“I’ll be right back. I can hear better at the back of the church.”
Cricket went down the side aisle and could see that the guards were also interested in the impromptu concert, a motley version of “I Shot the Sheriff.”
She heard the Brazilian yelling, couldn’t make out her words, and the music began sliding to a stop. A few impassioned players were buried in the rhythm that now sounded like a waltz to Cricket, and one lone singer, who kept repeating “I shot the sheriff,” was shot himself and the crowd cried out in disbelief, and then quickly grew silent. Now only the Brazilian’s voice boomed into the night, unaccompanied by drums, guitars, and dulcimers.
Cricket finally could hear the sun goddess.
“A new age dawns tomorrow replacing the old. This church, Saint Andrew’s, is the old. It embodies a two-thousand-year history that is ending soon, and it deserves this last night of quiet and respect. I don’t want to hear a peep from this crowd until the change is complete and official by late morning.” There was a pause, and she finished with: “May the Goddess be with you.”
“And with you too.” The crowd said in unison, like they had been practicing that line for weeks.
The Brazilian came through the front doors, talked with the guards in the vestibule, and then entered the church. Cricket was making her way up the side aisle. She could kill the woman before she left the church. But then what?
“Emily Cricket, Sister Marie, I’m sorry for the disturbance.”
The Brazilian sailed up the center aisle in her floor-length white toga.
“I warned them. But then I did eliminate an awful singer and wannabe terrorist. The guy was a real pain in the ass—all ambition, no talent.”
Cricket slid into the pew with Sister and touched the holstered gun with her feet. Sister gave her the age-old look of cleric authority, a raised eyebrow, a lift of the chin, and hell to pay if she disobeyed. Instead of shooting the Brazilian in the face, Cricket aimed her twenty-two-year-old look of defiance and her own version of an Elvis sneer straight at the cougar from hell.
“You’re hopeless, Emily Cricket. Your hate’s not going to help Sister Marie. She knows that better than any of us. Tomorrow morning you’ll know what hopelessness really is. Dante said it the best: ‘Abandon hope all ye who enter here.’”
She stood in front and leaned into the pew. Cricket’s foot covered only the gun. Not the knife.
“The best bet, for both of you, is to stay up all night praying. A frayed, tired body at some point can’t believe all the terror that’s being committed against it and enters a dream world, hellish for sure, but removed somewhat from the body. Take my advice. Talk old times, girl talk, religious talk, plenty to keep you wired until morning.”
“You should leave now,” Sister Marie said with scorn. “Your blathering is worse than the poor singer you just murdered in cold blood.”
The Brazilian lifted her chin and sniffed the air like she was searching for something delectable but found only rubbish. She turned and left, giving Sister the last word.
51
One Body, One Sorrow
Sister Marie didn’t take the Brazilian’s advice and fell asleep in the pew, using a red cushion from the priest’s chair for a pillow. Cricket promptly secured the knife to her ankle and the gun at the back of her jeans. She expected several thugs to retrieve them for execution. But when? She heard the Brazilian talk to the crowd about a mid-morning service. Would they be led out before the masses or something private in the courtyard or here, in the church?
Shoot and run was the simplest course of action once an exit opened. And who had left the weapons? Would they help in their escape, or was this their best effort? Did Tony somehow sneak the weapons in? But then how would he know they were to be held in the church?
Too many questions. Cricket and Sister Marie would have to act quickly and on their own. Fritz, my love, how about sending in the Marines?
Cricket moved to the pew opposite Sister Marie and prayed for her husband and prayed that they would again be together. She prayed for everyone she had lost in the passing weeks and those now missing—Grace, Mr. Holaday, and her husband.
