Crooked Vows

by John Watt

  He looks directly into Thomas’s eyes.

  ‘Finally, if we don’t meet each other again, I wish you good luck in your calling. Whatever it might turn out to be, in the end.’

  Walking out to the street, Thomas turns over in his mind Macpherson’s final words. His calling, whatever it might turn out to be, in the end. He wonders whether this man can see something looming in his future that he himself is at present unable to imagine.

  15

  Revelation

  Thomas steps off the bus and checks his watch. Thanks to the shorter consultation he’ll be back a good hour earlier than in the previous weeks. He steps out briskly on the twenty-minute walk. It’s a cooler afternoon; autumn is setting in at last.

  He thinks about that outburst of Macpherson’s about the church—intemperate, he had called it himself. The thought brings out a flock of questions that he had tried to cage at the back of his mind. They circle around inside his head. What is the reason for admiring a man who wastes an apple rather than eating it or giving it to someone else? Or another who refuses to visit his mother because he is so busy at the Lord’s work. Is it possible that the Lord would have been better pleased with him visiting his mother? What would Thomas’s own mother have thought about it? And why would we believe in a God who is gratified to see people suffer—at the hands of other people or at their own hands. Hair shirts, and fasting nearly to the point of starvation. And worse. Whips: self-flagellation, not unknown among the saints. Not uncommon, in fact. Not all of it in the ancient times, either.

  And what would Macpherson say if he heard the story of the local priest who was found when he died, so it is said, to have a small wooden cross nailed to his back? In place for a long time. Old ulcers, probably stinking. Perhaps that is what killed him. The cross is rumoured to be stored somewhere in the diocesan archives waiting to be produced as a valuable holy relic when the man is declared a saint. The story has been passed around locally for years among the most devout, with a sense of wonder at the thought of treading the same ground that has been trodden by a holy man whose life was lived in the tradition of the saints of ancient times.

  What was Macpherson’s word? Perverted. From a Latin root. Turned the wrong way. Twisted. Is it possible that all of this is twisted in the wrong direction? He shakes his head to dislodge the unsettling thoughts, turning his attention to the real world. There is the house of the young mother with the bikini. Thomas’s pace slows. But there’s nobody in sight this afternoon. Perhaps the little fellow has a rest after lunch. What would his mother be doing now? Possibly resting too? On her bed? Their bed, hers and her husband’s?

  He remembers Macpherson wishing him good luck in his calling—whatever it might turn out to be in the end. He wonders. How do two people decide that their calling is to marry? How would the course of his life so far have had to be different, for him to be looking towards marriage instead of ordination? The world of shared homes and shared beds and shared lives, it’s unexplored territory for him. He wonders how people find their way into it.

  He quickens his stride, trying to leave the fantasy image behind him, hearing the clomping sound of his thick-soled black shoes on the paving slabs and feeling the bottoms of his trouser-legs flap awkwardly as he steps out with a determined briskness.

  Turning in at the church gate, as usual, he half-shuts his eyes and lets his gaze drift out of focus, looking for the real church shining through this ugly grey shed of a building. And there it is, the remembered fantasy: the carved stone, the spires, the gargoyles, the saints’ statues, the windows with light in them and more saints glowing in stained glass. But it all seems hazier than before, less sharply defined, as if drifting further away on an invisible current. The austere liturgical chant of his imagination is almost inaudible.

  He heads past the church towards the presbytery, passing the front room window on his way to the door. His footsteps are almost silent on the bare ground and dried grass that could in other hands be a front garden. It’s not only Father Kevin; Thomas can think of a few other Catholic churches set in barren surroundings like these. And those set in well-maintained gardens are generally in parishes wealthy enough to employ a gardener. How many priests are gardeners themselves? He can think of one, among dozens who are not.

  His eye is caught by some activity inside the front room. Curtains screen most of the window except for a small gap in the centre. There seem to be rhythmical movements going on inside, but he can’t see what is moving, or who. It is difficult to make out any forms in the dim interior, but perhaps there is a head.

