The Good Shepherd

by Thomas Fleming

  I come to you without a mandate from my fellow bishops, without a following among my fellow priests. I have spoken to no one about this letter, or about what I am seeking. I have remained true to the vow of secrecy I took when Your Holiness raised me to the cardinalate. I only wish a chance to sit down with you as I was privileged to sit with your beloved predecessor and open my heart to you, to give you advice that I do not believe you are hearing within the walls of the Vatican, to warn you that the Church that we both love, the vessel in which the spirit of God voyages among the children of men, is in danger of catastrophe. Hear me, I beg you, before you speak against the Dutch bishops. Do not become another Pius IX or, worse, Julius II, a name spoken with regret by those who speak with charity, and with execration by those who speak the truth.

  Sincerely yours in Christ,

  Matthew Cardinal Mahan

  He had rewritten it a half-dozen times. It said too much, too much. He should have waited a day, until he was calmer. But it told the truth, the spiritual and the emotional truth. That was what he wanted to do, that was what he had to do from now on.

  Beside Matthew Mahan, Dennis McLaughlin tried to make up his mind whether he was frightened or exultant. He exulted to see the vision of his challenge to the papal monarchy suddenly assuming such staggering reality. Events and the courage of the man beside him were catapulting him light-years beyond the world of books. There was no need to take notes, to cite authorities, to elaborate arguments. This was a living challenge.

  Then, his fright or his fear would take charge. It was not concerned with possible punishment, some unforeseen public humiliation. It revolved around Matthew Mahan as a human being, as a man he loved. From the moment he said those words about going to Rome, Dennis could literally see the torment that began tearing the man apart. It was not simply one conflict; it was several. The smoothie, the man who hated to rock the boat or have his boat rocked, was appalled by the utter unorthodoxy of the act. It was so easy for him to put himself in Paul’s place, and ask himself: What would I do, what would I think?

  The humble bishop, the disciple of Pope John that he had been struggling to become for the past eight months, was equally appalled. Wasn’t this arrogance of the worst sort? Who was he, ex-infantry chaplain, ex-hotshot fundraiser, the non-scholar who barely graduated from the seminary, who was he to come hurtling into Rome to lecture the Prince of the Apostles, surrounded by the world’s best theologians? Then there was the loyalist, the man who shuddered at this implied threat to betray the man who had made him a Prince of the Church. Dennis’s eyes strayed to the right, and he saw Matthew Mahan fiddling with his Cardinal’s ring. The familiar symptom of inner disturbance. It had become acute in the last three days. He was tempted to say: Why don’t you take it off and put it in your pocket? But it was better, much better, not to let on how much he knew. Perhaps it made his guilt easier to bear.

  If Matthew Mahan had slept an hour in the last three nights, it would be remarkable, Dennis thought, eyeing him covertly. His face was ashen. Undoubtedly, his stomach throbbed with pain. He watched the big hand with the mass of black hair sprouting from its back move slowly across his belt line. Now they were piling on top of this exhaustion the ultimate barbarity, a night flight to Europe.

  “Why don’t you take a pill and try to sleep?” Dennis said.

  “I never sleep on planes, I’m afraid.”

  Five minutes later, he was dozing. Dennis signaled the stewardess, and she took a blanket from the overhead rack and spread it across the Cardinal’s chest. Watching the big head as it nodded to one side, Dennis found himself praying. Dear God, watch over him, please. Give him the strength, give him the strength. He stared moodily out the window at the stars. What were their chances, really? Weren’t you more interested in the attempt than in the possibility of success? He had poured out a lot of his guilt to Helen Reed last night. Calmly, she had told him to endure it. He was guilty. It was marvelous, the way women accepted reality.

  Dennis squirmed in his seat. He had been unable to tell her the next thought that had coruscated through his brain. If they failed, and he left the Church to marry her, would his book be worth writing? Wouldn’t the author be dismissed instantly as one of those failed priests who was trying to justify his weakness? A gust of desire had shaken him as he kissed Helen last night. Now you are going back to Rome, back to where love and sunshine mingled above the Tiber for the first time. Would it also be where love died?

  He fell asleep. He, too, had spent much of the previous three nights staring into the darkness. When he awoke, harsh slices of daylight were cutting through the drawn curtains. The overhead lights came aglow. The stewardesses began passing out orange juice and coffee. The pilot told them they would be landing in a half hour.

  “Do you think the baggage handlers are still on strike?”

  “I don’t know. At least we won’t have to worry about 400 pieces of luggage,” Matthew Mahan said.

  He shook out some pills and swallowed them with his orange juice. “Hey, that isn’t on your diet,” Dennis said.

  “I know. But I’m thirsty.”

  His smile was almost boyish. There was a reckless glint in his eyes. “Did you wire Father Mirante to meet us at the pensione?”

  “Yes. I’m not sure that was a good idea. If they find out you’re talking to him -”

  “I know. But we have to talk to him. He knows where Mary Shea - Mary Furia - is.”

