She tried not to think about it. She tried to think in a positive way about the baby she was going to have, and the gift of life, and all that. She even tried to study geometry, and she hated geometry, because it was either completely obvious or didn’t make any sense at all. But trying not to think about something is the best way to guarantee that you can’t think about anything else.
It seemed awful to be eating Raven’s birthday cake in front of her when her mouth was taped shut, but Hedwig said that that was the girl’s own fault and not to worry, because when Raven got hungry enough, she would eat. She always did. It even seemed a little cruel to be reading aloud from the book about the Shroud of Turin, since the part Hedwig had chosen to read aloud was all about how much Christ had suffered when he was crucified, which was not something anyone would necessarily want to dwell on in Raven’s situation, with her wrists and ankles buckled in leather restraints and her mouth taped shut. Hedwig was a very religious person, but religious people aren’t always sensitive about what people who are less religious feel, besides which Hedwig’s style of religion tended to be on the dark side, not to say morbid. She was an expert on how Christ had suffered and how various martyrs were killed. Also, abortion was a big issue, as you might expect, since preventing abortions was the whole reason she was here at the Shrine of Blessed Konrad of Paderborn, which was what the place had been called when it was built. But Hedwig didn’t seem very interested in the bright side of religion, the side that had to do with love.
That was the worst of it. The loneliness. Alison wasn’t used to spending so much time all by herself, with no one to talk to, no telephone, not even Mr. Boots, the neighbor’s cat who would come to the back door, meowing for scraps. Alison would have given anything just to be sitting beside her mother on the ratty old sofa in front of the TV, watching Roseanne and sharing Chinese takeout. Most of all she missed Greg. When they split up, she thought, “Okay, it’s over. Too bad. Now get on with the rest of your life.” But now that there was no way he could get in touch with her, she felt as though her life were over. Without Greg nothing mattered, not even the baby, even though it was his. She wanted to touch him and to feel his touch, and she couldn’t. She wished she were dead, and Greg too, and they were in heaven, making love again.
Janet, seeing that the party was about to be over, asked Hedwig, in her most inveigling whine, “Do you suppose I could have another little slice of cake? Just a sliver? It’s so good.”
“Oh well,” said Hedwig, who was vain about her cooking and had every right to be. It was a scrumptious chocolate cake. “Why not? Since you’ve both been so good.” She cut two more slices of cake. Then, just as she’d tipped the second slice sideways onto Alison’s paper plate, her beeper beeped. “Oh dear,” she said, “excuse me,” and went over to stand by the door of the cell, as though she’d be more private there, and took out her beeper from the pocket of her gray wool smock and said “Yes?” and then, in a different tone of voice, “No, I can’t.”
Alison knew right away that Hedwig must be talking with her brother Gerhardt, who had driven Alison to the Shrine in his big Cadillac. Whenever she talked with her brother, in person or on the phone, Hedwig became a different person. It was like in movies about the army, when the sergeant who is usually such a bully salutes his commanding officer and is suddenly a cocker spaniel. Hedwig clutched the beeper and nodded and said, “No, not now, I’m sorry. Can’t it wait?”
Apparently it couldn’t wait, because Hedwig finally had to put the beeper back in her pocket. “I’m sorry, girls. I’m going to have to leave you here with Raven for a little. Help yourselves to some more cake if you like. I won’t be long.”
She unlocked the cell with the little thing that looked like a calculator, and exited, and they heard the door lock behind her.
“I don’t believe it,” said Alison. “She left us alone. Together.”
“But she can still hear us, you know,” said Janet. “Every cell has got a microphone or maybe a camera.”
“But she won’t be listening to us now. She’ll be talking with her brother on the phone.”
“You’re right,” said Janet.
Raven was shaking her head from side to side, the only movement she could make.
“She wants us to take the tape off,” Janet said.
“But if she starts screaming again…”
“She won’t do that,” Janet said, beginning to peel the white tape from Raven’s face. “It’s only when Hedwig’s around she gets that way. She really hates Hedwig. You can’t blame her.”
Alison was astonished at the sudden change in Janet, whom she had only seen, till now, in Hedwig’s company. She was only twelve years old, a seventh grader, and she didn’t seem that bright. Now she was acting like Sigourney Weaver in Aliens, full of purpose and determination.
Janet had the tape off Raven’s mouth. “Are you okay?”
“Jesus,” said Raven, in a fervent whisper, “I hate that woman, I just hate her.”
“Are you okay?” Janet insisted.
“Yes, I’m okay. Is she?” Meaning Alison.
Janet glanced at Alison. “I don’t know. I think so. I mean, we can never talk anymore, except in front of Hedwig. It isn’t the way it was—it’s worse now.”
“I figured that,” said Raven. “What about Mary? And Tara?”
“Mary is sick. Hedwig lets us visit her, and I don’t think she’s acting. She looks sick. And she keeps asking Hedwig to let her see a doctor, and Hedwig keeps saying soon, soon. Tara—I don’t know. Maybe they took her away, or maybe she tried to escape.”
“But if she’d escaped, she’d have told someone, there’d be police here.”
“Maybe she didn’t get away, maybe she just tried.”
