Fearful Symmetries

by Thomas F Monteleone

  CALLER: I wasn’t planning on being there.

  MONAGHAN: Well, let me tell you something, Special Agent Fred O’Brien—you’d better plan on it. Tomorrow morning.

  CALLER: I think I should tell you, Detective…you’ve got the wrong attitude on this one. I’m trying to tell you as discreetly as possible: leave this one alone.

  MONAGHAN: You know, you federal guys make me wanna puke, you know that? You think a fucking phone call just when I’m ready to pack it in for the night is going to make me back off my investigation? Just because you say so? Because it’s got federal jurisdiction?

  CALLER: Detective…

  MONAGHAN:—well, that’s bullshit, Mr. O’Brien, or whoever you are! You can come into the precinct and we can talk about this face-to-face or we don’t talk about it at all.

  Call terminated 5:44:16 p.m.

  * * *

  Claudius Cheever

  Private Investigations Unlimited

  1209 University Parkway

  Baltimore MD 21210

  Dear Mr. Cheever:

  I am writing to you because I don’t trust the telephones anymore—at least when I’m talking about my brother, Ignatius Sanborn. You probably remember what happened to him from the news stories and the TV stuff. The bomb that blew up Saint. Andrews killed my brother and now I was just told by the cops that they’ve been ordered to drop the case because the FBI said it has something to do with National Security.

  Mr. Cheever, this is ridiculous. I have discovered that people saying they are “government agents” have been talking to my friends and family, and anybody else that ever knew Ignatius. From all I can tell, they haven’t been asking questions about him to help him in anyway. Instead, it looks to me like they were trying to dig up some kind of awful dirt on him. They even tracked down people who’d been his first students when he was teaching Catholic grade school, right out of the seminary more than 25 years ago. And they asked them point blank if Ignatius had ever molested them sexually. Can you imagine?!

  Thank God, my brother was like a saint, Mr. Cheever. He never did anything to ever hurt anybody. He was a good man, a god-fearing and god-loving man. All he ever wanted to do was help people. The job he did at Saint Andrews certainly proved that. And those government people didn’t ever find a thing they could use to make Ignatius look bad—and that’s exactly what I think they were trying to do.

  Anyway, when I complained to my congressman, I didn’t hear anything more on it, and when I tried to call the City Police Officer who was originally working on my brother’s murder (I’ve enclosed a newspaper clipping), they told me Lieutenant Monaghan was killed last week in a shoot-out “by an unknown assailant.” Nobody seems to want to tell me much of anything. But I want some answers.

  Anyway, I have a little money from my brother’s life insurance policy and I think I’d feel best spending it on a way to find out who killed him and why.

  If you are willing to take this case, please write me as soon as possible at the address on the top of this page. I will come into the city to meet with you and get you all settled up.

  Thank you in advance.

  Sincerely,

  Cecilia Sanborn Matheson

  * * *

  THE ARCHDIOCESE OF BALTIMORE

  MEMORANDUM

  To: Brother Ignatius Sanborn

  From: Joseph Cardinal Sheehy

  It is my sad duty to inform you that the Archdiocese can no longer subsidize the operating expenses at Saint Andrews. Diminishing funds and rising costs are a familiar refrain, and we can only afford to operate secondary schools that have sufficient enrollments to ensure a stable tuition-base. The neighborhood surrounding Saint Andrews High School has been on the slippery slope for quite a few years now, and the time we all feared when it might take the school with it has finally arrived.

  I would, however, like to take this opportunity to commend you on your excellent record of academic achievement in the face of continuing adversity. As Principal of Saint Andrews, you should feel very proud of all you have accomplished.

  You will eventually be receiving a new assignment from the Xaverian Office, but I trust you will require some time to tie up any loose ends at “Saint A’s.”

  Good luck and may God bless you.

  * * *

  From The Catholic Review

  Parochial High School Now Independent Despite a joint-decision by the Archdiocese and the Order of Saint Francis Xavier to close Saint Andrews High School at the end of last year’s Spring Semester, the 128 year-old secondary school continues to operate as a non-sectarian “independent” school. Spurred on by a valiant fund-raising effort by Principal Brother Ignatius, and a task-force of concerned parents, Saint Andrews High will remain open, serving as a beacon of stability and enlightenment to an embattled community trying to fight back against the onslaught of drug-traffic, violent street crime, and unrelenting poverty. Saint Andrews will keep its venerable name, despite having no religious affiliation. Current plans do not include any possibility of subsuming the school into the city’s public school system, although one should not rule out Federal funding.

  * * *

  from the scrap book of Ignatius Sanborn:

  National Education Association Mid-Atlantic Regional Stat Sheet, page 16

  Saint Andrews

  High School

  (Ind.)

  Nat. Avg.

  (Public)

  % Sr. Graduates from Fr. Year

  91%

  69%

  % Graduates Attending College

  86%

  46%

  % of SAT scores above 1000

  81%

  52%

  * * *

  You have reached the Principal’s Office of Saint Andrews High School. I’m sorry I cannot take your call at the moment, but if you leave your name, number, and a brief message after the beep, I will call you back as soon as possible…BEEP!

