“Sic est,” Dimitru agreed. “Truly, a truer word was never spoken.”
“The Socialist riffraff don’t give a fig for the Lord’s commandments,” roared the Saxon Schuster. “They test God’s patience,” he shouted. “To hell with the Communists.” Whereupon Roman, the middle Brancusi brother, couldn’t keep his seat a moment longer.
“You tra-tra-tra-traitor!” he screamed at Schuster, stammering as always when he got overexcited. He rushed over to the Saxon and with the words “Da-da-damned Hitlerist!” shattered an empty Sylvaner bottle on his head. Schuster gave a brief twitch, then keeled over like a wet sack. While a few men came to the aid of the unconscious fellow and carried him outside, Grandfather managed with quite a bit of difficulty to keep the outraged guests from going for the Brancusis.
“You haven’t heard the last of this,” the three of them cried defiantly before making a quick getaway.
Hermann Schuster slowly regained consciousness, still woozy from the bang on his skull. Kristan Desliu, Karl Koch, and I helped him drag his way home through the rain. Erika Schuster blanched when she caught sight of her husband with a big bruise on his forehead. She put up water for tea and wrapped his head in moist towels, but Hermann tore them off, pushed the chamomile tea away, and pretended nothing special had happened in the taproom.
The tavern emptied out after the fight. Most of the men went home sober and cranky. By the clock it wasn’t even seven yet. Ilja’s fifty-fifth birthday celebration was over before it had really begun.
Grandfather was at a loss. “Satellites circle the earth, and we humans have gone off the tracks. Believe me, Pavel, the world is out of joint. The maelstrom of evil grows strong again.”
I could read Grandfather’s thoughts. I knew exactly what was on his mind at this moment: his son, Nicolai, my father. Grandfather had already witnessed the fatal pull of perdition when the rabid tirades of the Führer in Berlin had lured the Saxons to their radios, and even his peace-loving neighbors had gotten fired up for the mad idea that their chancellor would bring them home to the Reich of their ancestors. It didn’t turn out that way. Instead, there was a war that cast its shadows even over Baia Luna, and my father joined the wrong side. He lost his life because he thought it was the right one.
In the fall of 1940, Wehrmacht units had marched into Transmontania, their ally against Stalin. The boys had run off, the best young men in Baia Luna, led by Karl Koch, Hermann Schuster, and Hans Schneider. And Nicolai Botev. They had all volunteered for the imminent campaign against the Soviets. They intended to achieve a glorious victory over the Bolsheviks, melt down the tanks and cannon of the godless troops of the red star, and recast them as bells that would ring in the victory of the Cross over Communism.
The war had left no trace in my memory. I was three years old when it ended. But for my grandfather, it had never ended. He lived with his loss. He had lost his future, Nicolai, his only son. I don’t believe a day went by when Ilja didn’t think of him, even though he still had his daughter-in-law Kathalina and me. And of course his daughter Antonia, too. I know that Grandfather wished Antonia had left his house long ago. With his whole heart he longed for her to find a decent husband. But the prospects weren’t good for him to acquire a new family and more grandchildren. A train wreck of a love affair that no one would talk about had derailed my aunt’s life to such an extent that she sought refuge in indifference and laziness. She conscientiously took care of the bookkeeping and paperwork for the store, but that was the extent of her household duties. Most of the time she lay in bed, salving her sorrow with chocolates and pralines and otherwise watching indifferently as her ample proportions increased with each passing day.
I was now fifteen and soon would have school behind me. Grandfather was asking more and more often what I had in mind for the future. I didn’t have an answer.
“Innkeeper, another drop?”
Dimitru pulled us back into the present. He was sitting in the corner beside the stove next to Johannes Baptiste and my school friend Fritz. Granddad set up Sylvaner and zuika while I went to the storeroom to get the broom and dustpan. I swept up the shards of the bottle Roman Brancusi had smashed on Hermann Schuster’s hard skull and then sat down with the mixed company.
“Pavel, you can take the rest of the night off,” said Granddad. “The bar is closed.”
I looked over at Fritz, but he indicated no desire to go home.
“We’ll hang around a bit,” I said. “It’s still early.”
