Gabriel's Stand

by Jay B. Gaskill

  “When I felt the hand on my shoulder, I just turned.

  “‘You’re coming downtown buddy.’

  “So that’s how I ended up here, dictating into an illegal mini recorder, waiting to be bailed out of a Manhattan jail by my colleague, Jim, with whom I am barely on speaking terms. I wonder if they ever caught her. If anything happens to me, and you get this recording, I, Max Cahoon hereby give you permission to post it, print it, and tell it. If Snowfeather has the guts to tell it like it is, then we have to be able to honor her courage and get the message out.

  “Right now, this reporter isn’t going anywhere. I’ve seen inside of jail cells before so I’m not whining, you understand… But where the hell is Jim? Tape off.”

  Chapter 56

  In Manhattan, the following week, a small van hissed through the rain, slowing a block from the next intersection.

  “The crowds are getting bigger,” Roberto said from the driver’s seat. “Now they know who you really are.”

  There was a long silence from the passenger seat. “Sorry,” Snowfeather said wearily. “What did you say?”

  “You are drawing more and more people each time.”

  “We’d do better if you’d just tell a few jokes. I like that one about the Pope and the Chinese Rabbi.”

  “You are tired.”

  “You think?”

  “This time was too close a call.” Roberto’s voice was hoarse and anxious. “Way too close. I don’t think we have enough bail money for a celebrity like you.”

  “Yup, I am. And the police are getting smarter,” she said. She leaned her head against the cool window of the van. “The training effect.”

  “You get some sleep, okay?”

  “I’m so tired, Roberto, I can’t frigging move. I think I’m asleep even when I’m awake. If close my eyes, I think I may not ever wake up.” Their van was stalled in traffic on Lexington. The windshield wipers snicked back and forth, and Snowfeather’s mind wandered.

  “I will be right here,” she had said, while Jenny Ryan lay dying. An involuntary tear had run down her cheek under the mask. In the car, her cheek against the window, she was dry…empty of tears. The sky weeps for everyone who can’t…

  After an hour of storytelling, Jenny had fallen asleep. Snowfeather had stayed at her side for the next seven hours. In the last hour, Jenny had slipped into a coma; her breathing became increasingly difficult, then it stopped.

  Code blue.

  “Crap,” Snowfeather said aloud.

  “Crap, what?” Roberto asked.

  “Too many sad memories.”

  “I hear that. So please let me make your hospital rounds tomorrow,” Kahn said. “Just this once. You need rest. You will wake up.”

  “Roberto, as if you haven’t been through enough already.”

  “And you haven’t? Hey. It’d be the Christian thing for me to do, wouldn’t it?” Roberto was smiling. “Besides I could do my lawyer thing. Hand out my ‘sue these people for malpractice’ cards.”

  “Good one. But I’m not into that suffering shtick. I didn’t even have a Jewish mother.”

  “But your guy did.”

  “Who?”

  “You know, that famous rabbi from the first century that you Christians worship.”

  “Oh, that guy. I guess he did have a Jewish mother, didn’t he? Touché.”

  “I’m going in for you tomorrow, Snowfeather, just the same. It’s my Mitzvah.”

  “You win, counselor. Thanks Roberto. I don’t know what I’d do if I had to do all this stuff alone.”

  “That’s why they call it a conspiracy. Takes more than one.”

  “Right. Don’t take my ‘suffering waif’ thing too seriously.”

  “And don’t you overlook my paternal doting.”

  Snowfeather smiled wearily as she retreated into her thoughts.

  She had administered Jenny’s Last Rites at 6:45 A.M., just as her parents were hailing a taxi at the old Newark Airport.

  After Jenny died, she just sat in the hallway outside Jenny’s room, holding her journal, the same small leather binder that Loud Owl had given her years earlier. By now it held her darkest musings. She didn’t notice the elevator door open at the far end of the hallway. When she looked up, they were there, right in front of her, ashen faced and holding hands. Jenny’s parents had been standing patiently in front of her for five minutes, hoping for good news, afraid of the bad.