Sleep started to overtake Cricket, and she stretched out on the smooth wooden pew and used her forearm for a pillow. She dreamed her dad was walking her toward the J-3 Cub. She was a little girl again. He explained in the clearest of terms how an airplane flew and what control did what. And he was adamant about using just the right amount of pressure to climb or bank or descend. “Flying’s a real balancing act. You’ll sometimes get thrown a real curveball. How do you get back that stability? If you over-control, get angry, flail, what does that accomplish?”
She awoke with a start. Some new energy had been pumped into her veins. Strange, in some ways her dad and Sister Marie were talking about the same thing. How does hating the Brazilian with all your heart help your heart, keep the plane flying? It doesn’t. She reviewed her options, felt the gun and knife and decided to move the knife next to the gun at the top of her jeans. She was straightening her blouse when the sacristy door opened and in flew the Brazilian in a formal black dress. With her shoulder-length blonde hair and glowing white arms, she had become Queen of the Dead.
“I know what you’re thinking: a new look, so sudden—well, it goes with the morning activities. Take a last look around, Sister. Soon, I’m bringing heaven truly to the people. Incense canisters will be positioned at all four corners with my favorite drug burning slowly, inhaled by my flock for my grand entrance. Of course to appreciate the heavenly brew for hours, one needs to drink it, which they will. I’ve had my chemists make a large batch. A cold drink that they’ll quickly toss back. A new Communion.”
Cricket wisely said nothing. Sister, head bowed before the cross, continued to pray.
Four men had followed the Brazilian into the church and now proceeded to escort the two women through the back of the rectory and into the walled-in courtyard, decorated with ornamental bushes and a large English flower bed stuffed with hostas and a variety of perennials. The mums were full of buds but were weeks from opening.
There was a thin line of daylight in the eastern sky, and the garden remained dark until a tiki torch was shoved into the ground and lit, near the building, casting a bloody-gold light on the quiet thugs and the Brazilian, who said, looking at the eastern sky:
“That is my sun rising. It belongs to me. Men, priests, soldiers, politicians have kept that from us, Sister. A pity you couldn’t have realized that. By early afternoon after swimming in the incense for hours, they’ll look up and see that the goddess has arrived in all her glory.”
Two eight-foot stakes, three inches in diameter and six feet apart, awaited Cricket and Sister in a grassy area bordered by marigolds.
“I had the meditation bench removed yesterday. Didn’t think you’d need it. Besides, you had all night to get your religious ducks in order.”
As they tied Cricket’s hands to the stakes, she kept her back slightly arched away from the post. In their rough handling of her, they came close to brushing up against the knife and gun. Still, maneuvering the knife wouldn’t be easy. She needed time. And on cue the Brazilian started talking about time.
“Cricket, you’re here to observe. To watch the death of Christianity, right in Father Danko’s backyard.”
“Nothing is going to die here today except me,” Sister Marie said.
“Eons from now, once foolish humans have finally understood their place in the universe, especially on this earth, a goddess will arise who will suffer physically and emotionally for the masses, eliminating the need for suffering and sacrifice. But until that day, leaders like myself will have to bend wills, break wills, burn and crucify the recalcitrant. Right now I’m using this age’s mostly easily understood pastime—sex, drugs, and rock-and-roll. Most kids never learned about the tired old freedoms of our civilization, so they’re easily controlled, like cutting through butter. The terrors of this new age that they will witness
routinely will be forgotten in orgies of sex and drugs. A world of punishment and fat, delicious moments of escape.”
Sister said nothing.
The Brazilian looked dismayed. “Odd, I expected some response.”
“Just thinking. I’ve been a nurse for forty years and have witnessed all types of disease. But yours is hard to diagnose.”
The Brazilian nodded to the four men and they left. She waited until they were alone.
“I’m really sad I didn’t gag you, Sister. You have a way of spoiling things, like your church has over the centuries. Of course your religion doesn’t completely end today, all at once, across the country. But I can’t tell that to the natives. Today they’ll hear about a real alternative. And to start off a five-thousand-year reign of the Goddess, I’m going to give them something they soon won’t forget. The young are hungry enough for it, and the old are afraid to interfere. They can only watch. Sister, you’ll soon be executed. Nailed to Jesus’ cross in Saint Andrew’s. There’s plenty of religious and literary symbolism to chew on, but I think other emotions will occupy your last hours.”
