The City Below

by James Carroll

  The waiter hooked his fingers together and eyed Terry.

  "He'll have the same thing," Father Collins said. "Silver bullet"

  "No, no."

  "Don't be a kid, Terry. Next week you're a deacon. New status, new rules. It'll be legal. We'll just jump the gun a bit."

  The chalk-faced waiter leaned down. "It's legal now, sir. If you're eighteen."

  "I'll have a beer."

  "Bud? Miller?"

  "Fine. Bud. Thanks."

  How long had it been since he'd uttered those simple words? During his years in the seminary, even those years when so much else had changed, he had rarely eaten in a restaurant, driven a car, or spoken to a girl. He had not once left the seminary grounds —that rolling estate across from his own BC —without permission. With his dark windbreaker and button-down shirt, he did not appear all that set aside, but he sensed the waiter sizing him up for a perfect fool. It was a point of view Terry understood. No outsiders were fiercer critics of the defensive, isolating mediocrity of the seminary system than the seminarians themselves. But also they were the only ones with a lively sense of the system's two great virtues: the rare camaraderie it encouraged, and the powerful dependence on God which alone justified the anachronism of the way they lived.

  When Terry looked at Father Collins, his eyes had taken on a new luster. Dependence on God? Doyle knew enough to take dependence on booze as a signal too. He knew that his own expression, compared to the priest's freshly lubricated one, would be opaque. They stared at each other for a moment, then Father Collins, letting it go at that, opened his menu.

  "I recommend the artichoke."

  "Not a feature in Brighton."

  "Get it Take my word."

  A few minutes passed before Terry's beer came, and before the waiter took up his position with pencil and pad. Terry asked for scrod and the artichoke. Father Collins ordered only the famous chowder and another drink, but when Terry glanced at him, he ordered the artichoke too. The waiter disappeared again. The priest lifted his martini glass, studied the olive, and said quietly, "The cardinal thinks the great weakness of the modern Catholic Church is the worldliness of the clergy." He sipped his drink. Then he looked at Terry. "But do you know what I think?"

  "What?"

  "It's the old women."

  "The what?"

  "Not the literal old women, not them. They make the thing go. No, I mean the old women in cassocks and collars. Like Loughlin. That wannabe grand inquisitor."

  Terry had to smile. "Which is he? An old woman or Torquemada?"

  "Both. The most dangerous combination."

  "Funny thing, Father. I thought Humanae Vitae meant that young women were the great weakness of the Church. If we could just get rid of them —"

  "Now there's an idea. You've got a future in this outfit"

  "You know what the young women say. It's not the infallibility of the pope they worry about, it's the infallibility of the Pill."

  The abruptness with which Father Collins leaned forward banished their frivolity. "It's not an infallible statement," he said gravely. "There is no pretense to infallibility. Nobody claims that for the damn thing."

  "Then how can they make it binding in conscience, in confession?"

  Collins dropped his eyes. The fresh martini arrived in the nick of time. He stopped the waiter from removing the drained one, to pop its olive into his mouth. Then he snapped the toothpick in half with the thumb and forefinger of one hand. "They can't," he said. "Cush said to me, 'What am I supposed to do, be a cop under people's beds?'"

  "Conjugal police."

  Collins nodded. "It's impossible. Just impossible. The cardinal knows that better than anyone."

  "But that's what he expects us to be. Did you see that oath?"

  "The one we're not talking about?"

  "How does he expect us to sign that?"

  "So we are talking about it," Collins said.

  "Well, how does he?"

  The priest looked across the rim of his martini glass and said, "The way professors of a pontifical theologate sign the 'Rejection of the Syllabus of Errors,' which is a summary of everything we teach. The way three generations of priests before you signed the 'Oath Against Modernism,' which is all that the Vatican Council eventually affirmed. By holding your nose, Terry. That's how." He took a careful sip, then lowered his glass. "Which is what I wanted to tell you, what I want you to tell the others. This is just a new dose of the old fish oil. The trick is to swallow it quick It does nothing except let the dispensing quack pretend he's fixing something. In this case Cicognani, the apostolic delegate whose job is to keep the lid on over here. He's using Loughlin to force Cushing's hand. Loughlin wants the purple shirt, and this is the way to get it, and the Cush can't stop him. Cushing's the one liberal who could do them some damage on this, and that's why Rome has fired this shot across his bow. Cushing's conformity —the best way to show that the American Church has heard the pope speak and will come about Unfortunately, you guys are the midshipmen on deck doing the saluting. Just a wave of the hand, Terry, that's all. Cushing doesn't buy what's in that declaration, and he doesn't expect you to."

