Chapter 5: Judgment Day

Chapter 5: Judgment Day

The rest of the afternoon passed in a state of charged tranquility. Arthur finished planing the cherrywood plank, the surface now as smooth and reflective as still water. He didn't allow himself to speculate on the furious conversations undoubtedly happening within the leadership of The Shepherd’s Flock Community Church. He had laid the demolition charges at the base of the structure; he did not need to watch every crack appear in the facade. The panicked, venomous call from Mark Albright had been the tremor that precedes the collapse. The main event was coming.

He was wiping the last of the sawdust from his workbench when his phone buzzed again. He glanced at the screen. The caller ID displayed a name he recognized from his research: Robert Henderson. The accountant. The head of the church board.

Arthur picked up the phone, the cold metal a familiar weight in his calloused hand. He let it ring a second time before answering, a small, deliberate assertion of control.

"Arthur Vance," he answered, his voice a flat, neutral slate.

There was a pause on the other end, filled by the sound of a weary, shaky sigh. "Mr. Vance. This is Robert Henderson, from The Shepherd's Flock."

The man’s voice was exactly as Arthur had imagined it would be: low, formal, and heavy with a palpable shame. This was not the shriek of a panicked boy; this was the mortified voice of a man of standing whose institution had just been dragged through the mud.

"Mr. Henderson," Arthur acknowledged, offering nothing more. He would not make this easy for him.

"Mr. Vance… I… on behalf of the entire board of elders, I want to offer our most profound and sincere apologies." Henderson’s words were carefully chosen, but the strain behind them was unmistakable. "We received your email. We have reviewed the evidence you provided. To say we are shocked and appalled would be a gross understatement."

Arthur remained silent, letting the man's discomfort hang in the air. He could picture Henderson in his polished office, tie loosened, staring at the damning photos on his computer screen. The image of the graffiti-marred mantelpiece, the symbol of a desecrated home, would be particularly galling to a man of his stature.

"We convened an emergency meeting this morning," Henderson continued, his voice dropping lower. "We confronted Pastor Albright. He… well, at first, he denied it. He claimed it was a misunderstanding, that you were a vindictive landlord persecuting him."

Arthur felt a cold flicker of amusement. It was the exact defense he had predicted. The shield of piety, raised in desperation.

"And then?" Arthur prompted, his voice like a chip of granite.

Henderson sighed again, a sound of complete defeat. "And then we showed him the photos. We showed him the itemized list of stolen property. And, Mr. Vance… we showed him the screenshot of the text message."

There was a significant pause. Arthur could hear the unspoken humiliation in that silence. The laughing emoji. That was the piece of evidence that had annihilated any possibility of denial, any claim of misunderstanding. It was the confession, signed with a smirk.

"He had no explanation," Henderson admitted, his voice barely above a whisper. "He and his son… they both just… fell apart."

A grim, satisfying image bloomed in Arthur’s mind: the beatific mask shattering, the arrogant sneer melting into fear, the two of them exposed as common thieves and vandals under the stern, judgmental gaze of their employers. The public shame they would now face within their own small circle was a punishment far greater than any court could levy.

"We have given him an ultimatum, Mr. Vance," Henderson said, his tone firming now, the voice of a businessman taking decisive action to cauterize a wound. "He is to make full and complete restitution for the damages, the stolen property, and the unpaid rent. The total you provided was twenty-two thousand dollars, correct?"

"That is correct," Arthur affirmed.

"He has until five o'clock this evening to wire the full amount to an account of your choosing. If he fails, he and his son will be terminated, effective immediately. We will be forced to make a public statement to the congregation regarding the nature of their dismissal. His career in the ministry, anywhere, will be over."

The threat was absolute. Public termination. Disgrace. The end of the road. They had left Albright no room to maneuver, no corner to hide in. They had taken Arthur’s cold, factual weapon and used it to hold a gun to their pastor’s head.

"I will text you my account information," Arthur said. "I will expect the full amount."

"You will have it," Henderson promised, his voice thick with the need to put this sordid affair behind him. "Again, Mr. Vance… I am truly sorry you were subjected to this. This is not what our church stands for."

Arthur thought of the pastor’s handshake, the talk of a bond before God. "I appreciate you handling this matter swiftly, Mr. Henderson." He offered no absolution, no words to soothe the elder’s shame. He had been wronged, and now the wrong was being righted. It was a transaction. Nothing more, nothing less.

He ended the call and, with methodical precision, texted his bank’s wire transfer details to Henderson’s number. Then he put the phone down and went back to work. He didn't watch the clock. He didn't think about the frantic scramble the Albrights must be in, the desperate calls to family, the humiliating requests for loans, the scraping together of every last cent to save themselves from utter ruin. He simply sanded and oiled the restored Mustang dashboard until it glowed with a deep, rich luster.

At 4:52 PM, his phone buzzed with a notification from his banking app.

He picked it up, opened the app, and looked at the screen. A new entry appeared at the top of his transaction history.

INCOMING WIRE TRANSFER: $22,000.00

He stared at the number. Twenty-two thousand dollars. The cost of the carpets, the paint, the rent, the stolen appliances. The money was back. The ledger was balanced.

But as he looked at the glowing figures, Arthur felt a satisfaction that went far beyond financial recovery. The money was just green ink and paper, a means to an end. The real payment was the story behind that wire transfer. It was the silent, screaming testament to Pastor John Albright's complete and utter humiliation. It was the price of his pride.

He thought of the laughing-crying emoji, the symbol of Albright's arrogant belief that he was untouchable, that his victim was powerless. And now, hours before his deadline, that same man had been forced to surrender, to digitally transfer his penance, not into a collection plate for God's forgiveness, but directly into the account of the man he had mocked.

Albright had sought to make a fool of Arthur Vance. Instead, his board of elders, the very men who propped up his existence, had seen him for the fool he was. He had paid his debt, not out of remorse, but out of fear. He had bent the knee, not to God, but to the consequences of his actions.

Arthur Vance closed the banking app and set his phone down. The workshop was quiet. The score was settled. Judgment had been rendered, and penance had been paid in full.