Free Naked Came the Stranger by Penelope Ashe, Mike McGrady Page A

"You'll have to admit,
Joshua, you did fumble a bit."
    Another ring.
    "Joshua, you really have to leave."
    "How am I going to get out of here?"
    Gillian quickly charted the escape route. Down the stairs, into
the den, through the plate glass windows, onto the patio and out the
driveway. She would entertain the ladies in the dining room while he
made his escape. Even as she was explaining his retreat, Gillian
straightened the bedclothes with quick precise movements. Then she
climbed into a long, modest frock and, without once looking back at
her aspirant lover, left the room.
    Turnbull, eyes glazed, sat on the bed until the door clicked shut.
Then, still in a weakened condition, he managed to pull himself
together. He scrambled into his clothes and, carrying the
bloodstained bedspread under his arm, managed to creep out the back
way. Despite a narrow escape from a swimming pool waiting for him in
the night, the rabbi managed to find the driveway, then the road,
then his car. Seated painfully in the safety of his automobile, the
rabbi began to consider the entire evening. Was it possible? Was it
possible a woman could plan something like that? The invitation, the
ferocious dog, the bridge club, even the moans – was it
possible that this had been staged for his benefit? Yes, he decided,
it was possible.
    The following week, Gillian received two phone calls from the
rabbi. She was noncommittal, evasive. The next four phone calls she
was politely unavailable. The following week – and by this time
he heard rumors that Gillian Blake had been seen at a drive-in
hamburger stand with Mario Vella, a common gangster – Rabbi
Turnbull began sending her presents. The gifts were returned,
unopened, to his office beside the Temple.
    The more she rejected him, the more he craved her. For just the
chance to kiss her knees. He decided that even the dog, Rolf, was not
too bad, quite probably a very effective watchdog.
    And then he began to hate her.
    Love and hate, mingled as they often are in the same current,
coursed through his veins and pounded at his temples. Turnbull could
not control the demons. And when Gillian began to hang up the phone
at the first sound of his voice, he knew the demons would claim
him.
    He snapped at the members of the ladies' auxiliary. At Temple
meetings he seemed distracted and morose, then engaged some of the
most important donors in senseless argument. He arrived drunk at
Friday night service. Saturday he was seen at a roadhouse with a
notorious woman. Acquaintances sought him out to talk to him, but he
would have none of it.
    In a way, a strange way, Turnbull became more popular in the
community than he had ever been. Scandal is a community service and a
free entertainment at that; witnesses generally feel obliged to pay
admission with sympathy. Turnbull scorned their sympathy, slapped his
wife, shouted at his children and, just before the scheduled
appearance of Jonah and the Wails, disappeared for three days.
    Cooler heads in the Temple said that this was all for the better,
and no police report was issued. Rabbi Lerman, Turnbull's
inarticulate assistant, was given specific instructions to get the
services over with as quickly as possible.
    The services that Friday night were expectably well attended.
Reporters and photographers fattened the congregation considerably,
and the first half of the proceedings went smoothly. Jonah and the
Wails, four grave young men dressed neatly in Mod black, made a
fairly conservative entrance if one could overlook the blond wigs.
They wore wide leather ties with leaping sperm whales spraying toward
the knots. They made their music with two electric guitars, a
tambourine and a whale's jawbone that was banged against a single
kettle drum. The second half of the service began with the Torah
removed from the holy ark and Jonah leading the group in song -
    Open the doors
    Git out the book
    Uh-Uh-uh-uh-uh
    And take a look.
    We all prayin'
    (Yeah,yeah,yeah)
    We all prayin'…
    It