by Tony Brennan
“My story actually begins the day before yesterday – that is Wednesday morning.”
***
Father Spotel’s narrative:
I had finished the work on the newspapers and been buzzed to let me know the cardinal was ready for our usual morning office routine. I gathered up my notes, and went into his office. We exchanged greetings and set to work.
The cardinal has a tremendous memory, and rarely uses notes, but he keeps a pad near him as I speak, so that if something he thinks important is said, he can jot it down in the strange shorthand he uses.
As I went through the political news, I really paid no heed to his usual derogatory remarks about the people involved – they were, as per usual, that is, ‘Why doesn’t that pestilential politician become a beachcomber – that’s all he’s fit for?’; ‘Isn’t that old idiot dead yet?’ and other felicitous remarks. It was when I got on to the Entertainment section that is of relevance to you, Inspector, so I’ll skip to that … I said to the Cardinal:
“Eminence, didn’t you tell me that you knew Terry Devlin; that he had been with you in the seminary, training for the priesthood, at one time?” The cardinal’s face grew sorrowful.
“Poor Terry! Broke his mother’s heart, it did. Only stayed one year in the seminary, then left. I knew he wasn’t for the priesthood; he should have left, but, afterwards …”
“Yes?”
“Oh, terrible things, Sammy, terrible! Did some tumbling and tap dancing act in some music hall, or other …vaudeville, I think.”
“Vaudeville, Eminence, was before your time …” The cardinal interrupted me, saying darkly:
“At my age, Sammy, there is practically nothing before my time, except perhaps Adam and Eve.”
“That’s as may be, but Terry Devlin certainly didn’t do vaudeville acts. What did he do?”
“Oh, didn’t he? Well, possibly, it was something about sword swallowing or juggling, or something,” the cardinal exclaimed impatiently: “I don’t really know. I only know that he ended up very badly; but he was once a great friend and I pray for him daily.”
“Well he didn’t end up too badly, Eminence,” I was happy to announce. “He is Sir Terence Devlin now, and he’s a pretty famous Opera singer – past his prime now, of course.”
The cardinal’s eyes were goggling. “Sir Terence? Oh, isn’t that a kindness of God. I must ring his mother.” He then gasped with annoyance. “Sammy, I’ve done it again! I’d forgotten the good woman’s been dead for at least thirty years – a bad sign … Never mind … Sir Terry, eh? Doesn’t that beat the band! And he’s appearing in some musical, or other, is he? What part is he playing?”
I had been waiting for this question. “Oh, nothing much, Eminence, only that of Pope St. Leo the Great!”
“WHAT? Is it a religious play?”
“Well, in a way you could say it is. You see, it’s a famous Opera by an Italian chap called Verdi, and Attila the Hun calls off sacking Rome because of the intervention of that saintly, and wonderful Bishop, Leo. And, your old friend is playing the non-singing role of that saint.” The cardinal was scandalized.
“The nerve of him – after the sort of life he’s led! … But why is that of particular interest to me here, in this city this morning?”
“Because, Eminence, he’s actually performing down at the Opera House, five minutes away from us. Tonight is the opening night of the Opera, ‘Attila.”’
“Well, well, I never! Very interesting.” The Cardinal sat up straight then picked up his notes. “Right! That’s enough gossiping; we’ve got a lot of things to do today Sammy, and then tonight …remind me again …” I looked at my diary:
“The six o’clock Mass for the Men’s Society. Remember, Eminence, there’ll only be a small number present – about one hundred, or so – before their annual meeting. You are not attending the meeting; we’ll be finished by eight o’clock, so it won’t be too tiring for you. Your sermon is typed up – jolly good if I may say so – and Miss Wright will have it for you when we come back from the meeting of the School Funding Board.”
“Thank you Sammy, now regarding the Funding details of the school meeting …”
The meeting continued, Inspector, as on any other ordinary morning. It was at night that everything went haywire.
***
At seven-forty five that evening, the cardinal followed the servers, and me – who acts as his secretary, and his MC as well – back into the sacristy to unvest after Mass. As we entered the large room, the cardinal’s cell phone started its infernal ringing.
