Assault with Intent

by William X. Kienzle

  “Do you own any guns?”

  “Of course. Automatics, revolvers, rifles, and a shotgun.”

  “I see. You subscribe to the theory that ‘guns don’t kill people, people kill people’?”

  “Of course not. Guns kill people. People kill people with guns better than with anything else.”

  “You don’t mean you approve of killing?”

  “It depends whether you’re talking about justifiable or unjustifiable homicide.”

  “What’s your definition of justifiable homicide, Mr. Kirkus?”

  “Killing someone who deserves to die.”

  “And whom would you put in that category?”

  “Oh, some.”

  “Do you know anyone who deserves to die?”

  “There are a few.”

  “Could you kill someone?”

  “I have. Two wars, remember?”

  “How about the person who attacked those priests in the seminary?”

  “He’s probably got his reasons.”

  “Could you think of any reason why he might have attacked them?”

  “Hell, you’ve been attending these meetings. I’ve seen you. You’re so pretty you stick out like a sore thumb. You’ve heard these people testify. The priests in the seminaries today are ruining the young seminarians with teaching about sex and this new namby-pamby religion that has no relation to the Church of our fathers. And these seminarians are all we have to build for the future of Catholicism in Detroit.”

  “And do you, Mr. Kirkus, think this is reason enough to kill?”

  “Some things are worth dying for and some things are worth killing for.” Kirkus’ smile was slightly twisted.

  “Thank you for the interview, Mr. Kirkus. If I need any more information, I’ll be in touch.” Lennon shut her notepad and departed.

  What a mind-blowing statement at the end. She could throw that into the lead and really grab the readers. Cox would regret he hadn’t attended this show.

  As she walked away from Kirkus, she could feel his gaze on her hips. Well, what the hell! She gave them an exaggerated shimmy and walked out and down the stairs.

  8

  Father Charles O’Dowd, although he taught a course in ascetical theology that included a healthy measure of contemplative prayer, did not consider himself much of a contemplative.

  He could not—would not—permit himself to be swept up past that Cloud of Unknowing into an altered state of consciousness. He had long ago decided to leave that to the Trappists. Many of them were using Zen to attain that altered state which, for the Oriental, was the point of it all, but which, for the Christian, was the vehicle, the means to the most intimate form of prayer. For some reason, though he was most familiar with the vehicle, he was reluctant to take the trip. Perhaps it was because this abandonment of rational consciousness was too suggestive of death. And, if the truth be known, Father O’Dowd feared death to a degree that he was ashamed of.

  Of course, as a Christian, let alone a Catholic priest, he believed in a life after death. But O’Dowd’s prayer was the same as that of the biblical father of a son possessed by the devil: “I believe, Lord. Help thou my unbelief.”

  Death was the ultimate argument. Every time someone he knew died, O’Dowd’s first thought was: Now he knows all the answers—now he is either in heaven, hell, purgatory, is a crayfish, or nothing.

  O’Dowd had been forced to reflect on death more subjectively during this scholastic year because some maniac had apparently declared open season on seminary professors. Though O’Dowd was well into his seventies, he was a remarkably healthy specimen. Under normal circumstances, he could be expected to live many more years. And many more years was what he hoped for. But a maniac could change such a prospect in an instant.

  It may have been the weather. A dull, chilly, wet, depressing March day when it seemed winter would never let Michigan out of its clutches. A day dreary enough to spawn thoughts of mortality.

  No sooner had he finished his afternoon class than he began brooding about violence, suffering, and death. Slowly, he made his way toward the dining area where, assuredly, his tea and biscuits awaited.

  It occurred to him how vulnerable he was in this setting. The students, staff, and other faculty members were now all in other parts of the seminary. No one ever visited the dining room at this hour but himself. Even the kitchen crew was gone. They would not need to begin preparing dinner for another couple of hours.