  He moves closer to the window, stepping carefully to avoid noise and keeping to one side, letting the curtains screen his approach. He leans momentarily to the centre for a quick glimpse. There are two heads in view. One of them, facing away from him, is the unmistakeable narrow bald pate of Father Kevin, with its sparse rear fringe of hair showing above the back of a chair. The other is a smaller head, facing to the side of the room.

  Thomas chances a step to the centre of the window for a longer look. His eyes are beginning to adjust to the dimmer light inside. The smaller head is a boy’s, familiar, though only part of the face is in sight. Of course. The Regan boy, Michael, the youngest altar boy.

  He is sitting sideways on the small man’s lap. The priest’s right hand seems to be holding the hand of the boy, moving it. The hands themselves are out of sight, but from behind Thomas can see the two arms moving rhythmically, up, down, up, down. As the arms move, Father Kevin’s head and shoulders rock in time; back and forth, back and forth. A physical sense of disgust rises in Thomas’s throat. The sound of regular heavy panting comes faintly through the window. On the boy’s cheek there are the faint tracks of tears. Noticing them, Thomas feels a surge of anger; his stomach muscles tense, his fists clench wanting to strike out.

  The rhythm of the movements becomes faster. The small man’s whole body writhes, jerks convulsively, then relaxes with a long out-breath that can be heard clearly outside. Then for half a minute or so the two inside are motionless, and Thomas is caught between disbelief and horror. Is this a figment of his imagination? He reaches out to touch the window-frame to be sure that what he has been watching is part of the real world.

  The frozen moment is splintered suddenly. The boy half-turns his head, sees Thomas staring through the window, slips abruptly off Father Kevin’s lap. The priest struggles to his feet and turns to the window, eyes wide with alarm. His hands are scrabbling to cram a limp pinkish member back into his trousers.

  While the room dissolves into movement, the boy scurrying toward the door into the passage, the small man fumbling with the disarray of his trousers, Thomas remains at the window, watching the appalling scene as if from a distance, on a screen. He feels still frozen into position, all his muscles tense, his mind, too, as if paralysed.

  Then, quite suddenly, he begins to see the situation as if from a different location. He can’t remain simply a passive viewer, looking in from the outside. He is part of that scene, involved in it. It demands action from him. He takes a step away from the window and towards the front door, then hesitates, unable to visualise what he will do once inside. He turns and begins walking out towards the street and away, wanting more time to think. But before he reaches the footpath he realises that he must confront this situation now. He must take a first decisive step, and what will follow in the wake of that step will, he supposes, show itself. He turns back up the presbytery path. Opens the door and sees the Regan boy slinking out the back.

  He steps into the front room. Father Kevin finishes scrabbling with his trouser buttons and looks up. Thomas stands silent, just inside the room, looking at the scrawny little man. He watches the priest turning his face away, looking down, trying with one hand to hide the small wet patch on his trousers, and succeeding only in drawing Thomas’s attention to it.

  After a long awkward silence the priest speaks.

  ‘You’re back early, aren’t you? I wasn’t expecting you
till later. I was just talking to him, you know. About being a priest—going to the seminary.’

  Thomas looks at the scrawny shoulders, the narrow face, the pot belly, the bald pate. He shakes his head. The older man looks away, silent for a moment, then tries again. There’s an unpleasant sharpness in his voice.

  ‘He wanted to, you know. He started it. All over me. I could hardly stop him.’

  Thomas watches the petty man protesting, looking away, avoiding his eyes. What is this feeling: contempt? disgust? Anger takes over; the bitter taste of bile rises from his throat onto his tongue. He shakes his head again in silence. There are no words that he can find to say to this despicable wretch.

  Father Kevin takes a few steps to the window and stares out at the street for a couple of silent minutes. When he turns back his face wears a ghost of the familiar one-sided grin. Even at its best it is not, as the younger man has noticed before, an entirely happy grin and it is far from its best at this moment.