Cricket stopped herself from a round of curses and denunciations, although her whole body felt weak and acid burned her throat. She stared at the Brazilian, not breathing for a moment, and then gulped the sweet morning air.
Sister Marie’s head hung low, ashamed to be nailed to the same cross as her Savior. In the flickering light, Cricket could see the years quickly added to Sister’s face.
The Brazilian took a step toward the two women. “What, Sister Marie, no clever retort, no sparring?”
“Leave her alone,” Cricket hissed.
“I plan to. And since neither of you is very good company this morning, I decided to leave you someone who might bring some color back to your faces.”
A low moan escaped Sister Marie. Cricket’s knees buckled.
The Brazilian left and the guards followed. Cricket started to move her hands along the post toward the back of her jeans. She painfully twisted her body. Her fingertips briefly touched the handle, and she relaxed her muscles and gathered her strength.
She was about to try and reach for the knife when the door opened and Anton walked in carrying a child. In a few steps both women knew it was Grace. The next moment they knew that she was dead.
The howl that came from the women was communal. They were of one body, one sorrow. The man had brought her right up to the two women so they could see her well and dropped her on the grass like one would a sack onto the back of a truck.
Anton looked them both in the eye, saying:
“I need to be taken seriously. You ignored me, even showed me disdain. Here’s an example of my performance art. I’ll leave the religious significance to the Brazilian.”
He turned and left.
Cricket twisted her body to reach the knife. Her hands were numb, her wrists aching.
Time passed and the sun lightened the garden, and no one had come out to check on the two women and the child at their feet. The young girl’s neck had been broken. Cricket heard prayers from Sister that were alien-sounding to her. The world had never felt as alien as it did now, with a girl who had suffered so much recently and yet briefly found a way to again feel the warmth of sunlight on her skin in the company of Cricket and her friends.
“I understand her hatred of me, dear Lord, but why this beautiful flower?” Sister Marie’s head hung to one side, gazing at the child for nearly two hours.
Cricket could now see the color of Grace’s dress, dark blue. Her white legs were delicate and would never move again. She gasped when she realized that Grace’s eyes were still open, staring at the opposite side of the garden.
With all her might, she reached the knife and slowly pulled it from its sheath. She grasped the handle and some of the blade. She cut herself, but it didn’t matter.
Sister wouldn’t talk to Cricket directly. Everything filtered through a prayer or a description of Grace from their short time together.
“Sister, I can’t have you in a state of shock. If I get loose I need you to be able to move, even fight if necessary.”
“I want to bring Grace with us,” she said in a soft voice. “We need to get her out of here.”
“I know, Sister.” Cricket carefully brought the blade between the rope and the stake and twisted the knife perpendicular to the rope, applied pressure, and started to saw in short strokes. But the strokes were light and it would take some time to free herself.
As the sun illuminated the beautiful garden and the terrible deed laid at the feet of the two women, Cricket’s strength waned. She hadn’t made it through the rope.
The door opened, and for a moment everything was so surreal that she watched the scene unfold like an observer in a dream who has nothing emotionally at stake.
Dressed in her white toga, the Brazilian held the door open wide and two men carried out the enormous cross from the back of the altar. Then they laid it on the grass with Christ’s body facedown, pressed into the grass, exposing the smooth, unobstructed back side of the cross.
“Sister, you’ve spent years at the foot of the cross, meditating, praying. I’m generously giving you an hour to meditate one last time.”
Cricket woke up from the dream: Fritz, where are you? She screamed to herself, looking at the sky, not wanting the Brazilian to see her torment.
Sister still hung her head down, staring lovingly at Grace. Her lips moved in prayer.