  No, she had thought vehemently, Prayer, alone, is never enough.

  Damn. Damn. Damn.

  “Are you okay?” Roberto asked.

  “Did I say something?”

  “You were swearing.”

  “I do that a lot, don’t I? I was just thinking about the Ryan girl.”

  “You need a longer break,” Roberto Kahn said. “Take a few days. Nobody can do what we do without time away from it. I went to LA just last month, remember?”

  “Deal,” she said finally. “Deal.” Her eyes closed. The tears stung.

  “I need to park this at the garage. I’ll let you out here, okay?” Snowfeather tried to shake off the spell. “Snowfeather, did you hear me?”

  Roberto’s voice. Fine, she thought. I’ll just find a safe phone and place that long distance call. John Owen will remember. Dad had promised. ‘You can count on John.’

  “Earth to Snowfeather. You can get out here,” Roberto touched her arm gently.

  The van had slipped into a red zone. Snowfeather stepped out. “Thanks, Roberto. I’ve just decided something. I’m calling Dr. Owen,” she said.

  The passenger window rolled down and Roberto leaned over. “Isn’t it dangerous to try to reach him?”

  “I guess I’ll find out.” A horn honked.

  Snowfeather stumbled over then curb and swept past the doorman, hiding fresh tears.

  ——

  The next morning, Snowfeather stared at the object that hung from the handle of the entrance to her apartment. The sign of Earth’s Sisters was a line drawing of the earth, a circle with interior lines outlining the continents; from the center of this circle, more elaborately rendered, stared a single, yellow feline eye. Snowfeather peered up and down the hallway for a moment, her robe pulled tight about her waist.

  No one in either direction.

  She removed the card and closed the door. Her hands were shaking.

  “Who was that?” It was Roberto’s voice from the adjacent bedroom. He had come back moments earlier from the hospital graveyard shift, too aware of the grim irony in the name, and closed his door.

  “Nothing, Roberto,” she said. “Go back to sleep.” Snowfeather sat down, letting her eyes close for just a second. When she opened her eyes, she was momentarily disoriented. She noticed the card, and opened it. Inside, in neat, small handwritten letters:

  Snowfeather.

  Yes, we know who you are.

  We request your presence this day at noon.

  Tan

  3-992-212-331-4200 ex. 303

  A SatCom number. So much for low tech, she thought.

  Then all the horrible old memories flooded back. Snowfeather shuddered. She closed her eyes. When she opened them, she was sitting on the couch in front of a glass table holding a warm tea pot. When did I make that tea? Boy, I am slipping….

  The tiny tea cup rattled as she lifted it from its saucer. She held it fiercely in both hands and sipped. She forced herself to study the ominous note. What would Dad say? For a moment, she considered calling him. No. This was her problem.

  Chapter 57

  On that same morning, elsewhere in New York, Bishop Allan Gardiner looked up from the pile of work on his desk.

  “Directorate Member K is here to see you, Father.”

  Why do so many of these “former” terrorists still persist in using their initials? The Bishop’s administrative assistant was standing, poised in the doorway to the Diocese’s offices. “Should I see her now?” Gardiner asked.

  “It was Tan, herself, who asked for the
appointment,” the assistant offered.

  “Perhaps we hold out for Ms. Berker, then?” Allan Gardiner smiled; then he shook his head. “Just kidding, Jerry. Offer our guest tea or something, then escort her in; say in five minutes, if you would.”

  Bishop Allan never wore vestments or even his collar in the secular offices. High, windowless, adobe faced walls surrounded a plain wooden desk and three straight backed wooden chairs. As the coordinator for the Human Conspiracy, he maintained more security precautions than the Vatican itself, except, of course, for official visitors from the Directorate whose exemption from personal searches was non-negotiable. He swept the sensitive papers on his desktop into their drawer. This left an old fashioned laptop sitting next to four stacks of papers, each held down by a different pewter paperweight. Allan discreetly pulled a cloth over the computer. You can’t be too careful with these people.