  ‘Well, m’boy. No point in protesting, I suppose. Caught red-handed, so to speak.’ He glances at his hand, the hand that was forcing the hand of the Regan boy. Wipes it against his trouser leg. ‘I’m off to the kitchen. There’s a bit of that Vat 69 left, I think. There’ll never be a better time to finish it off. You’ll join me?’

  The joviality doesn’t sound convincing. Thomas wonders whether it is ever real. He holds back in the doorway, watching as the narrow bald head and the puny shoulders retreat down the passage to the kitchen. How can he understand this miserable figure as the same man who stands tall in the pulpit in splendid robes every Sunday morning haranguing his congregation about their moral duties—and sits in the confessional listening to their outpourings of guilt? And judging them. It is all unintelligible. Thomas is unable to see what he is going to do about the situation, but certain that he must do something.

  First, though, he must try to get his head clearer—find some less confused understanding of what he has stumbled on. He follows down the passage, treading tentatively, uncertain what he will say or do when he gets to the end of it, arriving in the kitchen to hear the small priest set the bottle and two Vegemite glasses down on the table with a thump.

  ‘There we are. Half a bottle left, a bit more in fact. That’s better than I thought. Thank God.’

  He pours a cautious splash into one glass and a more generous ration into the other, keeping his eyes fixed on the task. He pushes the smaller share towards the younger man and slumps down in a chair with his own. Thomas watches the glass being slid towards him and pushes it away. How can he accept anything from that hand?

  Taking a careful sip, Father Kevin stares out through the kitchen window at the fence that separates the church property from the neighbours. He finishes his drink with one gulp and pours himself another.

  Finally the priest turns back to look Thomas in the face. The younger man turns his head away, feeling as he does so an onset of dizziness. Everything that has surrounded and shaped his life seems to be crumbling. The words of the familiar hymn come back to him: Change and decay in all around I see. Oh Thou who changest not … The flow of words dries up. Thomas is taken over by a strange sensation, as if he is falling into empty space. He grasps the edge of the table; at least that feels solid and dependable. Pulls out a chair and sits to save himself from falling.

  The small man speaks. The trace of strained joviality has gone altogether. He sounds tired, sad.

  ‘I don’t know what you’re thinking. About all of this.’

  He swallows another mouthful of whisky, looks despondently at the bottle, finishes what is left of his second drink and pours himself a full glass, gulping down a substantial part of it.

  ‘It’s not much fun, you know, being a parish priest. Especially in a place like this. I mean, look at it.’ He gestures around the room.

  Thomas looks around, following the gesture. It is certainly a mean little room. Fibro walls peeling, sadly in need of new paint. A fly-spotted framed print of a photograph of the pope hanging on one wall: Pius the Twelfth, looking, as always, lean, cold and remote. The lino on the floor is stained and cracked, almost worn through in the doorway and in front of the sink. The window looking out to the side fence is grimy and the dust coats the sill thickly, causing it to look stone grey.

  The young man shakes his head.

  ‘Yes, but what I saw. How could anyone do that? How could you?’

  Father Kevin sighs. Pours the last of the whisky into his glass and drains it in one mouthful, turning aside to stare out of the kitchen window for a full minute before responding.

  ‘What am I going to say? How could I do it? I don’t know. I tell myself I’ll never do it again. Every time. Well, nearly every time. But somehow I do.’ He turns towards Thomas with a faint hint of the same old grin. ‘Just can’t help myself, I suppose.’

  Thomas, listening, is beginning to grasp the dimensions of what he’s stumbled on. The incident seen through the front room window comes back to him, and with it the sensation of repugnance.

  ‘You mean you’ve done this before?’

  ‘You didn’t know? I wondered whether you’d have heard the story from someone. Some of it anyway. The old archbishop tried to keep it all quiet. Moved me on three or four times. Plenty of people seem to know something. You’d have heard sooner or later.

