God's Favorite

by Lawrence Wright

  “God could have stopped him.”

  “But he didn’t—because even Hitler was an instrument of his will. History is, after all, the expression of God’s unfolding story. At least, that is our doctrine. And if we adhere to it, we must believe that God has anticipated all things, and welcomes them, just as he expected the suffering and sacrifice of his son.”

  “That’s different from loving Hitler, or Stalin, or Noriega.”

  “You place the General in a rather exalted pantheon of villains.”

  “He may differ in scope but not in kind,” said Father Jorge. “It is as if all these big European monsters fruited and left behind the seeds that produced Marcos, Somoza, Sukarno, Idi Amin—the monstrous second-generation Third World progeny that includes Tony Noriega. Maybe they didn’t get to operate on the same scale as Hitler, but we are still talking about enormous evil—murder, drug trafficking, criminal enterprises on a grand scale, not to mention the corruption of a nation and innumerable lesser sins of the flesh. Surely God shuns such wickedness. How can he love the man who commits such crimes?”

  “General!” said the Nuncio. “I didn’t hear you knock!”

  Father Jorge abruptly sat up. Tony Noriega was standing in the doorway. The General gave him a look that was hard to read.

  “There was something disturbing on television,” said Tony.

  “Ah, you got it working,” said the Nuncio.

  “Cigar?” said Father Jorge, offering Tony a box of green-leafed Havanas. Tony drew back in revulsion. Father Jorge shrugged and lit one for himself.

  “They said you made an agreement with the Americans,” Tony said accusingly.

  “Yes, I did,” said the Nuncio.

  “You signed a paper allowing them to invade the nunciature.”

  “In the unlikely event that you decide to hold us hostage.”

  “Do you really think that of me?”

  “Certainly not. But it permitted the Americans to say that they have made progress in their negotiations. And frankly, if we had not come to some arrangement about the music, I would have handed you over myself.”

  Tony drew a chair well away from Father Jorge’s cigar. “But if you say I am not cooperating, then the Americans will say that you are my hostages. They only want an excuse, and now you have provided it.”

  The Nuncio tapped ashes from his pipe and refilled it from the tin of tobacco. “Let’s be honest with each other, General. This is a political matter with me, not a religious one. I don’t want to die for politics.”

  “For me, it’s the opposite,” said Tony. “My political life is over. I’ve entered a new stage. I have a request, Monseñor. I want you to hear my confession.”

  The Nuncio held the lit match in his hand for a second, then blew it out. “Well, yes, of course, this is a very important matter, and I am glad to hear you make such a request. But in fact I am in a bit of a bind. My role is to mediate the interests of all the parties involved and bring this affair to a peaceful and satisfactory conclusion. I don’t know that I would be able to serve those ends if I was also your priest.”

  “I thought a priest was obligated to hear all confessions.”

  “Absolutely,” said the Nuncio. “And I will if you wish me to. But I must caution you that such an action might compromise my status as a neutral third party.”

  Tony scowled and cast an accusing glance at the pope’s portrait.

  “Father Jorge, on the other hand, suffers from no such conflict,” the Nuncio said.

  Both Tony and Father Jorge looked at the Nuncio in undisguised alarm.

  AT FOUR THAT AFTERNOON, Tony entered the confessional box. Father Jorge waited unwillingly on the other side of the screen.

  “Bless me, Father, for I have sinned.”

  “What are your sins?”

  “I have not loved God sufficiently.”

  “What other sins have you committed?”

  “Really, that’s the main one.”

  There was a lengthy pause from the priest. “Certainly, you can think of others,” he finally said.

  Tony thought. “No.”

  “If we reflect on them, they will surely come to mind.”

  “You are probably thinking of adultery,” said Tony. “I will confess it if you like, but God doesn’t really mind that.”

  “God expressly forbids it in the seventh commandment. And it is well known that you have been with many women other than your wife.”

  “The same was true of every one of God’s special kings. Look at David and Solomon. God gave them many wives and hundreds of concubines. Was that adultery? No! God spells it out in Leviticus. You can’t sleep with your mother, your sister, your daughter, your granddaughter, your aunt, your in-laws, your neighbor’s wife, or a woman in her period. I never do these things. Therefore it is not adultery.”