  What a prime moment for the assailant to strike. O’Dowd’s body would not even be discovered until the kitchen crew returned. More than enough time for the killer to cover his tracks and escape.

  He consciously began to use and lean more upon his peripheral vision. He did not wish to turn continually. But he did want to know what was going on around him. He was enough of a contemplative to at least trust his intuition. And his intuition compellingly suggested that someone was watching him, or that something out of the ordinary was about to happen.

  He pushed open the swinging doors to the dining room. No one was in sight nor was there any sound other than his own footsteps on the tile floor. On the table at the rear of the room was O’Dowd’s midafternoon snack, thoughtfully if routinely prepared by the now absent kitchen staff.

  O’Dowd sat at the table in his customary seat. He poured his tea, cut a corner from a biscuit, carefully buttered it, bit into it, and began chewing.

  With this nourishment before him and the reassuring comfort that fulfilled routine always brought, he began to relax and consider that he had been overreacting. This nonsense of attacks on seminary professors was very probably over. Besides, why would anyone select him as a target? In all his years as a priest—almost all spent teaching seminarians—he had made no enemies he knew of. In fact, he sometimes chided himself for this. There were those even on this faculty, especially Fathers Feeny, Budreau, and Gennardo, who held that if you made no enemies it meant you were doing nothing. O’Dowd could not recall making any enemies, and, since he did not wish to admit he had done nothing, he sustained himself by denying the hypothesis.

  What was that? O’Dowd did not want to believe his ears, but it sounded as if the dining room doors had opened and swung shut.

  He cursed himself for having sat with his back to the doors. He had always trusted his intuition before. Why had he not taken the simple precaution of facing the entrance to the dining room? What a fool!

  Now it was clear. Footsteps approaching. His heart was in his mouth as he whirled in his chair to face the intruder.

  “Bob,” O’Dowd’s voice betrayed vast relief—“Bob Koesler! You scared the living daylights out of me!”

  “Sorry, I didn’t mean to.” Koesler took a seat opposite O’Dowd.

  “What do you mean coming down here now? No one ever does that!” Without intending to, O’Dowd sounded as if he were reprimanding Koesler.

  “Hey, calm down, Charlie. I only came down here to see you because I knew you’d be here now. And that is exactly why I wanted to see you.”

  “Oh?”

  “Well, I’ve been thinking about these attacks …”

  “Hasn’t everyone?” O’Dowd’s heartbeat was just beginning to settle back to normal.

  “Well, whoever is doing this has been taking advantage of the routine in our lives. Things like Phil’s daily Mass, Ed’s dry-cleaning visit, my Friday dinner. That’s what I wanted to talk to you about. Of all the faculty members, you are the one who might best see the wisdom of breaking up these routines. And the one the others might be most likely to listen to.”

  “I’m not the rector.” O’Dowd offered Koesler some tea. Koesler waved the offer away.

  “Listen, we both know that Ly, Tony, and Al, who, with you and George Dye, make up the older members of the faculty, would never agree to this evasive sort of action. In all candor, no one would listen to George. You are the only one who might consider it.”

  “You’re right, Bob, I might. And that’s especially true after this
afternoon. I had a premonition something was going to happen. I didn’t know the something would be your visit. I, of course, feared the worst, an attack on me. That’s why I was so startled when you came in here behind me.”

  “Well, isn’t that enough? I’m by no means the only person who knows you are habitually—and vulnerably—alone here at this hour. What happened just now ought to be the strongest argument possible for breaking up these routines that make you and the others so vulnerable.”

  O’Dowd smiled. “And what of you, Bob? Will you alter your routines?”

  “That’s different, Charlie. I’ve been through my baptism of fire.”

  “Ah, yes. That is the difference: you have been attacked. I know from talking with the others—Leo, Phil, Ed, and Tony—that you now consider yourselves, in a manner of speaking, immune. You all feel that once having been attacked and having survived, you will not be a target again. But you could be wrong.”

  “Yes, I suppose you’re right.”