  Three of his four paperweights were in the likeness of an ape. Gracefully fashioned in fine detail, a mountain gorilla, sat on the largest stack of papers, cradling a cross in its hands, its great head cocked at an odd angle; a chimpanzee held a cross over its head like a weapon, grinning fiercely. A cross rose from the third stack of papers, several monkeys climbing over it and hanging from it. On the fourth stack of papers, the likeness of a two people, a woman and a man, sat in office chairs intently staring at their empty hands. Episcopate humor, he thought.

  The purpose of the appointment had not been announced, a discourtesy typical of the Directorate. But Allan Gardiner knew the topic: a certain priest. The church had endured interference from secular authorities before; this afternoon’s meeting should be interesting at the very least. At the rap on the door, Bishop Gardiner got out of his chair and opened the door himself.

  K was an almost pretty woman in her early thirties, but somehow feral, with a shaved head, fierce eyes, and disconcertingly yellow teeth. Unlike the contract assassins employed by the Directorate, K was better trained in ideology than killing. But her training in the latter art was sufficient for any face-to-face encounter with an elderly, unarmed cleric.

  Gardiner, a lanky, but fit, man in his late seventies, looked directly into her face. He studied her eyes. Anybody home? he thought.

  “Please come in,” Allan said, guiding the woman to a seat in front of the desk. “You must tell Director Tan that we pray for her.” Gardiner shook the woman’s hand; then he slipped into the seat next to hers in front of his desk. He would face her directly at an uncomfortably close range.

  “Why would you pray for Tan?” K asked.

  Allan shrugged to himself. Another hard case. “Perhaps we should get to the point of your visit.”

  K shifted in her seat, uncomfortable with her proximity to Gardiner. “Well then,” she began, “the Directorate insists that you stop the activities of one of your priests, the woman named Hawke.”

  “She is a provisionally ordained deacon, not a priest. Is Ms. Hawke in custody again?”

  “Frankly, we’re not sure at the moment. She makes bail so frequently.”

  “Yes, we read the media accounts here, too. Your point?”

  “You must recognize that her actions pose a danger to public order by undermining the Technology Licensing Commission’s agenda for a greater America.”

  Allan Gardiner rose from his chair and paused thoughtfully, before resuming his regular seat behind his desk. “Would you like some tea or coffee?”

  “I was offered some already.”

  “Well,” Allan said, taking his seat. “Can you tell me what your Directorate expects me to actually do about this one woman of the cloth?”

  “Tan requests that you order her back to her parish…or whatever you call it. Just get her out of the field. She must stop these propaganda activities.”

  “There is no parish and no church for her…and she does not report to me. Reverend Hawke was ordained as a deacon by an independent Native American group several years ago. She receives no compensation from the Church at all. Just how does Tan suggest that I control her activities?” Bishop Allan tried to suppress a smile.

  “You will do nothing about this priest?”

  “My, how that word resonates. Are you a student of history, young woman?” She shrugged. “Have you heard of Archbishop Thomas Becket? Not? Am I boring you? You seem so frustrated.”

  “You are not answering my question.”

  “May I be frank? What you ask is pretty silly.” A ghost of a smile crossed Gardiner’s lined face.

  “Silly?” K spat out the word. “The Gaia Directorate is asking you, directing you, to stop this … cleric.”

  “You really don’t get it, do you?”

  “Stop this chatter and answer my question!”

  “I am not hearing allegations that this woman has renounced her faith, just that you don’t like her politics.”

  “I think I am hearing that you won’t help.”

  “Let me put it this way. Helen Hawke was blessed, endowed with the freedom to do the Lord’s work, and she has taken up the challenge on her own.”

  “ANSWER ME!”

  “I believe I just did. Let me be plain. The discipline of Helen Hawke by this Church for her activities is neither institutionally nor legally possible. You might as well petition the Governor of Idaho or the mayor of Santa Fe.”

  K sat in sullen silence. “I don’t have to listen to this. How dare you! You represent a dying cult built by dead patriarchs. We are a new religion dedicated to the living earth.”