  ‘Why do you think I’m in this godforsaken parish, with hardly two pennies to rub together? And me nearly sixty. I should have been in a decent parish fifteen years ago. Like Bayview—nice house, housekeeper, gardener, a couple of curates and plenty of money coming in. I drove past that place last week when I took a Holden for a test drive. I tell you, m’boy, it brought tears to my eyes just to look at it. A big wide double garage with one of them big Fords in it—the new model. Shiny black. And a new Holden for second-best. Both of them paid for in cash, I suppose. And me getting knocked back for a loan on a Holden, even a demo car.’

  The little man picks up his glass again but finds it empty; then he reaches over the table for Thomas’s glass, draining it in one gulp. Puts the bottle to his lips to salvage the last few drops. ‘All gone. Sad.’ He stands and takes a couple of steps to the corner of the room to drop the empty bottle into the bin. It hits the rim as it falls, and tumbles inside with a clatter. ‘Clumsy me.’

  He returns to the table, stumbling against his chair on the way. Just over half a bottle of whisky in fifteen minutes is much more than he is used to. And on an empty stomach.

  ‘There’s one blessing: the boy won’t tell his parents. A strange little boy, he is. Hardly a word to say for himself—God knows why. And if he did tell them they probably wouldn’t believe him. Good Irish Catholics. Won’t say a word against the priest.

  ‘Still, you can never be sure what people are going to do. Like the last time I got shifted. Good Catholic parents they were, too. You’d have thought so anyway. But off they scuttled, straight to the archbishop, the old one. And here I am in this rat-hole.’

  He looks around the room, running one hand across his bald head. He turns suddenly towards Thomas, his small eyes narrow, suspicious, almost hostile.

  ‘You wouldn’t be thinking of it yourself, by any chance— turning me in—would you?’ The sharp unpleasant tone is back in the small man’s voice.

  Thomas spreads his hands out, looking towards the window. He can think of nothing to say. He knows he will do something, but what?

  ‘You might, eh? I’ll deny it, you know. Swear by all the powers. I’ll swear I found you at it yourself. Only trying to shift the blame onto me. That’s what I’ll tell them. You’ll regret it.’ His small mouth is half-open, teeth showing, eyes cunning.

  Just as suddenly the blustering and bravado disappear. He wilts. Rests his elbows on the table, his chin on his hands.

  ‘No. That wouldn’t wash. They’d never believe it, would they? Not after all the other stuff. I’d be out, you know. This new archbishop—I don’t know that he’s been told anything. I think they tried to ke
ep him in the dark about it, with him coming from elsewhere. Clean slate and all that. But it would all come out soon enough.’ There are tears in his eyes.

  ‘He wouldn’t shift me again, he’d just kick me out. And where would I go? This place might be a rat-hole but at least it’s a place. I don’t know any other life. Out on the street. Mourning and weeping in this valley of tears.’ He pauses, pathetic, pleading. ‘You wouldn’t tell, would you?’

  Thomas turns his head to avoid the sight of all this misery.

  ‘What do you mean? Tell the archbishop?’ He remembers the traces of tears down the altar boy’s cheeks, and feels the surges of repulsion and anger return.

  The little priest turns towards him, small eyes wide with another level of fear.

  ‘Of course the archbishop. Who else? Not the police? You wouldn’t think of going to the police, would you?’ The tears in his eyes spill down his narrow cheeks.

  Thomas shifts uncomfortably on the hard kitchen chair. The sight of tears running down the wretched man’s face brings tears to his own eyes. How long is it since he has cried? He can’t remember. The contempt that has been flooding his mind is, to his own surprise, mixed with a dawning sense of pathos. Will he go to the police? Father Kevin’s misery is heart-rending. But there is the little boy. And others too. He can’t answer. He can’t see far enough ahead to catch any glimpse of exactly what he will do. But whatever it is, he knows he must put a stop to this dreadful story.

  He clears his throat, aware that he sounds awkward, uncertain.

  ‘I don’t understand. You do this to little boys. Not just this one. Others. For years. But you say Mass every morning, you hear people’s confessions, preach sermons, all those other things. How does it fit together? How can you believe in what you do in church, and at the same time go on doing what I’ve just seen?