  “Exactly. But how would you enjoy changing nearly everything you do for an unknown length of time? For, perhaps as long as you live, even? In effect, live the rest of your life mentally and emotionally in hiding. In fear.”

  “When you put it that way …”

  “That’s the way it is. It didn’t really occur to me plainly until after you walked in here a few minutes ago. At first, the very same thought occurred: I shouldn’t be here. I should never take my afternoon tea again. I must examine my life and alter it to find other habits. Do I take a walk at the same time each day? Offer Mass? Pray? Study alone? Visit the library?

  “No, Bob, a life like that is not living.”

  “I must say, I know exactly how you feel, Charlie, and I can’t really argue with you. Until recently, I thought it would be impossible for any of us to change our habits, our routines. I could see the wisdom of it but I just didn’t think it was possible. But I thought I would at least make the suggestion to you on the grounds that what I found impractical you might have been able to live with. But let’s just leave it in the ‘nice try’ category.”

  “We will. And thank you, Bob. Now have a biscuit.”

  Father Lyr Feeny was writing a series of words on the blackboard. Anyone familiar with “sperm,” “ovum,” “Fallopian tube,” “endometrium,” and “abortion” would have been able to make an informed guess as to the topic of this medical ethics class.

  “Has it occurred to you,” whispered one student to his neighbor, “that between Flinty Feeny and Tony Gennardo, we get a lot of information about the female anatomy?”

  “Well,” whispered the other, “you’ve got to admit there’s some connection between the theology of human sexuality and medical ethics.”

  “I was just thinking,” whispered the first, “it would save them a lot of trouble and, at the same time, hold our interest better if they brought in a live model.”

  They laughed just loudly enough to be heard by Feeny, who turned quickly and spotted the guilty pair immediately. His jaw, which seemed permanently set slightly off center, was clenched. A stern-visaged Flinty Feeny, as he was unaffectionately known to generations of students, was acknowledged to strike terror in the hearts of innocent and guilty alike.

  “I would like it remembered, both of you,” he addressed the two whisperers through clenched teeth, “that a military officer is a gentleman by an act of Congress, whereas a priest is a gentleman by an act of God! And God does not so act in behalf of seminarians who laugh behind a professor’s back.”

  He said it but he didn’t believe it. An anachronism, he was a throwback to a former day, and he knew it. In the good old days, any seminarian who dared toy with the displeasure of a rector found his days in the seminary were numbered. Not any more.

  Feeny sat at his desk and arranged his notes. He explained the clinical process leading to pregnancy. For most of his students he did not cast any new light on their understanding of the matter. Some few of his students had had more practical experience in matters sexual than Lyr Feeny had had in his long lifetime.

  “Now,” Feeny continued, “once the egg is fertilized, there is present a human being with an immortal soul. A person with all the rights that are due a human being. Chief among these is the right to life. Now, what is the popular term used in referring to a spontaneous abortion?” He glanced around the class, searching for the student who least wished to be called on. Feeny had a knack for that sort of thing.

  “Mr.Doody.”

  Raphael Doody, startled, dropped his pen. It rolled noisily down his desk and fell to the floor. In trying to retrieve it he nearly toppled out of his seat.

  “Mr. Doody,” Feeny repeated, “what is the popular term used when referring to a spontaneous abortion?”

  “Uh …” Doody might possibly have known, but he was unnerved. “Uh ... I think, ‘murder,’ Father.”

  “No, Doody. No, again, Doody!” Such incompetence! Such a simpleton! Doody’s continued presence in the seminary as well as his probable ordination in June was a monument to one shoddy solution to the priest shortage.

  As was his wont, Feeny next called upon someone he was certain would know the answer. “Miss Schaaf.”