  “There are nine other commandments that may not be so easy to rationalize. I urge you to consider your behavior and seek God’s forgiveness. Confession is not a game, it’s a holy act. This is not a time to dissemble or bargain. God knows what is in your soul! There’s no use in trying to make a defense. You must lay your soul bare and beg for God’s forgiveness.”

  “That’s exactly why I’m here!” said Tony. “People have accused me of many crimes, but I don’t see them as sins. The money I’ve accumulated—well, it was largely in the form of gifts. I didn’t steal it. I merely accepted it. I don’t bear false witness, I don’t curse God, I never work on Sunday—in all these ways, I obey the commandments.”

  “But you’ve killed.”

  “Yes, but even there God has published exemptions, and I fall within the guidelines.”

  This was sacrilege! Father Jorge was furious. “Major Giroldi didn’t deserve to die,” he said. “He protected your life, and look what you did to him in return.”

  “Yes, the poor deluded bastard. If he had killed me quickly, he would have gotten away with it—people would have called him a hero. But he thought he was carrying out God’s directives. Fortunately he lived long enough for justice to be served. Those who rose up against me were properly punished, according to biblical standards. So many people make mistakes by reading the scriptures superficially.”

  “Hugo Spadafora?”

  “It’s true I wanted him dead. I never ordered it. I never even asked that he be arrested. But I did pray for it, and apparently God answered my prayer. For some reason, Hugo’s death fit into God’s plan.”

  “We cannot know what God intends,” said the priest heatedly, “and I think it’s blasphemous to attribute Dr. Spadafora’s savage assassination to divine will. It was your own soldiers who murdered him, not the angels of the Lord.”

  “Maybe we can’t read the mind of God, but I do believe that he has picked me out for a special destiny.”

  “Many people believe that. Most of them are in mental hospitals,” the priest said before he could stop himself.

  “I am not a schizophrenic,” Tony replied defensively. “I’ve never claimed to hear the voice of God. But the evidence of my own life tells me he is at work behind the scenes, arranging events for my benefit. I came into this world with nothing. I was despised and abandoned. And yet God exalted me. He paved the way for me. How else can you explain my life?”

  “You seem to think that God has his hand on your shoulder, pardoning your misdeeds and leading you to wealth and power, when it was your own ruthless ambition that encouraged you to cheat and steal and slaughter your opponents. God certainly did not ordain these actions, no matter how cleverly you rationalize them.”

  “This, I don’t accept,” said Tony. “You think a bastard mestizo orphan could rise so high without the help of God? I cannot believe a priest would think this. God has chosen me, Father. Why, I cannot say. You tell me—you know so much. Why would God allow me to stay in power all these years if I really were so wicked as you believe? You must have prayed for my downfall, but he listened to my prayers, not to yours.”

  “Until now!�
�� the priest burst out. “Even if God did have a special place for you, as you like to believe, your situation has certainly changed!”

  “I thought the same thing. But I realize that every time I have tried to understand God, I have failed. When my most trusted men turned against me, God saved me! There is no other way to explain it! I am a sinner, but he loves me anyway. All those righteous men—Hugo, Giroldi, and the others—they died very badly, you know. I would not want to have ended up like them! And so God must have a plan for me. Maybe he intends my sacrifice to be a lesson to mankind. Haven’t you seen the cameras outside? The whole world is waiting for little Tony to surrender! God has not rejected me, he has only found a new way to extend my influence. Incidentally, Jesus came to the same conclusion.”

  “Do you really think your situation is comparable?” the priest said in disbelief.

  “What bothers me is that you don’t even know what my sins really are,” Tony continued. “You think you understand me better than I do myself—better than God. You don’t sound like a priest anymore. You sound like a prosecutor. That’s not what I’m here for, Father.”

  Father Jorge felt somewhat chastened. “I apologize for letting my personal feelings invade this sacred relationship. It’s true I hold you responsible for many crimes, but it is up to God to say whether or not they are also sins. Your conscience has to prompt you in these matters.”

