now noticed, were drooping with fatigue. More people arrived, exchanged low greetings, taking seats behind Westermann.
He was far from the City.
Brother Allison grabbed the podium with both hands. “Now, I haven’t had to lead worship too often in the past, so you might have to bear with me a little. I stopped by Brother Symmes’s abode this evening and he told me that he was unable to make it tonight. He had another obligation and said that it was rare that he missed worship but that tonight he could not be here. So I am sorry that Brother Symmes is not here, but I believe that we will be in the Lord’s presence tonight anyway. Praise the Lord!”
The crowd responded by murmuring “Praise the Lord,” and Brother Allison stood with his head down, perhaps gathering himself.
“Well, what I think I’ll do is turn this over to Roger and Annie and let them play the Lord’s music for a while and see if we can call on the Holy Spirit to make his presence known. Praise God!”
The boy’s guitar sounded both hollow and vast coming out of the small amplifier. Westermann felt the rhythmic, pulsing chords in his chest. The people watched motionless, riveted, entranced. Westermann could feel the metronomic repetition of the music beginning to work on his mind, and he found himself staring at the boy. The golden siblings began singing in a harmony that was just off, but more beautiful for the imperfection. They finished one song, and without pausing, the boy altered the chords and the rhythm of his playing. Westermann registered the change with his chest and his ears, equally heartbroken by the passing of the first song and excited by the promise of the new. He watched the two of them sing, exquisite in their placidity, nearly motionless—their eyes sometimes shut and sometimes staring over everybody’s heads and into the distance. Westermann wondered what he would do once the music stopped, thinking it would be unbearably sad.
He looked around, saw that the music was catalyzing the room; individuals seemed to fall into private reverie. Two of the older woman sat with their hands flapping spastically, moving their mouths with manic energy, uttering inaudible words. Another old woman was up and swaying with the music, clutching a cross that hung from her neck on a leather string. Her eyes were clenched shut, tears flowed down her cheeks. Younger people—adults in their thirties or forties—were here now; the crowd grown to three dozen or more. When had they all arrived?
He pulled himself out of his chair and stood at the periphery, his breathing shallow. His shirt was wet with sweat. A middle-aged woman was on the floor behind the rows of chairs, shaking as another woman held her head in her lap and gently stroked her hair.
The song ended and the brother and sister took seats in the front row, watching Brother Allison at the podium, talking, soothing. With the music stopped, the sounds of the other worshippers became audible: intense whispers of prayers and shouts of “Praise the Lord” and “He is here” mixed with women speaking strange words at a crazed pace. The sound was disorienting. His ears began to hum as the sensory environment became overwhelming. And the heat. He found an empty chair and closed his eyes against the intensity of his surroundings, but the noises seemed only stranger, more intense; frightening and thrilling him. He lost himself, his mind emptying, and was almost surprised when he opened his eyes to find the church.
Many people were up now, wandering around, speaking to each other or to themselves. Westermann saw three women lying on the floor, repeating some semicoherent chant.
“I can feel the Lord’s presence, I surely can. Praise Jesus! I can feel him working in me.” Brother Allison made an awkward, jerking movement, like a record that had skipped, and then recovered himself. “Yes. Yes.” He raised his eyes in ecstasy. “I can feel the Holy Ghost filling this room. Praise God!”
The boy had his guitar again and was strumming chords. Trance music.
Brother Allison smiled at someone in the crowd. “You think it’s time, brother? Okay. Okay. Praise Jesus! Maybe, yeah.” He was looking for someone among the assembled. “Harvey, could you come forward and help me with the crates? Brother Wallace, are you here?”
The two men walked to the unlit back of the room. Westermann unbuttoned the front of his shirt, wiped his hand across his damp chest, pulled it away cold. He felt a new tension in the room as people redoubled the earnestness of their prayers; others hugged; and the boy continued to strum.
Brother Allison appeared with his hands above his head, and from each hand dangled two rattlesnakes. The snakes’ movements were somehow incongruous with the people in reverie, the angry rattling at once electric and menacing. A thin man with patchy brown hair limped behind Allison with a rattlesnake in each hand and another snake—no rattle—draped across his shoulders. Two younger women next to Westermann were speaking in tongues and shaking their heads manically; a huge man wearing mechanic’s coveralls was weeping into his hands. The guitar pulsed and the sister swayed, creating wordless sound designs with her angelic voice. Allison had his head cocked and was looking quizzically at one of the rattlers who probed the air with its tongue and rattled a menacing trill.
Westermann stood, transfixed by the serpents as they undulated and twisted on the two men’s arms. Harvey Wallace tossed a rattler through the air to a gaunt man with a port-wine stain that crept up his neck from under his flannel shirt like an encroaching tide. The man batted the snake three times on its head, sending the rattle into spasms. Two other men had each taken a snake from Allison, who stood with his arms out wide and his face to the ceiling while the two remaining snakes entwined his arms and wound past his neck. Westermann found himself walking forward toward Allison, the aural chaos seeming to crescendo—tongues, prayer, the girl’s wordless singing, the rattles—all tethered by the hypnotic rhythm of the boy’s guitar. Westermann faced Allison, watching the snakes probe with their tongues around the man’s cherubic, sweating face. Allison opened his eyes abruptly and trapped Westermann’s with their intensity. Westermann held out both hands for a snake. Allison’s eyes widened.
Allison had to shout to be heard above the din. “You want the serpent?”
Westermann nodded. His knees shook. Sweat poured down his face.
He was so close that he caught the sweet, damp smell of the snakes.
“Are you good with the Lord?” Allison shouted.
Westermann stood mute, knowing the answer, wishing it were not true, his heart hammering.
“Are you good with the Lord, Brother West?” Allison repeated, his dank breath lingering in the air. The longer of the two rattlers—maybe five feet long, brown and gold, with a broad head the size of a child’s fist—was in striking distance of Westermann. Westermann stared at the snake as it pierced the air with its tongue in flickering jabs. He felt himself sway.
Allison said something; probably asking again if Westermann was right with the Lord. He took a backward step and another and then fled into the cool night.