  “Miscarriage.” She had tried insisting that Feeny address her as “Ms.,” but she soon learned that one did not insist on anything with Feeny. Neither did she care for the manner in which Feeny and others treated Raphael Doody. He might be naturally clumsy. But he could do so much better if people were supportive rather than made fun of him. She was sure if people continued to treat Doody with derision, he would become arrested in a state of klutziness.

  “And what is the morality of a miscarriage, Miss Schaaf?”

  “It’s an accident of nature. It is morally neutral.”

  “Now, a therapeutic abortion, any deliberate expulsion of the inviable fetus, is murder and more. It carries the penalty of excommunication for both the abortionist and all who formally cooperate in the abortion—is there a question, Miss Schaaf?” Feeny’s demeanor indicated there should be no question at this point.

  “I don’t think you can say for certain that there is a human person present at the moment of fertilization.”

  “You don’t.” Feenyologists would recognize that Vesuvius trembled inside him.

  “No, I think the most one can say at that point, and probably for a much longer time, is that a fertilized egg is present which, left to develop normally, will become a human being.”

  “Is that right?” The prominent vein in Feeny’s forehead had begun to throb.

  “It is much like the moment of death. No one really knows when that is. And until recently, it didn’t matter that much. Not until the technique of transplanting organs was developed. Then, determining the earliest moment when all could agree death had occurred became crucial. So, a general medical agreement was reached that when the EEG revealed no brain wave, that indicated clinical death, and if any organs were to be donated, that was the moment to permit removal for transplant.

  “So,” she continued, oblivious to Feeny’s barely contained rage, “I think it’s unfortunate that the approach to abortion is so black and white. One must be either for it or against it.

  “I think that, just as with death so with life: no one knows for certain when it commences. So, why could not the medical and perhaps the theological experts get together and agree when human life begins? Say, the time of implantation in the womb. Or, the third month.

  “Before that time, the fetus would be treated with all the respect and care one would give to something which will become human. But grave reasons would allow for an abortion. However, after that time, the fetus would have to be treated as a full human person.”

  “Are you quite finished?”

  “Yes.”

  “Does it make any difference to you, Miss Schaaf, that the Church has defined the moment of conception as the moment when human life begins? In the Church’s liturgy, Miss Schaaf, we pray that from the moment of conception in M
ary’s womb, that was the moment of the incarnation, the moment when the Son of God became man. And, Miss Schaaf, lex orandi, lex credendi—a law founded in prayer is a law to be believed.”

  “That is the Church’s opinion!”

  “Miss Schaaf—“

  The bell sounded.

  Several students thought that Eileen Schaaf had been saved by the bell.

  There was no denying, thought Feeny, as he gathered his books, that Eileen Schaaf had a brain. But it was undisciplined. Fortunately, although she could and might study theology the rest of her life she would never be able to be ordained a priest. The Church had waffled badly in many matters. But it was clear from the attitude of everyone from the Pope to the world’s bishops that the barrier between women and priestly ordination would never fall.

  He would argue for Schaaf’s dismissal at the year’s final faculty meeting. He would lose. He’d seen the writing on the wall. Bodies. The seminary must have bodies. Even bodies whose biology kept them from the goal for which a theological seminary is established. But, like St. Paul, he would fight the good fight anyway.

  He had time before his period of solitary exercise to return to his room, take up his field glasses, and see what was going on that needed correcting.

  In the mood he was in, God knows, he needed to take something out on somebody.

  “I don’t think you’re going to like this, Father.”

  Mary Murphy stood with Father Koesler near the rear of the film set.

  Koesler smiled. “Why, Mary? Is this going to be another of those torrid sex scenes like the one Pat Lennon wrote up in yesterday’s News?”

  “It’s not that …” Mary seemed apprehensive. “It’s … well… they’re going to shoot the attempt... on your life.”

  That wiped the smile off Koesler’s face. Then, in an attempt at nonchalance, he jested, “I don’t suppose many people whose lives are threatened get to see a reenactment of the event.” He brightened. “Well, I suppose if they ever needed me for technical advice, this is probably the time.”