  "He expects us to sign it."

  "We all sign things, Terry. Hell, it's in Latin. Nobody will notice except those guineas in the Curia, the only ones who can read it."

  "I can read it, close enough."

  "I warned you about learning Latin too well. Dead language, dead, dead, dead. Now you won't even need it to say Mass."

  "What are you telling me, Father? Swear on the Word of God something I don't believe?"

  "You don't believe the world was created in seven days either. You don't believe the Red Sea parted for Moses, and you're not sure about the Virgin Birth. But do you debunk any of it? Symbolic language, Terry. We're talking about the truth beyond the literal meaning of the words."

  "Which is what?"

  "In this case, the order of the Church."

  "The order of the Church, Father? It depends on a class of new deacons taking a phony oath?"

  "Maybe it does."

  "Then things are worse than I thought."

  Father Collins dropped his eyes to his hands on the table. In his fidgeting, he had arranged the two sticks of the broken toothpick into a cross, stark against the white tablecloth. "They are worse than you thought, Terry. That's my point What are we supposed to do, jump ship?"

  "I appreciate the analogy, Father, but Peter's bark notwithstanding, you and I and my classmates aren't in the same boat, not yet."

  "We will be when you make the vow to obey the cardinal. What did you think that commitment means, anyway?"

  Terry's fingers itched to hold a cigarette, another out-of-the-question indulgence all these years. He clasped his hands around his beer glass, let its moisture overwhelm his perspiration. "The vow? But the vow, Father, that's an oath, isn't it? How can you point to the gravity of one oath to mala the point that another is no big deal? I'm confused, Father. Do we mean what we say or not? Isn't that the question?"

  "Come on, Terry. Keep your eye on the ball. The vow is part of a sacrament This thing Loughlin wants is hazing. One way to think of it is, he has no right, given the moral uncertainty surrounding the question, to ask for absolute fealty. Therefore you have a right to a mental reservation."

  "Hey, Father, come on. I'm not a college kid looking to beat the draft."

  "What are you, Terry?"

  "You're asking me that? After hearing my confession twice a month for years?"

  "And hearing an oversupply of ambivalence in your voice about your vocation. If you grab this oath business as a last-ditch excuse to bail out, you should at least be aware that that's what you're doing."

  "Who's talking about bailing out? As if this is my problem. We're talking about Humanae Vitae. A problem for the whole Church, you called it You were the first one to call it a disaster, that first week."

  "Before I came to terms with it."

  "Well, I haven't done that yet I'm
working on it I just don't know how I swear on the Bible that I already have."

  "Because your word is so precious to you. Because you cannot tell a lie. Who the hell are you, George Washington? It's your only flaw, Mr. Doyle, that perfect virtue of yours."

  "Jesus, Father." Terry looked away, horrified to feel a burning behind his eyes. The figures across the restaurant were blurred suddenly. He tried to think of something else, and what popped into his mind was Nick, how his brother would skewer him. "Make like a tree and leave, Charlie," he would say, and when Terry winced, Nick would poke him. "The tree of life, kid. Let's climb it." Terry would answer, "That's what I thought I was doing, so why do I feel like I'm sinking?"

  "Now here's my confession," Father Collins said abruptly. "I'm having lunch with you because Loughlin told me to." The priest drained his martini in a gulp and held the glass up until a passing waiter took it "Loughlin sensed how the boys take their cues from you. He sensed the trouble coming, and he can't have it And I promise you, the Cush can't have it either. The archdiocese does not need rebellion in the ranks."

