More Tea, Vicar?

Mrs Branagh had a gift: The gift of being able to deceive. If one were able to see through this seemingly lovely 72-year-old lady’s concealment, one might be able to tell that, in fact, she was a bit of a sanctimonious prig at the best of times, but because she was an elderly lady – and head of the Church’s Mother’s Union – nobody felt the need to look beyond what they saw. What they saw was a dawdling old lady with an endless supply of top class scones and tea. However, Mrs Branagh was a lot darker and more manipulative than anyone could ever imagine.

The Parish had just enveloped a new vicar into its welcoming arms, and he was an instantaneous hit. A shy young man of about 27, Sebastian St. John-Smyth was thought to be the loveable eccentric that every Church required – he even wore a custom-made ‘jogging for Jesus’ t-shirt when out running or in the gym. He wanted to actively reach out to the district and organise social events for the youth of the community, thus keeping them off the streets.

And it was for these reasons that Mrs Branagh loathed him. The old vicar was quite the opposite – an 82-year-old man with a shockingly bad comb-over who was so boring that the Church’s congregation had actually started to play little paper games in amongst themselves whilst he was preaching (a popular game was ‘Armageddon-Outta-Here’ – the winner of which had to stand up and announce the arrival of the rapture and then proceed to run out of the building, screaming). He rarely took notice, of course, but continued to plough through his sermon without so much as acknowledging the presence of the congregation. That’s how a vicar should be.

Of course, most old ladies would just move Church or even write a letter to the diocese, asking for a new vicar (not that anything ever happened), but not Mrs Branagh. She decided to take matters into her own hands...

One Sunday morning, following the usual service, Mrs Branagh formulated a plan as to how to get rid of Sebastian St. John-Smyth once and for all. She approached him in her accustomed, pottering manner, “Vicar, dear. You are coming to this month’s Mother’s Union’s meeting, aren’t you?” she enquired, not really giving Sebastian the option of denying.

“Actually, Vera, I’ve organised a trip to the local ice-rink with some of the kids. I think it’s great that they live in a community where...” Mrs Branagh interrupted him with a wavering, croaking noise and put on her best distressed face. “...Then again,” Sebastian continued, “it’s important that all members of the congregation feel acknowledged... I could just get Sally to take them; I don’t really need to be there...”

“Oh, vicar – you are a star,” Vera beamed her crinkled smile before trundling out of the Church, leaving Sebastian standing alone, looking bemused and slightly puzzled.

*

Sebastian stood at Vera’s front door, bundled up in his cassock and surplice, and knocked twice, trotting on the spot slightly so as not to freeze to death. Mrs Branagh answered the door, allowing the vicar to gratefully enter the residence in which he would later breathe his last breath... but he didn’t know this of course.

“Would you like a scone, vicar?” Mrs Branagh asked, smirking silently at the arsenic she might’ve swapped for almonds. Nobody would notice. She followed the vicar into the living room where the Mother’s Union meeting was to be held.

“I’ll pass for now, thanks Vera. I had a heavy lunch.” the clergyman replied, patting his stomach lightly, “maybe later though...” he said, entering the floral kitchen where 3 other aged ladies were sat round the table, watching him cross the threshold of the room with their vacant, podgy eyes.

“Tea, vicar?” Ms. Fanthorpe, the closest lady, offered in her thick Yorkshire accent. When she was 20 – back in the Stone Age, so it seemed – Ms Fanthorpe had been a world-class hockey victor, infamous for knocking down adversaries as she charged, full steam ahead, towards the opposition’s goal. Unfortunately, the fear that she radiated to her enemies hadn’t quite worn off towards those she cared about, so Sebastian had no alternative but to accept the cup of tea, thanking her with a noise somewhere between a squeak and a sob. Mrs Branagh had an idea...

“Ms Fanthorpe,” she said slyly, “why don’t you offer our dear vicar one of the scones?” Ms Fanthorpe raised her thick, black eyebrows.

“What, now?” she asked, looking just slightly aghast. Clearly all of the old ladies were involved in Mrs Branagh’s plot.

“Yes, now.” Mrs Branagh hissed through gritted teeth, turning round so as to block the perplexed-looking cleric out of the conversation.

“Vera,” he began, “I just said, I had a heavy lunch... I’d actually like to talk about renovating the organ...?” Vera scowled silently at Ms Fanthorpe and slumped into the nearest chair, almost forgetting about her old-lady facade, but luckily, the young vicar hadn’t noticed.

“Right, so... the organ has been part of the Church since before Georgian England at least, so I vote that we...” Sebastian rambled on, not really aware of the alarmed glances that were being shot across the room by the 3 old ladies. Mrs Branagh, however seemed to be concentrating on every word that came out of the nervous young man’s mouth.

When the vicar had finished, about 5 minutes later, Mrs Branagh tried pressing her poisonous scones onto him once more before drastic measures needed to be taken.

“That organ renovating sounds like hard work... why, I’m hungry just thinking about it... aren’t you, vicar love?”

“Well, not really, but I know what you mean, Mrs B.” Sebastian said, smiling his boyish smile and absently sweeping his chestnut coloured hair away from his devastatingly blue eyes. How Mrs Branagh loathed him.

“Oh, vicar... I spent so long in the kitchen cooking... are you sure you don’t want just one before you leave?”

“I’ll tell you what, Vera,” Sebastian said chirpily, “I’ll take a couple home with me and eat them tonight for supper – how about that?”

“No!” Ms Fanthorpe exclaimed suddenly, “don’t do it, vicarage!”

Suddenly, the other 2 old ladies joined in, protesting that he’d so much as look at a scone until –

“Ladies, enough!” Mrs Branagh yelled over the noise, throwing her metaphorical mask to one side. “You would’ve thought that in today’s society, it’d be easy to give a vicar arsenic poisoning, but it’s proved to be harder than I thought,” she announced, fiercely leaping up, “especially when my allies are apparently against me...”

“Wait... arsenic poisoning?” Sebastian started.

“Shut it, you,” Mrs Branagh snapped. She walked over to the microwave, putting the remaining arsenic inside and setting the timer for 5 minutes. Mrs Branagh then left the kitchen, slamming and locking the door and proceeding to amble outside calmly for an ‘afternoon walk’, ignoring the screams and scratching coming from the kitchen door.

“Afternoon, Vera,” Nick the funeral director called from across the road.

“Oh, good afternoon, dearie,” she called back, beaming her usual crinkly smile.

“You look a bit flustered, love,” Nick said.

“I’m fine, my love. Just had the first Mother’s Union meeting – it went off with a bit of a bang...” As she said this, a mammoth explosion took place at the back of her house behind her.

“Oh my Lord!” the funeral director cried.

“Don’t worry about it, dear,” Mrs Branagh said casually, “Now, I have some funerals I need to arrange...”