The Anchor Book of New American Short Stories

by Ben Marcus

  THE FATHER’S BLESSING

  MARY CAPONEGRO

  Allow me, if you would, to tell you of a wedding, which took place not long ago, a wedding no different from any other—not objectively—in which I played my role to everyone’s satisfaction, at least initially. For all I know, the bride might have been already with child when I performed the rite, but I would never be so crude as to count months upon my fingers, when I hear of joyous news, for these very fingers may be called upon to cradle the wailing infant’s tender head at christening time, to give him support as he enters new terrain, unaware of the security, solace, and spiritual wealth that define it. To him, at that moment, I must seem merely a stranger offering unfamiliar, disturbing sensations. But later in his life he will realize the value of my gesture, and our bond.

  The parents of this hypothetical child are perhaps another matter: the couple I recently wed, for instance; they were, in my opinion, naive. They did not realize the contract they were making—with me, that is—when they asked if I would sanctify their union. They assumed they could bid me good riddance, I expect, once the vows were exchanged, as if the rite were mere formality. How strangely they regarded me when—after I had played my role to the satisfaction of all, from the solemnity of the vows to the levity of the reception, chatting pleasantly, even wittily, with the parents, both sets, commenting in passing on the beauty of the bride, lest they think me at too great a remove from human experience—when there was a lull in the receiving line, I took the couple aside (who would question my doing it?) and asked if they would have me perform the last rites.

  Without affectation or cynicism, I announced, “I live, as you know, in the rectory far away, and there is always the chance—though etiquette prohibits our acknowledging—that should you summon me at the last minute, I would be unable to reach you in time. There are so few of us, exiguously placed, and the parishes likewise scarce. The road to the rectory is seldom plowed in winter, and in spring the potholes impede smooth travel. When it rains, the roads turn almost instantly to clay, so that only in a skillful driver’s hands at high speeds can they be traversed successfully. If I were to administer the sacrament to one of you now, think of the time and anxiety we all might be spared, and the law of averages indicates that the partner to receive this prophylactic blessing would likely be that party to require it later on. I realize it is hard to think ahead in the bloom of youth.…”

  The bride, aghast, clutched the arm of the man who only hours ago had been made, under my aegis, her husband, and challenged him by her fear to confront me, which he, I must admit, quite eloquently did; no doubt a heroic effort to match my own eloquence and to impress her by trying to rhyme with my authority. “Father,” he scolded, “what can be your intent? This is a time of rejoicing. You yourself pronounced the words, ‘till death do us part.’ Would you part us so soon then?”

  Realizing that I had been misunderstood, I, who am an accommodating man—I do not proselytize, do not force myself—desisted (my objectives were unlikely to be understood within that public context—for heads were beginning to turn; those who had passed through the line were beginning to gravitate toward it again) and promptly took my leave, against the parents’ puzzled protests: “Do visit us again soon, Father.” And I had the sense, even as I gracefully accepted defeat, that I would see them all again soon enough.

  Walking in town to collect myself, I realized there was another related visit I could make, to clarify what had been muddled. And so I sought out an acquaintance, or might one say, a colleague: the owner, as it happens, of a funeral home. Indeed, the bride and groom appeared surprised when I returned, accompanied, much later in the evening, to the family’s house, where the wedding had taken place—the reception had been elsewhere, as is the custom. Little could they appreciate my willingness, my eagerness, to initiate them into a yet-deeper mystery than the one upon which they had already, by laws of convention, embarked, allegedly for the first time. I even brought my friend the undertaker with me—he required considerable persuasion—to reinforce what might otherwise seem mere words, and to balance the awkwardness of a third party lest they misinterpret my intentions. The undertaker and I allowed no ambiguity in our presentation; we were straightforward, precise.

  “I’ve come,” he said, just as I instructed him, barely glancing at the two individuals he addressed, “to take the measurements for the casket. Would you be so kind as to lie apart, upon your backs, hands folded so, and I’ll be through in no time.” They seemed in shock, paralyzed, in their melded state, until the undertaker brought forward his implement to measure the bridegroom’s member.

  “All parts are parts of the whole,” was his speech; “all shall come to dust.” Meanwhile the groom hid himself the more deeply inside his bride, as if this would render the whole of him invisible. The bride’s cry I could not pretend to interpret; perhaps she was pleased to offer him haven, or startled by his urgency; yet I would have thought the volume appropriate to an instance of assault. The ruler may as well have been a dagger: such was her alarm. Or did she fear that to which she had been newly joined would be, by the former’s measure, reduced? Who can possibly surmise the unbridled musings of the young in unfamiliar circumstances in a world relentlessly novel? I suppose in some ways the equanimity of a man of the cloth is an enviable thing.