Cardinal York has this thing about bells, so had chosen to have, as his call-sign, a peal of clashing bells clanging away each time his phone rang. The problem with this was that he usually forgot to turn it off most times when we went onto the sanctuary, in the cathedral. Thus, in the middle of High Mass, there could erupt a gigantic peal of bells emanating from the cardinal’s trouser pocket. As he wore a microphone clipped to his vestments, the mike picked up the sound, and it reverberated throughout the entire huge cathedral.
I’ve often thought people in the cathedral must think that the hunch-back of Notre Dame was real, not fiction, and that we’ve got him locked up in the bell-tower, where he swings, madly and insanely, on the great bells, whenever the mood takes him.
The cardinal picked up his phone and said grumpily: “Yes? … Cheryl Stoking? … The what? … The diver? No, I’m not interested in aquatic performers …” I grabbed the phone out of the cardinal’s hand.
“Miss Stoking, this is Father Spotels, the cardinal’s secretary. Yes, I’m sorry, a very bad line … Naturally, I know who you are, Miss Stoking – surely there isn’t a person in the entire world who doesn’t know the famous and wonderful Opera diva, Cheryl Stoking … Well, of course we will, anything we can do to help … Oh, I am sorry, he is my cardinal’s old friend; very ill, you said? What exactly was Sir Terence’s message? … … Really? Would you please hold for one moment, while I relay that to the cardinal? … Thank you …” I turned to the cardinal.
“Eminence, it seems that your old friend and fellow student, Terry Devlin, is dying, and is asking for you personally. He said to give you a special message. He said: ‘tell Charlie, I’m a goner, and I’m cashing in my chips, but there’s sticky problems to clean up, such as six marriages and … um … other things. Tell him he must come to save me, to pay me back, for I know he cheated at the first Logic exam we did in first year – because he copied from my paper, and we both got it wrong.”
The cardinal started to blush, and blustered to cover up:
“Is all this serious, Father? Is he actually dying? Ask that Choking woman how long does he have?” I picked up the phone again.
“Miss Stoking? Sorry to keep you. I have told the cardinal everything and he asked how long do you think Sir Terence has? … Oh my God! Truly? Just fifteen minutes. Right! We’ll do our best anyway. Tell him we’re coming …What’s that? He asked that the cardinal come fully vested? That’s pretty peculiar … very well.”
“Yes, I heard, Sammy. Fully dressed, huh? That’s just like the silly chap; he’d make a drama even out of his own death! Oh, well, we’ll have to take the bike; we’d never get through the traffic at this time of night. Fifteen minutes! Dear God have mercy on us, and on the dying poor man – dreadful humbug that he actually is, really! Right, grab the holy oils, and off we go.”
Well, we actually ran to the garage beneath the cathedral – the cardinal’s pretty nippy on his pins – and I had completely forgotten that the cardinal was still carrying his crosier. We had no time to go back, and as it is solid silver, we couldn’t just dump it – we were stuck with it. For the first time I was glad that the cardinal had chosen, against my wishes, to wear a particularly high mitre on his head with precious stones glittering in it.
I objected to it, as it was too tight for his head, and I always had a terrible job, taking it off and putting it on, during Solemn High Mass, but he persisted in using it
, and now I was glad. With it so tight, there was no danger of it coming off while we tore through the streets at a fearful rate.
The cardinal put the wretched crosier horizontally across his knees, and held it and my belt with one hand, and the flaps of his mitre with the other. As we tore through the crowded streets, there were several loud metallic noises, and a lot of swearing from other cars, but, to tell the truth, I was driving so fast I was not really paying attention to the other vehicles on the road.
We arrived at the Opera House, and went charging in the back entrance, explaining our presence as we ran to the Green Room, where apparently Sir Terence had been taken. The stage manager met us, and shouted some meaningless greeting which meant nothing to us. Something about: ‘Thank God, you’ve brought your own costume!’ while the famous diva Cheryl Stoking stood, looking magnificent, in her wonderful costume examining her face in a mirror.