“Maybe they killed her,” Raven said.
Janet began to cry. “No,” she said, “no, they wouldn’t do that.”
“Jesus, don’t cry,” said Raven. “Crying can’t do any good.”
Alison put her arm around Janet’s shoulders, trying to give her some comfort, but it’s hard to comfort someone else when you feel just as bad. Both Janet and Raven knew more about Birth-Right than she did, and from what she could gather, the situation was even worse than she’d imagined.
“Who is Tara?” she asked, looking up at Raven.
“Tara Seberg. She was the third one to get here. I was the first. Listen, we probably don’t have much time till Hedwig’s back. You want to get out of here?”
Alison nodded. Raven stared into her eyes, as though she were giving her a lie detector test, and Alison stared back, trying to think of something to say to make Raven trust her.
Janet slipped away from Alison’s forgetful embrace. “I’m sorry, I’ve got to throw up.” She went to the lidless toilet bowl in the far corner of the cell and knelt down to vomit.
“That’s okay,” said Raven, keeping her eyes on Alison. “Let her puke, she’ll feel better. I’ve got to tell you something while I can. The only way we’ll any of us get out of here is if one of us can get to the police. Right?”
Alison nodded.
“And it doesn’t look like it’s going to be me. Or Tara, either, by the sound of it. And Mary Tyler can’t pick her nose without a handkerchief. Janet? Well, she’s a great kid, tougher than any of us. She says when she gets out of here she wants to kill both her parents, and I think she’s serious about it. It was her daddy who got her knocked up, and then her mom sends her here, so she can’t get an abortion. But Hedwig’s no dummy, she’s got the sense not to trust Janet for all the act she puts on like she’s still in diapers. But for some reason Hedwig seems to trust you.”
“I think it’s because when we were driving up here, we got a flat tire, and Gerhardt had to leave me alone in the car. And I didn’t make a bolt for it. I mean, it was raining, and where was I going to go? But when he came back with the tow truck, I think he was actually surprised to see I was still there in the car.”
Raven nodded. “Hedwig said som
ething, earlier, about how you were up in the church with her, on the main floor?”
“I’ve helped her with the cleaning. Twice.”
“I used to do that. When I first got here, I was like you. Butter wouldn’t melt. I was waiting for my chance, but when it came, I messed up. But I did manage to do one thing. Hedwig had this can of Mace in her purse. You know what Mace is?”
“You squirt it at muggers, and it blinds them?”
“Right. She’d left me alone, just long enough to get it out of her purse and hide it the first place I could see. Maybe it’s still there. Under the kneeling pad inside the big carved-wood confessional. I don’t think anyone ever comes into the Shrine to go to confession, so it could still be there. Unless Hedwig found it, which I doubt, because she still questions me about it sometimes. I wish I’d used it while I had the chance. Anyhow, you better put the tape back over my mouth. She’ll be coming back any minute.”
Alison nodded and pressed the wide white strip of adhesive across Raven’s mouth.
Janet had finished throwing up, but she was still kneeling beside the toilet bowl, looking at the brown mulch still recognizable as chocolate cake. She looked up at Alison, smiling. “Isn’t it weird, I’m still hungry. Coming up it tasted almost as good as it did going down.” She hit the stainless steel flush handle with the heel of her hand, and watched the cake swirl away into the drain. “You know, a friend of mine told me that in France it’s as easy as that to get rid of a baby. There’s a pill you take. You bleed a little extra, and it’s gone.”
“I’ve heard the same thing. But it’s not legal here.”
“Sometimes I think I’d like to do the same thing myself. Just whirl around a few times inside the toilet bowl, then disappear. Like one of the rides at the fairgrounds. Have you ever been on the big Ferris wheel at the fair?”
Alison nodded.
“If I ever get out of here,” Janet said with determination, “what I want to do is go on the Ferris wheel again, and sit in one of the seats all by myself. I’ll probably have to buy two tickets. Do you think so?”
“Maybe if it’s not too busy you wouldn’t have to.”
“That’s what I would like to do.”
When Hedwig returned, her thin lips were bent into an anxious smile. “Well, I have just had the most wonderful news. We’re to have a priest with us here at Birth-Right. We’ll be able to attend Mass, perhaps every day. And go to confession, if we need to. To take Communion. Tara, for one, will be delighted.”
“What a treat,” said Janet.
“Is it Father Cogling?” Alison asked.
Hedwig shook her head. “No. No, it’s the director of Birth-Right. He’s only been here once before, and that was before any of you girls had come here. His name is Father Pat, and he’s much younger than Father Cogling. But a real crusader in the battle for Life. Oh yes, he’s been at the forefront!”
“Pat is his last name?” Janet asked.
Hedwig shook her head abstractedly. “I do wish they’d given me more notice. There are no fresh flowers on the altar, and I should have something special for his dinner, and a dozen other things. So I’m afraid our little celebration must come to an end. Alison, let me take you back to your room first. Janet, you stay here with Raven, and perhaps she’ll let you feed her some cake. But don’t take the bandage from her mouth till we’ve left, or she’ll start carrying on again.”
“Yes, Mrs. Ober,” said Janet.