  They made an uneventful landing, passed swiftly through customs, and taxied to the Pensione Christina. Dennis had selected it because it was inexpensive - and the Cardinal could be anonymous there. Father Mirante was waiting for them in the lobby, an especially doleful expression on his sallow face. He went upstairs with them to the single room they had reserved and Matthew Mahan ordered a second breakfast, a glass of milk for him and coffee and rolls for Mirante and Dennis. While they waited, he showed Mirante his letter. He read it swiftly and said something in Italian. Matthew Mahan laughed. “He says I’ve been seized by a heroic inspiration. That’s a polite way of saying I’m out of my mind.”

  Mirante smiled nervously. “No, no, Your Eminence,” he said in English. “It makes me all the more certain that I will return to your archdiocese with you, with your permission.”

  “You have that already.”

  Mirante murmured something about personal matters delaying him. “Never mind, never mind,” Matthew Mahan said. “What do you think our next move should be?”

  “I would call Confalonieri or his deputy. I presume you sent him a copy of this letter?”

  “Of course. It’s his business, too.”

  “He’s not a bad fellow. But he won’t even begin to decide what to do about you.”

  “Is there a chance of getting to see His Holiness?”

  “There’s always a chance,” Mirante said. “What will happen if you see him and he tells you to go home and keep your mouth shut?”

  “I’ll go home and keep my mouth shut.”

  “Are you sure? Or is it possible that your young friend here will persuade you to do something more daring?”

  Suddenly Dennis did not trust Father Mirante.

  Matthew Mahan asked him if he had located Mary Shea. Mirante nodded. “She is staying at a little convent to which she has contributed a great deal of money. It is on the outskirts of Rome.”

  “Take me there, now.”

  It was a long cab ride - almost a half hour down the Via Ostia, the road that Peter and Paul had taken when they first came to Rome. Mary met him in a small bare sitting room, a crucifix on the wall the only decoration. She looked ill. “I’m not sleeping,” she said, with a wan smile. “I’m trying to make it this time on prayer. No pills.”

  He told her why he was here - the clerical reason, first, the letter to the Pope, the imminent declaration on celibacy. “But you’re the real reason, Mary. I’m here to tell you something. Something I never thought I would have to tell you.”

  “What?”

>   “You’ve committed a sin. A serious sin.”

  She shook her head, wide-eyed. “How?”

  “A sin against the Christian ideal - the Church’s ideal - of love, Mary. You can’t do this to Mike. You can’t let a man start to love you the way he loves you - and then turn your back on him.”

  “I thought it was better to do it now, Matt, than later.”

  “That’s another sin, Mary. A sin against faith.”

  Her lovely face crumpled. Tears began to flow. He braced himself to endure them. “Matt - if you could have married us. If I felt I had your - your real blessing.”

  He seized her arms and gave her one fierce shake. “Mary! You have it.” Behind those words, he was saying: Receive ye the Holy Spirit. “As a bishop of the Holy Roman Catholic Church, I absolve you of all stain of sin in the love of this man. I affirm before God that it is a true, good, holy marriage. Receive ye the Holy Spirit.”

  “Oh, Matt.”

  She crumpled against him. He held her in his arms and prayed once more, Receive ye the Holy Spirit. He let go -totally, absolutely, forever - the wish to hold her, to love her in any other way. Suddenly, in his soul, there was a soaring joy, like light-filled water leaping from a fountain in a deserted square.

  He felt guilty. He searched Mary’s face for similar joy. It was not there. “Mary, I cabled Mike. He wants to come here. Come to you.”

  “Yes.”

  Her voice was calm. But there was no joy in it.

  “Are you - all right, Mary?”

  Those old familiar words. She smiled. “Yes, Matt, I’m all right. Are you?”

  “Only if you are.”

  The convent bell tolled, summoning the nuns to chapel. They were surrounded by prayer. Matthew Mahan could only add his favorite plea: Lord, say but the word and her soul shall be healed.

  Dennis McLaughlin spent the afternoon trudging and riding around Rome in search of his friend Goggin. He wandered through the Biblical Institute in the Piazza della Pilotta, near the Fountain of Trevi. No sign of Goggin there. He taxied to the Villa Stritch on the Via della Nocetta just off the Ancient Aurelian Way, west of the Tiber and the Vatican. He hurried across the villa’s beautifully trimmed green lawn to learn from a fat, smiling, young Irishman from Chicago that “the Fifth Evangelist” was not at home. The Irishman, who said that he worked for Cardinal Wright in the Congregation for the Clergy, and who looked as if they were eating the same desserts, cheerfully hunted Goggin by telephone, and found him at work in the office of the Jesuit general in the Borgo Santa Spirito near the Vatican.

  Goggin was naturally astonished to discover Dennis in Rome. “I’ll meet you at the foot of the Spanish Steps in fifteen minutes.”

  In twenty minutes, they were drinking cafe doppios in a marble-floored, old-fashioned restaurant on a street full of fashionable shops only a block or so from the Steps. Dennis told him what was happening, and Goggin’s eyes widened with disbelief. “As the French general said at the charge of the Light Brigade, ‘Magnificent, but it isn’t war.’”