Fritz nodded, and Father Johannes said, “I always like having young people around.” Grandfather didn’t object.
I heard the ticking of the clock whose hour hand had just passed seven. Johannes Baptiste was twiddling his thumbs, a habit that always meant he was looking for a good opportunity to start talking. Then he cleared his throat.
“So Dimitru, you think there’s a shady story no one can see through behind this Sputnik?”
“Absolutely!”
“And what dark plot do you see at work?”
Dimitru fumbled around looking for an answer. “I’m very close to a conclusio, if only—”
“So you know nothing,” Baptiste cut him off. “Does the name Sergei Pavlovich Korolev mean anything to you?”
“A Russian, I’m guessing.”
“A Ukrainian,” said Johannes Baptiste. “A luminary of rocket technology. The best. For years, Korolev has been developing a secret program of manned spaceflight with thousands of engineers working for him. Bad, very bad. And today we’ve learned”—Baptiste pointed at the television—“that the Sputnik is only a first step toward the illusion of human omnipotence. The way things stand now, the Bolsheviks have really managed to overcome the powerful gravitational forces of the earth. Against nature. First a dog, then a chimp, then a man. But I tell you that according to Holy Scripture, an ascension into the heavens is reserved for the Lord Jesus. Besides him, according to God’s design, only one other person of flesh and blood has been granted bodily admission into heaven. And as you very well know, Dimitru, it was Mary the Mother of Jesus. That’s how Pope Pius in Rome laid it down in a secret dogma in 1950.”
“Sic est,” agreed the Gypsy.
“Back to Korolev. What does this crafty Ukrainian have in mind? That’s the question that preys on my mind. In fact, it’s a burning question. What’s the Soviet Engineer Number One looking for in the vastness of the firmament? It’s a riveting question. And the answer is much more riveting.” The priest took a swallow of water. “You heard it today from this flickering doomsday box. From Khrushchev’s own lips. The Soviets want to send cosmonauts into the heavens and raise the Communist flag on the moon.”
“So what? Let them do it,” Fritz interrupted the priest in a snotty voice.
“And you would be Fritz Hofmann, the lad who just had the idea of using wire for the antenna? A clever fellow, no doubt, although I’ve never seen you in church. But you should keep quiet, Mr. Know-It-All, when an old man is talking about things you haven’t got the foggiest notion of.”
Fritz tried to conceal how much this reprimand had hurt him as the Benedictine continued. “If my information is correct, Korolev is working with a man by the name of Yury Gagarin. When Khrushchev was elevated to first secretary last year, Korolev and Gagarin got personal audiences in the Politburo. They spread their rocket plans out on Khrushchev’s desk and asked for money for a titanic space program. A lot of money.”
“And they got it,” Dimitru interjected. “Probably double what they asked for. I suspect the army raised the ante a fair amount.”
“In any event, Korolev can build his rockets—as many as he wants. But only under top secret conditions somewhere out in the steppes of Kazakhstan and only on condition that he never uses the word ‘ascension.’ He’s only allowed to refer to it by the code name ‘the Project.’ If he doesn’t”—and Baptiste made his fingers into scissors—“they’ll cut out his tongue.”
“But why would the
chief of all the Soviets want to cut out people’s tongues,” Grandfather put in his oar, “just on account of a Russki flag on the moon that nobody’s going to see from down here anyway?”
“Forget the flag,” replied Johannes Baptiste. “That’s just to taunt the Americans and rub their noses in Soviet superiority. Pure vanity. That’s also why the Sputnik sends out those signals. From a scientific perspective, the beep-beep makes no sense. Basically, the Sputnik is just announcing, Listen up, listen up. I exist. I’m up here. Of course, that’s how Khrushchev drives his opponent Eisenhower stark raving mad and demonstrates to the Americans that the Bolsheviks’ engineers are faster, smarter, and further along. Remember, we’re in the world political phase of a Cold War that sometimes produces quite heated skirmishes. Even in Baia Luna, to which the ringing skull of our doughty Hermann Schuster can attest. Without a doubt the Kremlin wants to win the race against the capitalist system of the USA. But that’s not the heart of the problem. The essence of an ascension is something completely different. And I claim that Korolev knows what it is.”