  "You know better than anyone how far I am from being a rebel."

  "Yeah, so were Lucifer's angels. They just thought they were a little better than the others, a little purer. Their word of honor, you know, was a tad more sacred."

  "I'm not better than anybody. That's not what I'm saying."

  "What are you saying?"

  "I'm trying to be on board here, Father."

  "Good. That's good."

  The waiter brought him his drink. Terry watched the priest's hand shake as he brought it to his mouth, and, to his horror, he found himself thinking, I'm better than you.

  "Good," Father Collins said again. He leaned back. "Monsignor Loughlin also told me to tell you not to call any meetings about the oath."

  "What?"

  "No assemblies, no group discussions. Just distribute copies and leave each man alone to come to terms with his own conscience, in counsel with his confessor, if needs be."

  "Like this, you mean."

  Father Collins shrugged.

  "I don't control whether my classmates have meetings, Father."

  "You're just not to call it, that's all. Understand?"

  "Yes," he said, then added to himself, Mental reservation: what if I already did?

  "Good."

  "Anything else?"

  "Yes. You've a bright future ahead of yourself, Terry. This thing is temporary. We've been through it before. Hunker down. The wind blows, knocks the Church around. But you know what? It's the wind of the Holy Spirit Our faith in his guidance means that eventually the truth will out, and then you and I will laugh about this little setback. You'll see."

  "And meanwhile, the men and women whose lives are wrecked by it? Or whose faith in the Church is? What about them?"

  Father Collins's face clouded over, and Terry thought for sure he would get angry now. Yes, that would be next, the revelation that the priest beloved of all was a mean bastard drunk.

  But the waiter arrived just then. When he'd placed the artichokes in front of each one, when he'd poured the pungent dressing over the gaping mouth of the crusty flower, he departed.

  Terry said, "It looks like a grenade."

  "Ready to explode?" Father Collins laughed, and his mood brightened as he lifted his martini. "You've really never had an artichoke? Reason enough right there not to ordain you. Watch." He set down his drink, flapped his napkin to the side, then tucked its corner into his collar and spread the cloth. Then he removed a leaf of the artichoke, scooped the vinaigrette, and put the tip of the leaf between his teeth. He pulled sharply once, for the meat, then closed his lips on the leaf a second time, to suck it "Delicious."

  Terry imitated him, although without the napkin at his neck. The tiny morsel he coaxed off the end of the leaf was delicious, but it surprised him to realize that the nubby dp was all there was to eat It was a relief to have the complicated novelty of the thistlelike artichoke as a point of concentration.

  The two men worked their leaves in silence for some moments.

  "Imagine," Father Collins said, "the first guy to eat one of these, huh?"

  Imagine, Terry thought instead, the first guy to stand up to the pope. But that was Martin Luther, and if ever there was a man who'd aggrandized himself ...

  The seminarians' up-to-date study of the Reformation had been ecumenical: Luther was sincere and had valid criticisms to make. And it was psychological: Luther was constipated and hated his father. The seminarians were taught not to condemn Luther, but to disdain him.

  Terry felt mystified suddenly by how he came to be here, in a public-setting conference with his private confessor, feeling confused and guilty. For what? Hesitating to swear falsely? Only a minute ago, it seemed, he was holding that girl, touching her skin inside her winter clothing at the Lincoln Memorial, his chest full of air, trying to help her remember how to breathe. Over the years, that image had taken over the empty niches in his mind while men around him went on about the proofs of God's existence or the question of whether Christ had really felt pain or only pretended to. If Didi Mullen had presented a classic occasion of sin, what the hell was this?

  The rank absurdity of his situation made him laugh out loud as he tore open the core of the artichoke. "Yes," he said, "imagine."

  "Watch that part, lad. It's where the name comes from, the heart Eat that and you choke." lerry looked up sharply because Father Collins's voice had slipped into a slur. At the corner of his mouth, a ribbon of saliva leaked. His always rheumy eyes were now fully glazed over. The edgy posture in which he customarily held himself had folded. He was smiling serenely, needless to say.

