Chief Featherstone marched across the vestibule and flung open the broad double doors into the sanctuary. As he was silhouetted in the doorway, I realized that even without the mask he was rather an odd figure, with a stout, barrel-shaped body perched on the thinnest legs I’d ever seen.

We followed him and stood just inside the doorway. I was beginning to regret hastily scampering after Grandfather without demanding that the fire chief lend me my own breathing apparatus.

The New Life sanctuary always overwhelmed me when I first walked in. Not so much because of its beauty, although the soaring expanses of light oak and whitewashed walls looked particularly elegant with all the evergreen, tinsel, and ribbon. No, it was the size that always got me—the place was so incredibly huge. The stained-glass windows wouldn’t have been out of place in a medieval cathedral. And at the back of the church the choir loft, looming high over the altar, could probably fit almost as many people as the entire sanctuary of Trinity Episcopal, where Michael, the boys, and I had begun going a lot more regularly now that Mother had been elected to the vestry.

The sanctuary was also lined with the Christmas carol banners whose bright, cheerful colors contrasted strangely with the rank odor that was assaulting our noses. I wondered if the felt was absorbing the odor, and whether it would be possible to fumigate the banners.

“Up there.” Chief Featherstone pointed at the choir loft, which was top-heavy with great looping ropes of ribbon-trimmed greenery.

“Pretty powerful odor to be coming from way up there.” Grandfather sounded dubious.

“Unfortunately, it’s not just coming from up there,” Chief Featherstone said. “One of my men reported that in spraying Mr. Dandridge, the skunk or skunks also appear to have scored a direct hit on an intake duct for the air circulation system.”

“That’s going to be a challenge for the church, isn’t it?” Grandfather said. “Well, how do we get up there?”

He struck a familiar pose: shoulders back, chin high, mouth firmly set, visibly determined to push through all obstacles. If we were filming one of his nature specials, this would be the signal that he was about to jump in the tank with the sharks, crawl into the lion’s den, step out into the path of the charging elephant, grasp the rattlesnake’s head, or whatever other foolhardy and camera-worthy stunt he’d come up with.

It would have looked more dramatic if he hadn’t chosen to pose in front of a banner filled with several dozen cottonball sheep with broad black pipe-cleaner grins.

“I don’t think there are enough handholds to do a free climb up there,” I said. “But we could get some ropes and rappel up. Or— Wait! There’s no camera crew. Why don’t we just take the stairs?”