Pater Johannes paused to ask for a refill of water, and I guess also to give us listeners a chance to ask questions. No one had any, so he continued: “I don’t see the world with the eyes of a politician but of a pastor concerned with the spiritual needs of his flock. All the more so since I can feel that my days are numbered. And what I see concerns me. Really concerns me. Where do we come from and where are we going? Those are the fundamental questions of human existence. The world knows only one answer: ashes to ashes and dust to dust. There is no God and no heaven. But I believe in the Trinity of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. I believe in heaven and that there’s someone up there.”
“Laika the dog?” I interjected.
“Forget about that yapper. No, Pavel, I’m talking about a woman. I already mentioned that mysterious Vatican dogma of the corporeal Assumption into heaven of Mary the Mother of God. Is it beginning to dawn on you why Korolev is building rockets? The reason that the Soviets plan to shoot cosmonauts into the firmament is so top secret that only Khrushchev, Korolev, and this Gagarin fellow are in on it. They’re looking for an answer to the question: Does God exist?”
“Oh my God.” Dimitru groaned and hammered his fist on his skull. “The Bolsheviks simply fly up to the stars and take a look. Pure empiricism! The ultimatoric proof of God’s existence! No more Thomas Aquinas!”
“You could see it that way. And I’ll wager that in the near future, when the first cosmonaut returns from space, there’s only one thing Khrushchev and Korolev will want to know—”
“Did you see God up there?” Fritz chimed in.
“You’re no dim bulb, Hofmann Fritzy, but you’re not a good listener. You think you’ve got nothing more to learn, not in church and not about church. Wrong, boy, big big mistake! If you’d only think back, you upstart whippersnapper, then you’d know what Korolev’s question would be and can only be: Did you see Mary up there?”
I registered a nervous tic in Fritz’s face. Not even Barbu’s pointer could shake his composure, but Father Johannes had unnerved him. He chewed his nails in silence. It was clear to me that, privately, Fritz was determined to pay the priest back for his humiliation. He just didn’t know how yet.
“And why won’t Korolev ask after God himself?” I chimed in.
Baptiste patted my shoulder. “Put yourself in his place, boy. Try to think like he does! Korolev is a researcher—measuring, weighing, counting, testing—a materialist, a self-declared atheist for whom only the scientific theory and its proof are valid. Nevertheless, he isn’t stupid. Of course he is aware that if God really does exist against all expectations, his cosmonauts would never be able to see him. The Almighty is invisible, as the Jews already knew. He is invisible not only for the human eye, but for optical instruments of any kind whatsoever. Ditto the Holy Ghost. The spiritus sanctus escapes every pupil for the obvious reason that he’s a spirit. With Jesus Christ, it’s a little more complicated. He lived, suffered, and died as a man, and he rose from the dead as the Redeemer. As such he is obviously visible in the form of the consecrated bread and the gleam of the Eternal Flame in the sanctuary lamp that attests day and night to the presence of divine omnipotence in our church. But what about Mary? Mary was a human being, and she remained a human being in death and after death. That’s what Pope Pius (whom otherwise I don’t think much of) recognized so fittingly. In 1950, five years after the war, he issued the Apostolic Constitution Munificentissimus Deus. It says more or less, ‘We proclaim, declare, and define it as a dogma revealed by God that the immaculate, eternally virginal Mother of God Mary at the end of her earthly life was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory.’ That means not only Mary’s spirit but also her flesh and blood are in heaven. Now just imagine what this Vatican dogma means for a materialist: it’s the supreme challenge, pure and simple. If the dogma is true, then this Jewess from Nazareth beat Korolev to it. The first spaceflight in history, the first conquest of gravity. Without a rocket. That’s why the Russians are firing cosmonauts in among the stars. They have to find the answer to the all-important question about God. If the visible Mother of God exists, then logically the invisible Creator of All Things exists as well. And no one knows that better than Engineer Number One.”
