by Ulf Wolf
The final delegate was Margaret Gurney, the woman elected by the Quaker community to attend the meeting. She, too, saw Ruth Marten as something quite sinister placed here on earth in order to confuse and mislead the young people of today. She, too, felt that the oddly talented young woman must have been sent here by dark forces, perhaps even by the darkest one himself.
At ten o’clock sharp, Jones rose, walked over to, closed, and locked the door. Then returned to his seat.
“No record—by that I mean, no sound recording—will be made of this meeting, this conference,” he lied. “I am saying this to put each of you at ease, and to assure you that you can freely speak your mind.”
Murmurs of agreement, and some shifting in chairs.
A sip of water here, a sip of coffee there. Fielding was checking his watch again.
Margaret Gurney could not take her eyes off of Aisha Amiri, such a beautiful woman. They had no right to. And by they she meant the Muslims who only kept growing in numbers, not only here in New York and in other big cities, but back home in Pennsylvania as well. She considered her own plain appearance and compared it to this, well, affront was the word, this assault on decency. Weren’t they supposed to hide their faces?
Then she joined the other seven in looking over at the now silent Otto Jones who apparently planned to stay silent until he had everyone’s undivided attention. Okay, he had hers now, too.
And that apparently meant he now had everybody’s.
“Everyone all set?” said Jones. “Coffee? Donuts? Water? Juice anyone? All fine?” To an assortment of head nods and shakes. “Well, good.”
His voice, for some reason, at least to Margaret Gurney, seemed to match his bow tie. Small and proper, but quite prominent nonetheless. Odd sensation that. She wondered briefly how her husband would look with a bow tie one, especially one this color, was it phosphorescent? It sure looked that way, pinkish. No, not a good fit on her husband at all. But on this little man, or not so little, really—thin, though—it really suited him to a tee, him and that voice. That continued:
“You all know why we are here.”
Jones looked around the table to ensure they all did. Then, finding no evidence to the contrary, he said, “In a word—or four words, actually—as expressed by my client, Ruth Marten must be stopped.”
That was five words, actually, thought Margaret Gurney, who liked people to mean precisely what they say, not approximately, like this.
“She almost was, twice,” said Fielding. “Stopped, I mean. Permanently.” The room turned dead quiet, and he looked up, then at the faces around the table, in various states of alarm. “He said we’re not being recorded,” he protested. Then he checked his watch again.
“She hasn’t really done anything wrong,” said Laron Miller. And that was precisely how he felt. The Marten girl was preaching nothing but peace and love, even if it was not a peace and a love grounded in Our Savior.
Otto Jones could have reached out to touch him, even slapped his wrist—something Margaret Gurney almost expected him to do, at least judging by his expression. “She has done something wrong, Reverend Miller,” said Jones. “She has.”
“What, precisely?” said Miller, who was rapidly taking a dislike to this Otto Jones, and added, “In the opinion of the Church of Crystal Faith, that is.”
Otto Jones straightened in his chair, rose a couple of inches and took on a shade of menace: “Ruth Marten is seducing the youth of this world away from the true path, a path that each of us might view from a slightly different perspective, but a path that we all agree was created by God, or by Allah,” looking at Aisha Amiri as he added her God. “And we can all agree that she is, in effect, distracting the young of the world from what leads them to God. She is in effect—in effect,” he stressed. Then took a deep breath, “She is, in effect, denying God. She is denying his word. And his son.” And then, again looking directly at Aisha Amiri, he added, “And his prophet.”
Aisha Amiri met Jones’ pale blue eyes with her deep brown. She did not like this man. He was presumptuous and condescending, though he hid his arrogance rather well. And she could tell that he wouldn’t mind at all to spend some time alone with her. A despicable man; no matter how correct he might be—and he was, there was no denying that.
Jones smiled at her, and said, “N’est-ce pas?”
Oh, thought Amiri, who was born in Algeria and had spent most of her childhood in France, he’s good. He’s done his homework. She nodded in his direction, both conceding the point and acknowledging his savoir-faire.
