Free Lethal Lineage by Charlotte Hinger

Ownership of all the land around is clear and easily traceable. It’s only these forty acres that seem to have risen up from Middle Earth. It’s funny, but one of the land owners of an adjacent field said it has always been a family tradition not to farm those particular ten acres on the edge of his property. He didn’t know why.”
    “And the other owners or alleged owners?”
    I smiled. “When we pointed out the legal mess, that’s all it took. Two of the other land donors, used their acres for pasture and one of them doesn’t run cattle anymore. The Carlton County donor was a widow, Edna Mavery, who thought all her land had been sold when she moved to town. They were all glad to sign over their acres for our little church.”
    He sighed. “I come from Dallas. It’s hard for me to get used to these little churches out in the middle of nowhere. They’re all over. And all denominations. When I first came here, I thought they were abandoned buildings. They are, but parishioners won’t let them die.”
    “We made a terrible mistake having St. Helena straddle four counties. From every angle. It’s a legal nightmare because no one knows which county has jurisdiction.” I gave him more details about Josie and my encounter with Sheriff Deal and our wild night in the Copeland County jail.
    “Can Sheriff Deal do that?” He was clearly amazed.
    “Technically, yes. So he did.”
    “You a coffee drinker?”
    “Sir, I am. Black.”
    He nodded, walked over to a little inset sink and mini-bar, and flipped up a louvered cover anchored to an upper cabinet. Filling cheery mugs sporting the Episcopal church symbol, he handed one to me before he sat back down.
    “All right, let’s move to what you do have some answers to and work our way up to this fake Bishop. To begin with, why did your niece want to be confirmed in St. Helena? Isn’t she from Junction City?”
    “She is. And of course, there’s an Episcopal Church there. It’s where she received all her preparation for confirmation. My uncle, Frank Clements, my mother’s brother, used to go on the wheat harvest in Western Kansas when he was in high school and he just fell in love with the High Plains.”
    He held up his palm to stop me while he made a few notes. “Go on.”
    “Uncle Frank heard about this church and called me, asking if Keith and I would host a family reunion if Tammy could be confirmed out here. We’re overdue for one. A lot of my folks have never met Keith, my husband. So naturally we said yes and we thought it would get our little church off to a great beginning if we included the whole congregation.”
    “My next question has to do with Mary Farnsworth,” he said. “I don’t know who she is.”
    “Apparently, I don’t know either. That’s one of the reasons I came in person. I have too many questions myself for you to handle with a phone call.”
    “Our office doesn’t have one iota of information about this woman.”
    “I thought I knew Mary well. She’s been in the area a long time.” I explained her unselfish service as a social worker. Her long days. “But it turns out we didn’t know a thing about her.”
    He thrummed his pencil on his desk, then laced it back and forth between his fingers like he was handling a baton. “Are you sure she’s a priest?”
    “I’ve been thinking about that. I have no proof, but yes, I’m sure. Different persons have mentioned her being at little house churches in Northwest Kansas. No big deal. Not unusual out here. Several families just want to receive communion. A coffee table substitutes for an altar.”
    “There’s no reason I can think of why someone would want to fake being a priest,” he said flatly.
    “None,” I agreed. “No money or prestige out here. Back East, maybe, but not here.”
    “There’s no record of this woman in the Diocese records. She had to have been ordained somewhere else and if she came here nineteen years ago, it would have been in a firestorm of