  Terry thought of his mother. Her drink was not gin but sherry, with which she had maintained her steady, low-grade buzz. Sherry or beer, like Terry had in front of him now. "When I was a kid," he said, as much to himself as to the priest, "my mother used to make me go to confession when I knew I hadn't done anything wrong. My only sins were the lies I told the priest in the box, so I'd be like the others."

  Father Collins reached across the table and clasped Terry's hand. "You know I love you, Terry," he said sadly, "but I have to say your sin was thinking you weren't already like them. And it still is."

  "Maybe so, Father." Terry took his hand back and unconsciously wiped his fingers on the napkin. He could not bring himself, after that, to look at his mentor.

  The rest of the meal went strangely. They hardly spoke again. Father Collins did not bother to feign interest in the chowder when it came, spooning it over on itself once or twice but never tasting it. Twice more he drained his martini, ate the olive, snapped the toothpick in half, held the torch of his glass up until a waiter replaced it. Meanwhile the fingers of his free hand fussed with the pieces of broken toothpicks, absently arranging them into shapes and figures, boxes and letters and, once, the cross of Jesus again, which, from Terry's vantage, resembled a sword.

  Terry, meanwhile, idled with his fish, pretending to eat, aware that other diners increasingly eyed the unsteady priest. Then at last the meal was over, and Terry was mortified when he realized that Father Collins was preparing to leave with no expectation of having to pay.

  "What about the check?"

  "Not at Dini's," the priest said. "No such thing." He was sober enough to read Terry's reaction: Clerical privilege, no wonder the people hate us. But he was not sober enough to rein in the fierceness with which he leaned across the table. "We do them the favor. It brightens the tone of the place, having the dog collar in here. That's why they put us up front Business, we help business. You'll get the picture soon enough."

  But Terry's thoughts, as he looked at the ribbon of spittle on the priest's chin, were: I already have the picture. And: I'm no dog, and neither are you.

  On Tremont Street he helped Father Collins into a cab, to bring him back to St John's, and Terry started to get in too. But the priest refused to allow it "You'll get into trouble," he said, "if you show up wi
th me."

  Terry watched the cab pull away. At the corner of Park Street it swung right, gunning for the golden dome of the State House and then out of sight But Terry continued staring after it, as if he could see the long arrow of Beacon Street cutting through Back Bay and Kenmore Square, through Brookline and out to Brighton. Unconsciously his eyes rested on the soft greens of the Boston Common, and he allowed himself to slip into a kind of trance of melancholy. He did not move.

  One of the things that made Terry Doyle a true Bostonian was the way in which the very geography of the city could serve as the throne of his ruling moods. Nothing had enshrined the ache of his boyhood desire like the sparkling view from Bunker Hill; the sense of marginality that went with seminary life like the location of St. John's on the far edge of the city; and now the feeling, admitted at last, of being weighted down by what he saw from where he stood. The Parker House took over the field of his concentration. Its awning protruded over the pavement To most of Boston, the old hotel meant the famous dinner rolls, or perhaps the place where Dickens stayed, or the basement Grill Room, Curley's favorite watering hole. But to Doyle, the Parker House meant only Kennedy.

  He began to walk toward it and soon was passing the row of storefronts, long since redivided and tenanted, that had served as the. 1960 campaign headquarters. His focus went to the curbside spot where he and Didi had briefly met Ted Kennedy, the young, bright-eyed brother who, that night, had been barely older than Terry Doyle was now. The change in Ted's status, more than anything, defined the decade.

  Ted Kennedy. Terry could not help but think of him standing at the podium in the sanctuary of St Patrick's Cathedral a bare three months ago, quoting Bobby: "Each time a man stands up for an ideal, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope."

  Ripples. Doyle was aware of the salty ocean in his throat, and he was waiting for something to breach its surface. How easy to imagine the surviving brother, staggered and afraid, wondering in secret, What will I do now?

  Yes, what?

  Terry's question, of course. And it told him that, in this navigation, the needle of his inner compass was drawn not toward points of faith, the last words of Jesus, any teaching of the Church —but to Kennedy.