Jones then turned to Miller again, “Do you not agree Reverend Miller? Is Ruth Marten not denying God?”
Well, Miller had to concede, the man had a point. Marten mentions God in none of her lectures, and he had checked them—or, rather, had had his staff check them. There was no mention of any Deity whatever. Didn’t the Buddhist have a score of deities, or was that the Hindus?
“By omission, perhaps,” Miller finally conceded.
“Yes,” Otto Jones smiled. “Yes, by omission. But by more than omission, in my opinion. By so fervently advocating self-sufficiency and meditation rather than faith in the Creator, she is demeaning God.” He repeated this last, for effect, “Demeaning God.”
John Keeler cleared his throat, which—to those who knew him meant that he was about to say something, and which also meant that he now expected everyone’s silence and full attention. This signal, however, was lost on this gathering, so instead he now spoke into a blurred silence, and rather loudly at that, “If I may.”
Otto Jones looked at Keeler, then around the table, twice, and then back at Keeler. “Of course.”
“Although we have not examined this for the exact numbers, our priests, and not only those in Boston, but in New York, Philadelphia, and Baltimore as well, to name a few cities surveyed, our priests report, or estimate, rather, a falling off of almost thirty percent in attendance.”
Before he continued he cleared his throat to actually clear his throat.
“These same priests estimate that this figure doubles in the twenty-to-thirty age bracket. There is no doubt in my mind, or among us, I should say, us meaning the majority of our bishops, that this falling away of our flock, as it were, is as a direct result of the astonishing spread of the word of this Ruth Marten. What with the Internet and her lectures available to anyone with a computer or a phone or a Mortimer these days.”
Otto Jones smiled.
And he smiles a little too much, thought Margaret Gurney, who would have been surprised to learn that her thought mirrored Aisha Amiri’s to the letter.
Then Jones said, “The last thing this world needs, today, is the spread of sacrilegious doctrine. Are we all agreed?”
“Of course we’re all agreed,” said the Reverend Blackburn Moses in a voice so deep, and so resounding, as to remind Margaret Gurney of a fog horn. “Or we wouldn’t be here.”
Nods and noises of assent.
“What about you, Rabbi Hefter?” said Jones. “Are we on the same page?”
The Rabbi, who seemed startled to be addressed directly, looked down at his leather binder—as if the answer was concealed within—then looked up at Jones. “What question are you asking me?” he said finally. “What page are you talking about?”
“We don’t need the spread—especially with this speed—of sacrilegious doctrine. That page.”
“Ah, that page,” said Hefter. “Yes, I mean no, I agree, we don’t need that page, or that doctrine, rather. It is disruptive. Definitely.” He then looked down at his binder again, as if consulting it.
“Does anyone dis-agree?” said Jones. “We need to be very clear here. A consensus here can, and will, accomplish things. A disagreement will only lead to discussion.”
He then looked at each one in turn, lingering a little too long on Aisha Amiri, then asked Margaret Gurney, “And you, Mrs. Gurney. Do you agree as well?”
“Of course I agree,” she said, hoping to sound at least a li
ttle offended by the implied doubt.
“Good. Good,” said Jones. “Then I would like to take care of the first order of administrative business.” He bent to his right and fished up a slim, black portfolio, which he carefully opened. Looked inside, and found what he was looking for.
“First order of administrative business,” he repeated. “Please confirm, by your signature, your agreement on the line above your name.” He handed the single sheet of paper to Laron Miller. “If you would.”
Miller received the paper, and began reading it.
“It’s what I would call a conference letter,” said Jones. “Stating that we, the delegates to the New York Faith Summit of April 15, 2030, all agree that Ruth Marten is, in fact, spreading a sacrilegious doctrine, one that not only affects our respective flocks, but also denies the existence of God.”
Miller finished reading, and looked around the table. Nodded. “Yes, that’s pretty much what it says.”