  Hello, Brother Ignatius, my name is Alec Cristopolis and I’m with the U. S. Department of Education. I would like to set up an appointment to stop by and talk to you about an exciting new Federal Program that your school might be eligible for. Please call me at 202-555-0989, extension 086.

  Ms. Cecilia Sanborn Matheson

  8310 Winter Walk Lane

  Pittsfield MA 01203

  Cecilia:

  In keeping with your request to not use telephones, I’m sending you this short note to keep you up on what I have discovered so far.

  Which is not much, I’m afraid. However, I think you’ll agree that what I am NOT finding is telling us maybe as much as anything I could find. Let me explain:

  1. All BCPD records of the Saint Andrews bombing have been “removed” from their files. No one seems to know how or why this could have happened.

  2. The shooting death of Lieutenant Patrick Monaghan has not been investigated by any metropolitan homicide or internal affairs divisions. It was turned over to Federal authorities, on the Feds’ request, but there was no evidence to indicate Federal jurisdiction.

  3. Your brother’s apartment on Cross Street had been completely “sanitized” within several hours of his death. That means someone had thoroughly and methodically searched and seized anything and everything your brother owned that might be informative. From what I can learn, there was not a single scrap of paper, computer disk, or record of any kind in his living quarters. This is almost impossible. People always keep things—receipts, notebooks, calendars, etc.

  4. I am convinced that your brother was indeed killed for reasons we cannot yet fathom. It most likely involves local or Federal authorities.

  It is possible he was a criminal, but highly unlikely. Impossible, actually. And you know, the more I investigate this case, and the more I learn about Ignatius, the more I realize it’s my loss for never knowing him. People like your brother are rare and special and I wish he’d been a friend of mine.

  Anyway, my guess is he stumbled into something he wasn’t supposed to…and somebody
didn’t like it much.

  Cecilia, this is very important. Do you have anything that belonged to Ignatius? Any correspondence, keepsakes, safe deposit keys, or anything you can think of that he may have given you that would lead us in the direction of additional information?

  Please spend a little time thinking about this, because it may be the only lead we will have left to follow. Because I have to be honest with you—I am running into brick walls everywhere I turn.

  I await your next letter with great interest. In the meantime, I will make every attempt to find out what really happened to your brother.

  Sincerely,

  Claud Cheever

  * * *

  In a stack of things to be shredded:

  Inter-Office Memo

  Department of Education

  Washington, DC

  From: E. D. Frost

  To: A. Cristopolis

  Just saw your report on the I. Sanborn case.

  Imperative that he get with the Program. You’re authorized to do whatever it takes.

  * * *

  Dear Claud:

  After reading your last letter, I must confess to spending a little time being all teary-eyed. Despair is like a disease and you have to fight it off. I could not shake the feeling that we are stopped good and final, but I tried to be strong. I prayed to God and the Saints and I tried to put everything distressing out of my mind.

  My trust in the divine was just what I needed because I began to think more clearly and looking into my memory was like looking through new glass. One of the things that could be important was a man named Thaddeus Bowen. My brother mentioned this man several times over the last three years or so, saying that Mr. Bowen had told him things nobody would ever believe, but that someday, the whole country would understand. I confess I never asked Ignatius what he was talking about, and I never met Mr. Bowen myself, but I just recalled his name and thought you might want to talk to him yourself.

  Another thing I had either forgotten about or maybe just never thought was important till now is something my brother told me last Christmas. He was sitting at the dinner table after the family had finished clearing it. And it was just me and him sitting there with our coffee. He said: “If you ever have any questions you can’t get answered, you can always go to Theresa for the key.”

  It was one of those funny things people say that you really don’t understand, but you’re afraid to say so…do you know what I mean? I can remember Ignatius looking at me with a very solemn expression, and I was embarrassed to tell him I had no idea what he was talking about. So I nodded my head slowly, and with great seriousness. The moment passed and we were distracted by this or that, and it never came up again.

  Theresa was the name of our sister. She died when we were both teenagers and she was just eleven years-old. Ignatius had loved her so much, and he’d been very affected by her passing. He never forgot Theresa and I guess I imagined he meant that no matter what kind of trouble we ever found ourselves in, that maybe Theresa would be there to watch over us, to help us.

  But thinking about it now, what with the confusion and how we do have questions we can’t get answered, maybe there was some other meaning?

  Do you have any suggestions how we might be able to make sense of this? Or do you think it doesn’t mean anything at all?

  Please get in touch as soon as you can. I will be happy to do anything I can.

  Sincerely,

  Cecilia

  * * *

  from the notebook of Claudius Cheever:

  Thaddeus Bowen,

  black male, divorced.

  employed by National Teachers Union for 21 years

  killed by a hit-and-run driver

  * * *

  To: ICIaudius@USOL.com

  From: TSkunk@UVMChamplain.edu

  Subject: USEPGP

  cc: not a damn soul

  Hey old buddy:

  If you’re reading this, you remembered your own key-code and that’s the way it’s gotta be. Anyway, the hackwork you wanted was a piece of cake. Ignatius Sanborn was a BIG internet user. Found his cookie crumbs on the Archdiocese of Baltimore servers, and was able to follow the trail all the way to his mailbox and a digital safe-deposit box.