  Tony stared at the shadowy figure behind the screen. “For this, I forgive you, Father. See, we are all sinners, after all.”

  “I don’t know what you want of me,” Father Jorge said in exasperation. “I thought you wanted to confess. Instead, you seem to be waging some kind of theological assault on human decency.”

  “But I did confess!” Tony protested. “I confessed that I didn’t love God sufficiently.”

  “It’s not a sin if you don’t love God.”

  “Really?” Tony was stunned. “How can that be so? Isn’t loving God the reason for life? Maybe you’re mistaken, Father. Maybe what you mean is that it is something bigger than sin if you don’t love God. It’s so big we don’t have a name for it. And I am guilty of this big thing! I confess this to you! Please, Father, give me your blessing.”

  Father Jorge bit his lip. For the first time, the General made sense to him. Once, he also had thought he understood what God wanted in the world and where he stood in God’s plan. Now he had lost faith in that understanding. He had been just as deluded as Tony Noriega—and perhaps for the same reason: he had failed to love God. The priest wondered whether it was a mistake ever to try to understand the ways of the Lord. It was too easy to fall into confusion and despair. Still, he wished he could be as certain of God’s love as was General Noriega.

  In any case, there was little he could do to change the General’s conscience. His sole duty as a priest was to make certain that the confession was sincere and contrite. In these matters, there was no doubt. In all other things, doubt abounded.

  “You understand what your penance must be?” he asked.

  “Trusting God, I am ready to accept it,” said Tony.

  “In that case, ego te absolvo.”

  As soon as he came out of the confessional, there was stunning evidence of God’s forgiveness. Sitting on the divan in the foyer, smacking gum and jiggling her foot, was Carmen. She looked at him with an expression of wonder, almost of awe.

  “Tony, you’re in so much trouble!”

  He was so shaken he could barely speak.

  “What? What?” said Carmen. “Aren’t you glad to see me? Is there something wrong?”

  “No, nothing wrong,” said Tony. “The very opposite!” He took her long, freckled fingers in his. “I was sure you were already gone.”

  “I was going, but we got caught in the invasion. And then I didn’t know what I wanted. I guess I just wanted to make sure you were safe.”

  “It means that much to you?”

  “They showed a picture of you on television. Where’d you get these clothes?”

  Tony flushed. “It’s not dignified, is it? As a fugitive, it was necessary to assume a disguise. Now I regret it.”

  “That’s why I brought your uniform.”

  Tony’s delighted eyes fell on the laundry bag draped over a chair. “But what about shoes? I can’t wear the uniform with these sandals.”

  “Here,” said Carmen, handing him a shopping bag, “I stole these for you.”

  Tony’s eyes misted over in gratitude.

  “Damn you, Tony, why didn’t you quit a week ago when there was still time to negotiate? We could have lived together in Paris.”

  “But you left me! You were going to be a fashion designer in Miami.”

  “We both know that’s not the point. The point is that you still wanted to be the leader of the country and I didn’t know what I wanted.” Carmen took the gum out of her mouth and wrapped it in a tissue. “What I really wanted was you, Tony, not Mister Ruler of All I Survey. You were too big for me. I couldn’t reach you. But now you’re kind of a nobody. You don’t have anybody except me. It’s the first time in my life I’ve really been needed.” Then she put her arms around him and kissed him hard.

  Tony’s heart was beating so fast he thought he might have a seizure. “You really love me?” he asked breathlessly.

  “Yeah, but it’s going to be a little hard to be with you. The Americans say they’re going to put you in prison for a hundred years.”

  Tony held her to him, and her body felt familiar but also somehow new. It was the body of his beloved. “We don’t have much time,” he said, “but for this moment, I swear that I am completely yours.”

  I KNOW IT ISN’T SANCTIONED by the Church, Monseñor, but true love, isn’t it divine, no matter what people say?”