“We can all read,” boomed Blackburn Moses. “Sign it and pass it on.”
Miller fished around for a pen, prompting Jones to find one first, and hand it to Miller. “Thanks,” he said.
Miller signed and passed it over to Fielding, who took it, glanced at the three paragraphs that spelled out their agreement, then checked his watch, then signed it with his own pen.
Gurney, Keeler, and Hefter followed suit.
“Should I be insulted?” asked Aisha Amiri once she read through the brief statement. “God?”
“Generically speaking,” offered Jones. “No offense intended.”
Amiri shrugged, then signed and passed it on to Reverend Moses who already had his pen poised.
Jones received it back, verified all signatures, then signed it himself.
“Just a formality, really,” he said. “But a formality that will carry weight, trust me.”
John Keeler cleared his throat and then said, “But the question, Mr. Jones. The question, if I am not mistaken, the real question is what do we do about her? She’s like an avalanche. She’s everywhere. What with the science experiments and the Alvarez situation, and the assassination attempts and the Internet. Everyone knows about her. Everybody listens to her.” He then fell silent, but silent in the manner that said he wasn’t quite done yet, only looking for a word. Found it, “I believe the word is viral.”
“That, sir, is indeed both the word and the question,” confirmed Jones while restoring the now signed letter to his portfolio. “And here is where I am wide open to suggestions.”
That spawned the deepest silence yet around the table.
Margaret Gurney looked at Aisha Amiri who, with a frown, looked from Reverend Moses to Jones and back to Moses as if trying to decide which of the two offensive men was the most repellent.
Fielding checked his watch again, while Miller shifted in his chair, and then shifted again.
“Anyone?” said Jones. Then waited a while. “No one?”
“We could denounce her,” offered Miller, “but I don’t see what difference that would make. People know that she’s not a Christian, so they probably will not care.”
“Denouncement is good,” agreed Jones, although taking his time to pronounce denouncement. “But you’re right, that won’t stop her. In fact, if you stop to consider, it might even boost her, if that’s even conceivable.”
“How so?” asked Miller.
“She’s a rebel,” offered Jones. “And rebels tend to thrive in cross-fire, don’t they?”
“I see your point,” said Miller.
“Is she,” said Aisha Amiri, loudly. The table, to a man/woman turned to face her. “Is she breaking any laws?”
“That’s the right question,” more or less exploded Jones. Perhaps a little bit too quickly, and a lot too loudly. As if this was the very thing he was fishing for—which, as it happens, it was.
“That’s is precisely the question,” he said again, back to normal.
“Is she?” said Amiri.
“Well, as it happens,” said Jones. “It may be what some may call a stretch, though it really isn’t.” Then stopped.
“And?” said Amiri.
“And,” said Jones. “We still have an impressive collection of fairly stretchable anti-terrorism laws on the books.”
Amiri quietly wondered what, precisely, Jones meant by stretchable.
“Surely,” said Miller, but Jones held up a hand to stop him in his tracks, for Jones wasn’t done yet.
Miller, however, did not take to kindly to that, and insisted on completing his thought: “Surely, the woman is not inciting to terrorist attacks. Far from it.” And then added, “At least according to our research.”
“Granted,” said Jones with a forced smile, for he was used to having his way in these situations. “But I ask you, and not only you Reverend Miller, what is the prerequisite for inciting a group to riot, or to terrorist-like attacks or destruction?”
“Weapons?” said Blackburn Moses.
“Not really,” said Jones. “More fundamental than that.”
“A target,” suggested John Fielding.
“Yes, you need that,” said Jones. “But more fundamental than that. What do you need, first of all, to incite a group to destruction?”
“You need a group,” said Margaret Gurney. Statement of fact. So obvious. She really did not like Jones.
“Pre-cise-ly,” said Jones, beaming now. “You need a group.”
Aisha Amiri did not take kindly to being talked down to at the best of times, and especially not by this man. “What’s your point?” she said.