Her face was painted with an extraordinary amount of ‘blue-ness’ around the eyes. The cardinal muttered to me as we raced along: “Why does that Choking woman have blue around her eyes? A birthmark perhaps?” He never received an answer, as we had arrived at the Green Room by then, and Cardinal York had rushed in to his old friend whom he found lying on a fancy velvet lounge looking dramatically ill. The cardinal took the holy oils from me and told me, and a group of stage people, brusquely, to ‘get the hell out,’ so we did.
We huddled in the hall. Five minutes later the cardinal came out looking very serious.
“Father Spotels, you and I are about to make our stage debut!”
“We’re what?” I shouted. “Have you gone completely insane?”
The stage manager bustled up. “They’re ready. Just follow the monks and the other priests, and you, son, stay close to the understudy. When you get to Attila the Hun, he will fall at the bishop’s feet; the bishop will bless him, and then he will follow the procession off the other side of the stage. All understood?”
“No!” I shouted, just as the cardinal said: “Perfectly.”
The costume manager rushed up to us as we joined this weird procession. He grabbed me: “No you can’t go on like that; it’s too ordinary; put this cape over your black skirt – that’ll look more authentic.” Before I could get out of it, I was walking on to the Opera stage beside the cardinal, who was looking magnificent in his very tall mitre and robes, with me, at his side, looking as if I were a prize fighter dressed up in his mother’s old tatty sequinned evening cape.
The cardinal kept whispering to me as we walked slowly across that endless stage: “They do this better than we do, Sammy; where do all these monks come from? I thought there was a shortage of vocations? Does their Abbot know what they’re doing, I wonder? Goodness, isn’t the singing magnificent, and so loud! I had no idea there’d be so much noise!”
The ‘noise’ was thrillingly magnificent: the whole chorus were singing their heads off, the orchestra going flat out, while the greatest noise seemed to be coming from a chap, with horns on his helmet, in the centre of the stage. He turned to see us, and began uttering cries of what seemed like surprise mingled with anguish.
The cardinal followed the procession to Attila. Charles Cardinal York had a magnificent voice himself, though at his age, naturally enough, it was slightly cracked. He faltered for a moment, as he stared at the opera singer, who was now on his knees at his feet. The cardinal looked startled, and then his great voice boomed out:
“Ar-tur-o!” and, unconsciously mimicking the sounds around him, he sang the name on three notes. The orchestra faltered, and stopped.
A deadly silence permeated the 3,000 seat auditorium. Attila was crying; the cardinal was bent over him, and then I noticed his hand rising slowly in benediction. Being a bishop, without thinking, the cardinal began to sing the benediction, as he usually did at the Latin High Mass: “Benedictio Dei omnipotentis, Patris + et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti, descend---------.” He laid his hand on Attila’s head, and gently raised him by the arm up to his feet again.
Both the cardinal and the singer seemed oblivious to the terrifying, total silence enveloping this huge building. I was nearly fainting with sheer terror – stuck in the middle of that god-awful stage – the size of a football stadium.
I think it was sheer funk that made me bellow out: “A…men.” I’ve had to do that many times at Mass, when the choir has failed to respond when they should.
At the end of my long note, the first violin began to replay the last section of what Attila had been singing; the rest of the orchestra joined in; the tenor, brought back to the present by the sound, picked up the line, and then his glorious voice rang out in triumphant joy.
The cardinal and I then followed the procession to stage left, and found ourselves back in the corridor.
I was dripping with sweat, and ripping the tatty cape from my body, I grabbed the arm of my boss. “Eminence, what about Sir Terence? Do we need to go back there? Is he dead?”
To my amazement the cardinal swore.
“Damn fellow! I should have known! He always was a tricky bloke; nothing wrong with him – strong as an ox; just sprained his ankle and wanted an understudy to go on, for one night only. If they got another chap to play the Bishop, then the precious Sir Terence would have got the sack! Hasn’t changed a bit; was always getting other people to do his work back at the seminary!”
“But,” I asked, “what about the other fellow – the ‘Arturo Hun’ chap on stage?”