  That’s the good news.

  Bad news: somebody had been there before me. They cleaned out his mailbox. Whatever was in there’s been scarfed up.

  More good news: The SDBox was a different story. Ignatius used PGP and as you know there’s no way in hell anybody cracks that w/o the key-code.

  If you have the key, access to the ISP is 410-555-1330 and Sanborn’s password was XAVIER.

  Good luck. Next time in the Big B. You owe me dinner at Tio Pepe’s for this one.

  yr buddy,

  The Skunk

  * * *

  Dear Cecilia:

  Enclosed you will find print-outs of some of the documents written by your brother. I cannot tell you how I found them, but you should rest easy knowing I couldn’t have done it without you, your excellent memory, and your sister, Theresa. After you read them, I would suggest hiding them in the safest place you can imagine, or maybe even just burning them. I don’t know anymore what is wise and what is foolish—after getting even an inkling of the kind of forces we are all up against.

  Although I cannot verify anything, I must concur with your belief that Ignatius was murdered. His involvement with Thaddeus Bowen appears to have been one of the factors which led to his death. Mr. Bowen, as you will see from the documents, was something of a hero in my eyes, and as such, was the kind of person your brother would champion.

  Ironically, it seems as if Ignatius’s relationship with Bowen would have been a safe one if not for an accidental meeting with Alec Cristopolis. But you will see what I mean by that after you’ve looked over your brother’s notes. It’s pretty much all there.

  There really isn’t much more I can do for you in any official capacity. You have been more than generous in my compensation, and to be honest, no more is necessary. There is only one final matter to be considered and dealt with—what to do about what we have learned.

  Going public with any of this may be very injurious to our health, but I don’t see much choice (at least for myself). Getting to know your brother, even in the displaced manner forced upon me, has frankly inspired me to be a better person. Me, I’m all by myself. No family and few real friends. I don’t have all that much to lose. You have kids to raise and lots of responsibilities, so if you want to just throw all this stuff in the woodstove, I will more than understand.

  I look forward to your next note. Stay well and try to feel good about what was going on in your brother’s life when he died. After you read the batch of papers behind this letter, you will at least know he believed he was doing the right thing.

  Take care of yourself and your children.

  It’s the children that we should all be concerned about.

  Sincerely,

  Claud

  * * *

  excerpted from the notes of Ignatius Sanborn:

  …but none of what Bowen tells me is all that surprising when I consider the historical record. The information is all there. In the libraries, the databases, the annual reports. So boldly placed before our eyes, and no one bothers to read what it is really saying. Not even a question of reading between the lines—no one is even reading the lines themselves.

  …From what I can see in the enclosed documents, it appears to have begun in 1913 when two other significant events took place: the creation of the Federal Reserve Corporation and what has become known as the Income Tax on individuals.

  Something happened in America that year that has been eroding the very foundation of what had been the most creative, inventive, industrious dynamo in the history of civilization. A place where the common man was not only allowed to dream, but also achieve.

  No constraints. Not one.

  And that scared some people.

  Some very important, very influential, and ve
ry wealthy people.

  …and it was clear that something had to be done before there were no such things as privilege, breeding, or aristocracy.

  Bowen said something that stays with me, haunting my thoughts endlessly. “The ideas upon which this country had been established were clearly working too well.” Even without civil rights for blacks and women, the country was still becoming a juggernaut of outrageous freedom of thinking that would eventually destroy even the idea of a ruling class.

  …and that was, ultimately, unthinkable in itself.

  And so, as the banks and the bureaucrats began the quiet and seemingly benign assault on the privacy of the “common” man, so did the super-elite band of academics begin to employ their new methodologies in the classrooms of America.

  …it is somewhat unclear how things changed so deliriously and so quickly, but there is no doubt that they did. What had been the model of public education for the entire civilized world has been gradually dismantled and replaced by a system riddled with disinformation, distraction, politicized claptrap, and endless new and deadly theories.

  The goal of self-esteem has replaced that of knowledge, and it has been accomplished with a purpose so grim and relentless that its phosphorescent slimy trail can be traced back four generations.

  I knew we were in the grip of a deadly malaise when a President could proudly proclaim to an audience of a quarter billion people that our country needs millions of “volunteers” to teach our children to read by the third grade…and elicited thundering applause at such a pitiful notion.

  No shame. No conscience.

  …The educational establishment seems proud of its failures…because it has been allowed to do so. And yet I was so hard in accepting it, not believing such a great piece of machinery could ever be set in motion and kept so, grinding ever more exceedingly small, the hopes and dreams of those not privileged. But people like Bowen have traveled deep into the bowels of the Great Machine, and they have come back white with terror.