Smile now firmly in place, Jones turned to face her. “My point is that Ruth Marten is creating and rallying one of the largest groups every rallied in the history of mankind.”
He let that sink in.
“And,” he then added. “They are doing what she tells them to do.”
“That’s overstating it, isn’t it?” said the Archbishop from across the table.
“Not really,” said Jones.
“They’re all doing that Anapasti Mumbo Jumbo,” said Rabbi Hefter who seemed infatuated with the phrase.
“Yes, they are,” agreed Jones. And then took the delegates in, one by one. “What do you think they’re doing when they’re not attending your congregations? Why do you think they are abandoning your churches, in the millions?”
“Anapasti?” said Fielding, after consulting his watch.
“Anapana…” began Jones, but then thought better of correcting anyone. “Anapasti. Yes, correct. That’s what they are doing.”
“But that’s simply meditation,” said the (from Jones’ viewpoint) irritatingly well-researched Miller.
Jones sighed. “Do you want to split hairs or stop this lunacy?”
“Yes, of course,” said Miller. “Of course I—we—want this to stop. But we can’t go rogue here.”
“Rogue? Who said anything about going rogue? Ruth Marten is organizing the largest congregation on earth, and they are doing her bidding. Can you think of a larger threat to national security?”
“Well, put that way,” conceded Miller.
“You’re right. It is definitely a stretch,” said Amiri.
Margaret Gurney had been about to voice a similar opinion, but now did not want to follow suit. She was her own person, not just a mirror.
Keeler had no such qualms, however. “A definite stretch, yes, I’d say so.”
“But a legal one,” said Jones, smile still in place. This was going very much according to plan.
Blackburn Moses drew breath, and even that seemed to boom. “It’s a matter of intent, isn’t it?”
An unusually bright observation coming from that quarter, thought Jones. “Of course it is,” he said. “But how do you establish intent? Based on Ruth Marten’s say-so? And she will definitely claim to be well-intend.”
He paused to survey the seven faces again, all at various stages of attention. Then said, “Legally, we establish intent based on effect. Cause and effect
.”
Another long pause. “But when it comes to the anti-terrorist statutes, we cannot take a chance on intent. If someone who might be a terrorist has a bomb, and the opportunity to use it, we cannot take the chance that he or she is well-intended and will in fact not use it.”
Again he paused for effect.
“We cannot take the chance that Ruth Marten is well-intended.”
“I believe she is, though,” said Miller.
“The effect is,” and Jones stressed the word effect. “The effect is that your flocks are leaving, and they are rallying to her cry. She is decimating your churches. That is the effect, and effect usually—and legally—leads back to intent as the cause. There is no way this young lady does not know that her gun is loaded.”
Heads nod around the table. Jones has a point.
“And it’s aimed right at you,” said Jones.
More nods. Yes, yes, they see his point.
“Does anyone disagree?” said Jones.
No takers.
Again, Jones looks into his portfolio, and selects a document. This time it is a two-page conference letter, again with pre-arranged signature lines. He looks at it for a moment, as if considering how best to proceed. But it’s all for show, Jones is nothing if not the ultimate showman.
“Please,” he says to Miller, has he hands him the letter. “Please sign this, and pass it on.”
Miller laughs, a little nervously. “What does it say?”
“Take your time, read it,” said Jones. “By all means. Though all this letter says it that we, as the delegates of the New York Faith Summit, recognize the grave danger posed by the unparalleled influence of Ruth Marten on the young of the world, and how this unparalleled influence is driving our flocks away from our churches.
“It further states that we request that the U.S. Justice Department, as well as the Department of Homeland Security, look into this threat and take whatever legal action they deem appropriate. Not verbatim, but that’s the gist.”
Miller, reading the letter nods in agreement. “Yes,” he says. Then looks for his signature line, and signs it.
The letter then makes its way around the table, to then arrive back to Jones by way of Blackburn Moses, signed by one and all. Jones then, with quite a flourish, signs his allocated line, and restores the letter to his portfolio.