  “You came to me. I have explained why we cannot grant your request. You insult a major world religion, while your little fringe group is a throwback to pagan times. You are earth-goddess worshippers who have profaned humanity. You may have gotten political power, but that —”

  “Must you insult—”

  “No. I should probably thank you. We all live in a new reality. All traditional religious faiths are undergoing a revival, thanks to you. You are driving people back into the fold. Evil does that. So, I suppose we should be grateful.”

  “You will fail.”

  “I doubt that. This ‘dying cult built by dead patriarchs’ has her warts. Yes, the Mother Church may be old. Yes, she may be excessively backward at times. But we have always valued people over things, children over animals. We believe that the discoveries and bounties of science and technology are gifts. Gifts from the Creator. These gifts have not been received without price because of human error and folly, but that price has been paid. Whatever humanity’s failings, we do not regard hunger and disease as goals to be achieved but as evils to be eliminated.”

  K had reddened shade by shade until she got to her feet and reached into the small bag she had brought with her. “I’ve heard enough!” she shouted. “We have asked you to stop this woman’s activities. We know you can. Her slander will not be allowed. I will ask you one last time: are you refusing the Director’s order?”

  The Bishop shook his head sadly. “I am sorry that your Director exaggerates the influence of a single person. If the Gaia movement feels threatened at this moment, at the very pinnacle of its power, the danger comes from its own weaknesses. Helen Hawke has, but does not need, my blessings. God will follow and guard her. I will add you to my prayers. Good day.”

  K pulled a handgun out of the case, and leveled it at Bishop Allan Gardiner. He stared back without flinching. She pulled the trigger three times. Each silenced round entered his chest, making a neat grouping. Blood spattered on the wall behind him as he slumped back in his chair.

  “To Gaia, then, old fool.” K replaced the weapon in her hand case and slipped quietly out of the office.

  A concealed camera and microphone had recorded the conversation and murder. In an few days they would reach a private server owned by Dr. John Owen.

  Chapter 58

  Over the span of its previously shadowed existence, the Directorate had met in a number of secret places. Now it blatantly met wherever it chose. For this occasion, one historical monument from th
e early days of New York City had been selected. It had been a traditional church for generations; the building and grounds were located within sight of the ancient Empire State Building. Now the Commission leased the entire property to the G-O-D for $1 a year. Supposedly, all Christian symbolism had been effaced, leaving only the outer shell of the now deconsecrated sanctuary to suggest its earlier function.

  Meeting here, Snowfeather thought, was intended to be their puerile little show of force. They should have built a teepee, she thought maliciously.

  Who is that awful woman standing on the steps?

  Louise had not weathered her ascent to power gracefully. Now so sallow that anemia seemed indicated, she stood in the doorway to the former sanctuary. Her head was shaved shiny bald. In her robes, which were a fungal gray color, she was a strange caricature of a medieval monk.

  “Snowfeather, dear,” Tan said with forced friendliness, “so good of you to come.” Turning, she led Snowfeather into the former chapel.

  Inside, the walls had been stripped, ceiling to bottom. There was no floor at all, just an expanse of scummy soil and twisting, tangled plants. Insect sounds filled the dank air. Immense dark green leaves, gray vines, thick black stems, swollen purple branches, entwined and twisting like snakes—these things and more grew everywhere, filling every available niche. The sensation of closeness and decay was overwhelming. Flickering yellow incandescent lamps were scattered in this cool, fetid jungle; and water dripped from the moldy ceiling. Snowfeather tripped over a root, and quickly regained her balance. Her heart was hammering.

  The Directorate’s members were still seven in number, but K’s seat was empty for the moment. They were arranged in tree stump seats, making a semi-circle around a single empty rusted metal chair set—no doubt purposefully—slightly lower than the stumps. Without speaking, Tan had quickly taken the first stump. The other five members—Snowfeather ticked off their given names in her mind—were also dressed in robes in that appalling fungus shade. Every head was shaved, and their eyes cold and lifeless.

  How could I ever have been part of this?