The Other Sunday

Last Sunday we went to a different church. Not because I don't like Salem (I love it), but because I'd discovered that a man who'd be preaching at a nearby Methodist Church was using borrowed sermons. That wasn't the only thing he'd stolen, he'd stolen someone's identity too. I think that made him the biggest pulpit criminal in London.
So Scruff and I left our copies of Gadsby at home and walked over to the liberal Methodist Church where the crook was preaching. I put on a grey touser-suit over my Girl in Grey costume, keeping the cowl down, of course (otherwise the disguise would be fairly pointless).
We managed to talk the teenage girl on the door into letting us up in the gallery, where Scruff found a whole lot of old hymn-books to build a tower with (I really need to talk with her about that). I sat down and waited.
At last the door at the back opened and the preacher stepped in. He strode up to the pulpit and was introduced to the congregation by his false name. He looked quite a deecent chap, but I knew that he was in fact the most monstrous and cunning villain (I've always wanted to say that).
He announced the first hymn, a turgid liberal effusion that seemed to have been written to praise man, not God. Not for the first time I was reminded why I went to Salem. Turning round I saw Scruff's tower of hymn-books was getting on nicely.
The Church Secretary gave out some announcements, but I was concentrating on my target, who looked smug and secure. He didn't know that I knew the truth.
After some formal prayers and two more terrible hymns the man got up to preach.

"There is," he declared, "a terrible doctrine going around the churches in this country," Yes, I thought, and it was preached here last week. "A doctrine that doesn't believe that God loves everyone!"
There were shocked gasps from the congregation. I started to unbutton my jacket. Then I noticed Scruff was about to throw a hymn-book at him and I shook my head.
"No, Scruff, not yet."
"This doctrine teaches that God doesn't want to save everyone!"
More shocked gasps. Since the church taught that God would save everyone, even the devil (although they don't believe in a devil), I wasn't surprised.
I took off my jacket and discreetly removed the trousers of my suit. The preacher was getting into full swing on his anti-Calvinist sermon, and some of the poor liberal Methodists were looking rather confused. I shed my blouse, leaving me in my close-fitting grey costume.
"...Why, Jesus said to Jerusalem, 'How oft would I have gathered you..."
"That's it!" I pulled my whip from my belt, leaped to my feet, and jumped from the gallery.
I landed on the preacher, knocking him to the floor.
"If I hear that misquoted again, I'm going to do serious injury to someone," I remarked.
"The Girl in Grey!" the Church Secretary cried in horror.
"Yes. But don't worry, this is Slick Harry Moore, not Rev. Barry Jones. I know that, Mr. Moore, because I found where you buried Mr. Jones after you gunned him down in cold blood."
"You ain't got nothin' on me!"
"I have everything on you." I fixed a pair of handcuffs on his wrists. "And so do the police." the sound of a police siren broke in on the congregation. "goodbye."
Then I was gone. Scruff left rapidly too, leaving a tower of hymnbooks behind.
And I meant what I said about Matthew 23.36.
We went straight to Sir Richard's Christmas party after that, and I'm glad to report I got the Green Man under the Misteltoe!