Hedwig opened the cell door. “Come along, dear,” she said to Alison. “I’ll get some fresh linen, and you can help me make Father Pat’s bed.”
28
At ten a.m. promptly Father Cogling rapped on Father Pat’s bedroom door. “Father Pat, you really must get up now. I explained, when you laid down, that you mustn’t get too comfortable. It’s imperative that you set off now for the Shrine without any more delay. You can catch up on your sleep in the car. Father Pat, are you listening to what I say?”
There was only a groan in reply, but that was better than the silence of utter, unrousable stupor.
“Gerhardt is waiting for you right now, Father Pat,” Father Cogling went on, more loudly. “I’ve packed two bags for you. You must get up! Do you understand?”
Father Pat produced a groggy “Yes, yes,” but that was an improvement on groans.
“The police phoned twice yesterday, and once the day before. I’m sure it’s purely routine. It’s probably all because the young man I spoke of had written a new will recently, in which he particularly requested that you perform his funeral service. I told the man at McCarron’s that that would be out of the question, and he understood at once, given what is known about this Bing Anker, which I won’t go into. But now there’s another priest who’s been pestering me about the same thing, and wanting to talk with you, and it’s all become very complicated. The long and short of it, Father Pat, is that you must leave now!”
The door was opened from inside, and Father Pat, unshaven and bleary-eyed, regarded Father Cogling balefully. He seemed to have slept in his clothes, and his hair was a fright. Father Cogling took out a comb from the inside pocket of his suit coat and neatened Father Pat’s hair. Father Pat allowed himself to be put to rights with the resentful impassivity of a four-year-old boy who disdains to comb his own hair or button his own buttons.
“Do you remember anything of what I told you when you got home this morning?” Father Cogling asked, with that tone of resigned, contemptuous solicitude with which the wives of alcoholics address their spouses.
Father Pat shook his head.
Father Cogling found that possible to believe. He’d never seen the pastor of St. Bernardine’s looking so much the worse for wear—or so little inclined to assert his own authority. He seemed ready to do anything he was told to, without question or protest. This was gratifying in one way, but also somewhat unsettling. Getting Father Pat to do what needed to be done was like driving a car with a steering wheel that allows too much slip. It went where it was directed, but the driver didn’t feel that he was securely in control.
Father Cogling sighed and shook his head. “Then let me explain the matter, as much as I understand it myself. Some days ago—in fact, the very night you chose to go on a binge—a young man in St. Paul was found shot twice. It was in the papers, but I’d thrown them out before the police called here, so I can’t give you any more of the details. His name was Bing Anker, and it appears that many years ago, when you were at Our Lady of Mercy, he was an altar boy there. Does the name ring a bell?”
Father Pat shook his head, and Father Cogling could have wished the police had been there to see it. A professional actor could not have given a more persuasive performance.
“I didn’t suppose it would, Father. It was so long ago. However, and this is unfortunate, there was a priest outside the house on the night the young man was killed. And there’s no possibility, according to the police, that the young man committed suicide. And there was no evidence of a burglary. And that is why they want to talk with you. They’ll want to know where you were last Thursday evening, and who you were with. I should have had the presence of mind to tell them, at once, that you were here with me. But I didn’t, and now it would be too late. But I did the next best thing and told them that you were on retreat, and that I would tell you to get in touch with them as soon as you phoned here. So, what must be done now is for Gerhardt to drive you to the Shrine, so that you can call the police from the telephone there. Both Gerhardt and his sister will vouch for your having been there, so there will be no need for you to feel any… embarrassment about this. Not that you have anything to feel embarrassed about. However, it’s possible that you were… with someone else during the time in question, someone who wouldn’t want to be involved in this.”
Father Pat nodded, and answered guardedly, “Yes, I have been with… someone else.”
“And there’s no reason why anyone else need be involved. I really don’t think the police have any business in matters that
concern the Church. So!” He held out his hand. “Your bags are already in the car, and Gerhardt is waiting.”
Father Pat made rather more of the handshake than was strictly warranted. He hesitated at first, and then clasped Father Cogling’s hand too firmly and held it too long. It was as though he feared they might be parting forever, and Father Cogling realized, with a twinge of misgiving, that it was not an entirely unwarranted fear.
“God bless you!” Father Cogling said with a final squeeze and then a slipping loose. He led the way to the door, and Father Pat followed with what seemed, under the circumstances, a miraculous acquiescence. No questions, no hesitations, no demurs. Only at the last moment, as he stood in the open doorway, with Gerhardt at the curb, holding open the door of the Cadillac, did he turn to Father Cogling and ask, “I am still a priest, am I not?”
“Yes, indeed, Father, you are still a priest. That can never be taken away from us. Ordination leaves a mark on the soul that is indelible.”
“Like a tattoo,” said Father Pat.
Father Cogling nodded. “I would not have thought of that comparison myself, but yes, I suppose it could be thought of as the soul’s tattoo. But this is not the time, or the place, to wax poetical. Good-bye for now.” He stepped back inside the rectory and, after Father Pat had lowered his head as a sign of parting, closed the door.
THE PRIEST A Gothic Romance Page 23