“Oh holy shit!” howled Dimitru. “This doesn’t look good. Bad news for the Catholics. And worse news for Gypsies. Mary is our Mother, our queen, our advocate at the heavenly throne, Mater Regina of the miserable! Without her, no deals with the Lord God. Uh-oh, I’m telling you, if Korolev finds the Madonna, then God have mercy on us. Didn’t I give early warning that Sputnik would spell disaster? But nobody listens to a Black. Didn’t they laugh at me, slander me, mock me, spit on me? But I predict here and now that what began as a beep will end in desastrum.”
“Hang on, hang on. Not so fast,” Grandfather jumped in. “There’s a way to stop Korolev.”
“I’m unable to see such a possibility,” Pater Johannes objected.
Dimitru took a swallow and agreed: “Where nothingness reigns, even the seer is blind.”
“It’s simple,” Grandfather continued undeterred. “The Americans have to get in ahead of the Russians. They can’t let this Sputnik beeping drive them crazy. They’ve got to keep a cool head and build their own rockets. Better ones than the Russians. Rockets that fly higher and farther. After all, the United States of America has certain obligations to the Virgin Mary, who protects the city of Noueeyorka from enemy attacks. So it’s high time for the Yanks to give Mary some protection of her own.”
Dimitru rose slowly to his feet, swaying slightly. He stumbled, caught himself, and fell into Ilja’s arms.
“Tha’s it! America’ll build rockets and save th’ Madonna! And the Soviets’ll bite their own asses. Why di’nt I think’ve it myself? That’d be th’ answer!”
Ilja felt entitled to correct his friend: “That wouldn’t be the answer, Dimitru, that is the answer.”
Chapter Four
THE ETERNAL FLAME, BLOND HAIR IN THE WIND,
AND A THREE-DAY DEADLINE
“Time to go,” said Johannes Baptiste, picking up his cane. “Until Sunday. In church. It’s time to confront the collectivists.”
He tapped the television set with his stick, grumbled something about an apparatura diavoli non grata whose presence transformed every tavern into a brawling dive, and gestured toward the birthday present wrapped in brown paper that Ilja had set down next to the cash register.
Grandfather gave the priest his arm and offered to accompany him back to the rectory, but Baptiste waved him away grumpily before his weary steps receded into the blackness of the night.
Fritz and I stood up, too. I yawned but wasn’t tired. I felt like getting some exercise and fresh air. Fritz was silent, his lips clamped together tight as a vise. He was nursing his grudge against the priest for the dressing-down he’d been given.
Dimitru reached for the bottle of zuika a
nd held it up to the light from the ceiling lamp. It was empty. He spied the full glass of wine Pater Johannes had left behind and slurred, “What th’ sainted hand disdain z’good ’nuffer th’ Gypsy.” Then he tossed off the Sylvaner and staggered out onto the porch. His hands groped for the railing but found only thin air. Dimitru slipped, fell over, slid down the slippery steps on his belly, and landed headfirst in the mud. He moaned pitifully, cursed Saint Joseph (the patron saint of carpenters) and the disasters associated with wooden steps in the rain. Then he ran his hands along his thighs, knees, and calves while the mud dripped from his hair.
“Morphine,” he groaned, “need morphine.”
Grandfather scolded him, “Don’t carry on so, you big baby.”
Dimitru shut right up, his mouth still wide open and his face distorted in such a painful grimace that I couldn’t help grinning in schadenfreude.
“Pavel! Fritz! Help Dimitru get home.” Whining, the Gypsy pulled himself to his feet and leaned on my arm. Then we set off, he limping, cursing, and crying while he sagged on my shoulder like a wet sack of corn. Fritz trotted along behind us. The clock in the church tower was tolling nine thirty when we reached the gypsy’s cottage at the lower end of the village. His niece Buba took delivery of her drunken uncle. Dimitru dropped onto the rug, pulled his knees to his chest like a fetus, and fell asleep at once. Buba took off his shoes, shoved a pillow under his head, and covered him with wool blankets and sheepskins.
“Uncle Dimi gets a chill easily. He must have been a block of ice in an earlier life.” She laughed and extended her hand. Although the girl with the unruly black curls was usually ready with some cheeky remark, she thanked us for our help and asked if we’d like to stay a bit.
The Madonna on the Moon Page 8