The cardinal’s eyes glowed with happiness and satisfaction. “What a surprise that was, Sammy! That was Young Arturo, the son of another great old friend of mine who was also at the seminary with me – he left in the second year, I think. I knew he had a very gifted son, but we lost touch. The boy’s father’s dead now, and his son, Young Arturo, is singing the lead in this Opera – his first big lead in his own town.
“When I saw the young man I received a shock; for a moment I thought I was seeing my dear old friend whom I knew was dead – the son is the living image of his father. That’s why I called out his name. But when he saw me he recognized me instantly, and, good lad that he is, knelt down immediately and asked for my blessing – very moving, actually.
“We both really forgot where we were; I invited him to the cathedral tomorrow for afternoon tea, and it was only when you bellowed out your frightful ‘Amen’, that we realised where we were – and that we were not alone.”
We had reached the bike by this time. The cardinal perched himself complacently on the back, still with that blasted crosier in his hand.
“I did not bellow,” I objected.
“You did, you know full well you did.”
“Well, if I did, it was to help you get out of the mess you’d got us both in.”
“That’s as may be; let’s get moving …”
“No, I want to know; how did young Arturo recognize you?”
The Cardinal interrupted me. “Good Gracious me! What does this silly chap want?” I turned to see the director of the Opera running to catch us.
“Good work, chaps! That was splendid. We’ll keep in that ‘ad lib’ business you did tonight – the crowd loved it. Anytime you want to earn a bit of pocket money as extras – that goes for both of you …”
I was angry at this affront to the cardinal. “I’ll have you know, sir, that this is a real bishop, not a pretend one!”
The director laughed loudly, and slapped his sides. “Oh, you are so good! A real one! Off you go; you actors tell the biggest whoppers ever!” And laughing, he went back into the building. The cardinal, totally unperturbed, turned back to me.
“You were asking, Father?”
“How young Arturo recognized you instantly on stage tonight?” The cardinal actually looked slightly embarrassed.
“Well, it seems that his father spoke about me a lot, and they actually had my official portrait-photo in their hall …”
“To frighten the burglars, I suppose …”
“Sammy, Sammy, Sammy,” Cardinal York
chided sadly, shaking his head. “I have to tell you that I’m very concerned about you. You see, I shouldn’t be telling you this, but I have an important report to write on you soon. It could be that it concerns your promotion …”
“You don’t mean that anyone would be mad enough to think of promoting me, do you? Good God!” I shouted in amazement.
“Believe me, Father, I share your astonishment! … However,” continued the cardinal, “I’m beginning to think that you do not have sufficient ‘gravitas’.”
“Gravitas?”
“It means …”
“For heavens’ sake, I know what it means! Well, I think I have enough ‘gravitas’ as anyone needs. I don’t go tumbling somersaults around the office in my undies, do I?”
“No, Sammy, but that’s only because I won’t let you.”
I gave a theatrical sigh. “That’s true, of course,” I answered sadly, and we both collapsed in laughter. “OK Eminence, hold on to your mitre; keep that blasted crosier upright – might be safer that way – and it’s back to the cathedral for us. And,” I added firmly, “when we get there, we’re going to have a small sherry before bed – to mark our first, and last appearance on the Opera stage!”
With the Cardinal chuckling behind me I drove as fast as I dared back to the Cathedral.
***
Father Spotels stopped, and paused for a few moments. He then declared: “And, that, Inspector Naseby, is the whole story!” He had kept his eyes down on his clasped hands all the time he had been speaking, trying to remember every detail that the inspector had demanded.
He now lifted his head, and was puzzled to see both Miss Wright and Constable Costello shaking with laughter and holding hands, while the inspector’s eyes were like saucers.
“You don’t mean to tell me that was what actually happened?” shouted the highly incensed policeman.
“Of course, that’s what I was trying to do: tell you every detail of the whole evening – it’s the complete truth.”
“I don’t believe it!” The Inspector shook his head. “No, I cannot believe it; it’s like something from a Marx brothers’ film.” He stood up and motioned to the constable. “Come on Constable, let’s get out of this place. I’m writing this down as a case of ‘mistaken identity’. No one would ever believe it, if I told the truth.”