  “I know,” said Dennis, “but it may be something better than war. It may be peace.”

  “Old pal, don’t get grandiose on me.”

  “All right. What do you know about Father Guilio Mirante, fellow ex-Jesuit or Jesuit, take your pick?”

  “Nothing,” said Goggin, “but I’ll do my best to find out a few things.”

  Dennis told him that he suspected Mirante was working for the Vatican. “Leave it to ye old biblical scholar,” Goggin said. “I’ll give them my absentminded professor act.”

  “What else do you hear from your employer?”

  “If this were 1570 instead of 1970, there would be a pall of smoke hanging over the Netherlands. The Sacred Inquisition would be buying up firewood all over Europe. It would have been a marvelous opportunity to see how bishops burn. As for your employer, he would be in a cell in the bottom tier of Castle St. Angelo, which the Tiber floods regularly.”

  “Paolo is not happy.”

  “Paolo and everyone around him are steaming. I spent the morning translating a little something for the radio that will probably be in Osservatore Romano tomorrow. It talks about the Church being prepared to use its coercive powers in order to insure the unity of the faith.”

  “Nice.”

  “Why don’t you retreat to the first century with me while there’s still time? We can spring our coup on them without warning. From now on, your employer will be anathema. And they won’t let you within 100 miles of any library with archives worth looking at.”

  Dennis shook his head. “This is more important. This could make your book an official text, a sacred document, instead of an underground classic.”

  “But politics are so boring.” Goggin finished his coffee, stood up, and saluted. “I am off to see the Jesuits.”

  Back at the hotel, Dennis found Matthew Mahan sitting on the edge of the bed, talking on the telephone. “I’m sorry to hear that Cardinal Confalonieri will be on retreat for the next two weeks. May I speak to Monsignor Draghi, the secretary of the Congregation?

  “Oh? He’s on retreat, too. Odd that they would go at the same time, isn’t it? Well, you tell them that I called. I may still be here when they get back. I intend to stay in Rome until His Holiness gives me an appointment.”

  He hung up and nodded to Dennis with a grim half-smile. “The freeze is on,” he said. “Everybody’s out of town.”

  “Including the Pope?”

  “No, I haven’t called him directly. But I tried calling Villot. I got Benelli, the Substitute Secretary of State. He pretended he didn’t know what I was talking about. No, that could be unjust. Maybe he didn’t know. Anyway, he said there was absolutely no hope of a break in His Holiness’s schedule for at least a month. I asked him to see what he could do to change that, and he got a little unpleasant.”

  Dennis nodded. “I took a walk and bumped into my friend Goggin, the biblical scholar and part-time Vatican translator. He said they’re breathing fire over there.”

  Matthew Mahan sighed and looked across the Tiber at St. Peter’s dome. “Well, we knew it was probably a fool’s errand. But let’s just sit here for a day or two and see what happens.”

  Father Mirante returned that night after supper. The ex-Jesuit could not have been more negative. All his friends at the Vatican were appalled by what Cardinal Mahan was doing. No one had heard so much as a whisper about his arrival. Almost certainly, his letter had been routed to the office of the Secretary of State, where Archbishop Benelli, the chief administrator of the department, would take charge of it. He was a fierce, combative man.

  “How do we get around him?” Matthew Mahan asked.

  “There is no way around him, Your Eminence,” said Mirante. “He is a colossus. He bestrides the Vatican. No one speaks to His Holiness without his permission.”

  “Did you tell your friends how serious I was?”

  “Of course.”

  “And their advice -”

  “- is go home.”

  “These are people who are on our side?”

  “Assuredly. Insofar as a man is capable of maintaining that position in the present atmosphere.”

  Mirante departed once more. Matthew Mahan paced restlessly up and down the room, growing gloomier and gloomier. A half hour later, Goggin called. “I’ve been told our friend is negotiating. He’s a baddy. Went sour a year or two ago, started chasing girls. When his superiors tried to straighten him out, he trotted up to Isolotto and jumped on that little bandwagon. He misjudged the temper of the times, oh grievously. He didn’t realize that the word was out to get tough. By now I’m sure he’s ready to perform all sorts of services for the Prince of this world or anyone else.”

  “Thanks,” said Dennis. “We’ll be in touch.”

  He told Matthew Mahan what he had just heard. The Cardinal sat down slowly in a wing chair and began to nod mournfully. “It’s really a little like war, isn’t it?”

  “Yes,” sa
id Dennis, ruefully recalling his overblown words about peace to Goggin earlier in the day.

  That night Dennis awoke to find Matthew Mahan stumbling around the room, he turned on his bed lamp and the Cardinal said, “Dennis, I’m sorry. I got completely disoriented in the dark and couldn’t find the bathroom. Look at the mess I just made.”

  Dennis walked around the bed and saw a three- or four-inch splotch of blood on the rug. “Are you - all right?”

  “Yes, yes, of course. Nothing unusual. Let’s clean this up.”

  They scrubbed with cold water and towels until there was only a faint stain.