The Brazilian said, “Cricket, you and I will have brunch in a few hours, after you clean up of course.”
Again, Cricket controlled an outburst that would have rocked the heavens.
“Sister,” the Brazilian said, “I suggest you take your attention away from the temporal in that little slip of a girl and turn it to the bigger question of the cross and all that it represents.”
The men followed the Brazilian back into the rectory.
52
Crucifixion
The morning air was cool. Dew had formed everywhere in the courtyard on all the flowers and bushes, wetting Grace’s hair.
“Cricket, I don’t know if I can be strong,” Sister Marie said. “I’m tired and cold … so sad for this beautiful young girl. I don’t know if I have the strength to die well.”
“I’m going to get you out of here.” Her hands numb, Cricket slashed at the rope. She could have been slashing herself. One rope popped and she dropped the knife.
“You’re so much like your parents. Such beautiful people … so in love.”
“Dammit.” She pulled her hands several inches apart but was still bound. “Almost there, Sister.”
“And you’re finally in love. I’m sure of it. He’s such a good man.” Sister sighed loudly like she was exhaling her last breath.
Cricket worked harder to free herself. She tried rubbing the rope across the pole, weakening the strands. Then she started grabbing the rope with her right hand and forcing it off the left. She got to the meat of her palm and the door opened. She froze.
The Brazilian was followed by the big-time wrestlers who had guarded them in the study—Spandex shorts and bare-chested. One man carried an open tool box and a coil of rope.
“Don’t touch her!” Cricket yelled hoarsely. She twisted her arms against the loose ropes and felt the gun. She could pull it from the holster, but couldn’t aim.
“I’m not going to,” the Brazilian said, arriving with the flounce of an actress filming a soap commercial in the Garden of Eden. She looked fresh and beautiful in her white toga. “I’m a great politician who doesn’t like to watch the sausage being made. That’s the job of these men.” She addressed them directly, “Please be careful when you bring the new cross back inside. I don’t want any damage to the walls and furniture. I like this place. I may be here awhile.”
One of the men dragged the cross onto the stone patio. Christ remained facedown. The other began untying Sister Marie. The Brazilian walked over to the cross.
“A rich moment
of pageantry and spiritual energy, Sister.” The Brazilian didn’t look up when Cricket screamed.
But it was Sister Marie’s words that rose above the cries of her young friend.
“I forgive you.”
“What?” The Brazilian turned like someone had pissed on the back of her toga.
“There is no more forgiveness! No more sin. No redemption. I’m setting people free—free to live by their own rules.”
The two executioners waited. The one who had untied Sister held her with one hand. He asked, “Clothes on or off?”
“Oh, keep them on. We’re crucifying an elderly woman. Not all convention goes out the window today.”
“Thank you,” Sister said, “for that kindness.”
The Brazilian ran to Sister Marie and cracked her across the face.
“Say your rosary. Pray to the God you’re dying with.”
She stormed off the patio. When the Brazilian opened the door, Cricket heard arguing and shouting from inside. The two executioners looked at each other and shrugged and went about their work, bored plumbers who needed to finish a job and get on to the next.
“She’s crazy,” Cricket yelled, but there was no volume, only hoarseness.
The men ignored her as they placed Sister on the cross, and one began affixing her right arm to the crossbeam with rope. The other man tied her feet to the bottom of the cross.
“Make her feet secure, John,” the first man told his partner. “Don’t want the old gal slipping.”
Cricket was furious, pulling and tugging against the stake.
Sister Marie let out a wail Cricket had never heard before. In roughly positioning her right arm, they had pulled it from the socket.
“You bastards!” Cricket yelled. “How could you do this?” She couldn’t say anything else; she was weeping and fighting the ropes.
In her tears she prayed for Fritz, Tony, the cavalry to come bursting through the door, but the door remained closed tight.
Pulse of the Goddess: American Blackout Book One Page 27
