The Retaliation. Episode 10 - The Final Twist

WHAT YOU ARE ABOUT TO READ IS:

IRRELIGIOUS, IRREVERENT, AND IRRELEVANT.

THE PEOPLE, PLACES, AND EVENTS CONTAINED IN ST MUCKYMUCK ARE COMPLETELY FICTIONAL.  ANY AND ALL RESEMBLANCES TO REAL PEOPLE, REAL PLACES, AND/OR REAL EVENTS PAST, PRESENT, OR FUTURE IS PURELY COINCIDENTAL.  

IN FACT, ANY RESEMBLANCE TO ANYTHING AT ALL WILL BE REMARKABLY COINCIDENTAL.

 

Friday 27th November - The Chapter House at St Mochaoi's Church - 10.07am

Sister Gertie gently removed a battered, dog-eared envelope from inside her scapular  and held it up to her nose and inhaled the scent impregnated on it. It smelt of Hai Karate aftershave. It smelt unmistakably of......him. She was instantly transported back over half a century to a small village in Vladivostok....

She blushed as she gingerly opened the envelope and carefully removed the contents.  There were around a dozen photos and nine handwritten love letters, all well fingered but still legible and clear.

She looked at one of the slightly faded sepia photos of a very handsome, chunky young man, with white-blond hair and piercing blue eyes, dressed in the brown uniform of the Soviet Stalinjeune Brigade. He was wearing a tall, white, Cossack-style fur hat which vaguely resembled a papal mitre.

Gertie sighed heavily.

In the photo he had his arms around a young woman, aged no more than sixteen, wearing a knitted povena. The girl also wore a shawl around her head and covering her chin, reminiscent of a nun’s whipple.

They looked very much in love.

She allowed herself a little chuckle as she glanced through the other photos in the envelope. Each one more explicit than the last, telling the story of their torrid and forbidden love affair.

Sister Gertie turned over the last of the photographs. Written on the back in faded ink, in Russian, it said “Люблю тебя всем сердцем, всей душою” - “To Gertie, my darling Melons. Always yours with much love, Stumpy. ”

In a sudden fit of rage which she had repressed for fifty years, Gertie angrily tossed the photos at the gilt-edged framed portrait which hung on the wall of the Chapter House. It was a painting of a chunky elderly man with white hair, piercing blue eyes, wearing a white papal mitre which framed his craggy, yet still handsome face.  He had not changed a bit.

He was still her Stumpy.

To the rest of the world he was Pope Quivox LXXXVII.

Gertie clutched the photos to her chest and smiled serenely.  She had known for some time that the Lord had plans for her. Archbishop of Kilcathclyde?  Pah!

Next stop – The Papacy!

To be continued........

To what lengths will Gertie go to become Pope?

Will Emma find out about Gertie’s plans?

Have Tartuffo, McKivon and Big Fannie White really gone quietly?

Where is Snugglebum?

Did the drycleaners get the stain out of Tartuffo’s leather thong?

Tune in for more stories of betrayal, lust and blackmail – every day at St Muckymuck!

©2010 Steven Gorman.  All rights reserved.