  The Nuncio looked at Tony with unexpected affection. The two men were saying good-bye in the library. Outside, the black American helicopter that would ferry Tony off to justice awaited, its blades idling impatiently. Television lights ringed the nunciature, waiting to record the departure. Tony appeared to be completely transformed—and not just by the freshly pressed uniform and the last-minute haircut that Sister Sarita had given him. His face glowed. And when the Nuncio had offered him—and Carmen—Communion that evening, it had been one of the most moving experiences he had ever witnessed. They had knelt before him, holding hands. Their love for each other was so obvious that the air in the chapel was charged with it.

  “Love is always precious,” the Nuncio said.

  “Now God has given me everything,” said Tony.

  “I find myself in the odd position of envying you,” said the Nuncio, surprising himself with this admission. Of course, he had long since renounced any notions of romantic love in his own life, but he had never given up on the love of God. Clearly Tony was deluded about God’s particular interest in him, but there was power in the delusion, and consolation. Perhaps it was a form of madness—a similar madness shared by monsters and saints, who all feel divinely entitled to their freedom.

  Tony stood up and the two men embraced.

  “Go with God,” said the Nuncio.

  Downstairs, the staff and the refugees were waiting. Tony said farewell to each of them, particularly to Scar, who was also wanted by the Americans, but not so much that they would pursue him after Tony was gone. Father Jorge stood beside the sturdy oak door. He handed Tony a Bible. “Something to read on your journey,” he said.

  Tony accepted it gratefully. “When I read it, I’ll think of you, Father. I’ll remember your blessing.”

  Father Jorge bowed and looked askance. He felt oddly proud of that moment as well.

  Tony opened the door. The lights blazed into the room, and then he vanished, as if he had been swallowed by the light.

  The Nuncio was drawn after him. Once he got outside, he could feel the draft of the helicopter’s eager blades. He saw Tony opening the front gate. The Nuncio walked quicker, trying to catch up to him, but two huge Americans clapped handcuffs on Tony a
nd picked him up under his arms. They hurried toward the helicopter as if all the ghosts in Panama were chasing them.

  The helicopter door opened, and Tony turned around. He saw the Nuncio and smiled, and then said something that the Nuncio couldn’t hear.

  “What?” the Nuncio cried, and put his hand to his ear to indicate that he hadn’t understood. But now Tony was pulled into the helicopter. As soon as his shoes left the ground the door closed on him, and the helicopter leaned forward, then leapt into the air, spewing wind like a wave. The Nuncio’s skullcap blew off his head and went tumbling into the street.

  From the window of the helicopter, Tony caught a last glimpse of the Nuncio, with one hand on his bare bald head and the other waving frantically. In another second he saw the lights of Panama City spilled along the coastline like pearls carelessly thrown in the sand. The sea, the jungle, the mountains were all below him now, and only the sky and his future awaited him. Next to Tony, an American drug agent was trying to explain his legal rights, but Tony could not pay attention to him. The moment was too powerful. “Why me?” he asked himself again. “Why does God love Tony Noriega?”

  There was no answer. But then, Tony really didn’t expect to hear one. He wouldn’t have answered, either, if he were God, and God were Tony Noriega.

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  This novel does not pretend to be a journalistic account of General Manuel Antonio Noriega and his seven-year reign in Panama. Some of the people chronicled here are part composite, part invention. This was done to allow myself the freedom necessary to imagine the thoughts, feelings, and actions of literary characters. In the case of the Nuncio and his secretary, for example, I have imposed my own characters in place of their real-life counterparts. The book largely follows the true events that occurred between September 13, 1985, when Dr. Hugo Spadafora was assassinated, and the U.S. invasion of Panama on December 20, 1989.

  My character, Tony Noriega, is a creature of my imagination. Although his actions are structured upon the facts of General Noriega’s life as I understand them, my goal in this book is to create a personality who lives plausibly within these pages. It may help the reader to know that, in addition to General Noriega’s conviction for racketeering and conspiring to manufacture and import cocaine into the United States, for which he is currently serving a thirty-year sentence in federal prison in Miami, he has also been convicted in absentia in Panama for his involvement in the murders of Hugo Spadafora and Major Moisés Giroldi. The scenes of his direct participation in those murders are my own creations. Hugo Spadafora’s head has never actually been found.