  Because I am a sincere man I must tell you that there is indeed advantage to the closet called confessional: one can be so close, intimate; only a thin screen separates oneself from the sinner, one’s own sagacious voice from the whispers which reveal the deepest secrets. That is our special privilege; one might say power: that no one can justify surprise or suspicion when I appear on the other side of, by extension, any partition. There is, with me, potentially greater intimacy than that between a man and wife: one bound to breed resentment, foster ambivalence; for people are uncomfortable robbed of accusations: meddler, eavesdropper, peeping tom, spy; no one of these terms applies to a man of my vocation.

  Father is the name by which all know me, the term by which I’m ceaselessly addressed. But was that the sound that echoed in mythic Daedalus’s ears long after he’d watched the flesh of his flesh falling inexorably from air into water: Father? Father? I am the man who must give answers; thus expectation begets my ingenuity, for I want them prepared, as one does one’s children. And I, like any parent, will never learn my sermon’s lesson: that they must have their own experience; one cannot spare them. The more you try the more they will reject, be repelled—and thereby eject themselves from the sky. Seldom are they equipped to receive the truth, though one wants to believe sheer force of one’s sincerity will smooth the roughest road, quarry hardest stone. Yet one must exercise caution, for sincerity is a dangerous thing.

  It was caution that dictated I depart, with my accomplice, allowing the other two to sort through their admittedly challenging instruction. A man in my profession must be bold, as He whom I revere was bold, but never reckless. The long journey back to the rectory is always an ideal opportunity for reflection.

  As I might have guessed, no sooner had the season changed—or so it seemed; perhaps it had changed more than once—than I received a summons: I was needed. It must, I thought, be time for the baptism now. As my sense of direction is acute, my memory guided me accurately to the town, the tree-lined avenue, the stately Victorian house which was the Callahan residence and inside it, the very chamber from which I had once been banished. I was unable to persuade the undertaker to accompany me this time; from his point of view the prior experience had bred only humiliation. His profession has not taught him, as mine has, the value, the necessity, of perseverance. I would represent him, as I represented so many already. I had my vial of holy water and prayer book in hand as I entered the house of the bride’s parents, the same in which the ceremony had occurred. I assumed I would lead the family to the church after exchanging pleasantries, becoming reacquainted. Perhaps I would hold the child once we arrived, so that my hand upon him would not feel
strange when the ritual was enacted.

  But when I arrived, the cries I heard were not an infant’s, but those of a mature woman, and that is how I came to grace the threshold of their chamber, for I ascended the staircase to investigate with the intention of assisting. As I squinted through the crack in the door, I saw the mother-to-be perspiring, panting, writhing, from time to time moaning in effort of that singular process of which I can perforce have no inkling, called labor, derived from Eve’s seduction by a serpent. Even a husband, it is said, cannot soothe a woman during this arduous period; but I who as a priest possess potentially greater intimacy, thought to humbly offer solace.

  “I am here,” I said, through the crack which gave me witness.

  “No,” she screamed, I assumed to the source of her pain.

  And when she repeated it over and over, I questioned whether contractions could be so frequent. I realized I possessed not even clinical knowledge regarding this miraculous yet commonplace event. I felt something akin to shame, before her next and more explicit statement jarred me from the sentiment: “It’s that horrid priest again!” Her husband rushed to the door and said diplomatically, “There must be some mistake, Father; we sent for the midwife, to assist delivery. It was planned that we have a home birth.”

  I replied that I found it odd they had chosen this alternative with a hospital down the street.

  “Father,” the groom was losing his studied patience, “medicine—am I correct?—is not your area of expertise, and our affairs are not your”—he used His name in vain—“business. Besides, isn’t it obvious that my wife is in no condition to travel, even a short distance, at this stage? On the other hand, there is nothing to hold you here. If priests are in as scarce supply as you report, then I would not want it on my conscience that we had monopolized you.”

  As the groom spoke, admittedly with cleverness, I realized that the suggestion that served his convenience was not without substance, for if it was the case that the couple had not summoned me, then some miscommunication must have occurred through the secretary at the rectory, and some other couple required my ministrations in some fashion. But before I could take action, the most searing cry of all pierced the air, and the woman, to whom the groom turned again to face, and who had previously appeared distorted only in the distention of her abdomen, now manifested a most peculiar symmetry, for she possessed two heads, one at each end. We stood transfixed by this sight, suspended in time, in awe, until the bride herself corrected this anomaly as she pushed out—with disconcertingly audible discomfort, through that chamber that will ever be a secret to me—a diminutive whole human being.

  The completed act restored us to our senses and he dismissed me, saying, “Father, you must not distract me any longer. I have neglected my wife at her most critical hour. She must have no disturbance now. If you want to make yourself useful, you might go find the midwife for us.” Then with his foot he closed the slender aperture that had been my access to the two, now three.

  Although for reasons other than those the groom believed, it was, I felt, my duty to explore elsewhere. The hospital was my destination for there was very likely another couple, another newborn, with whom I had business, a family more receptive to that business. I recalled the pleasant and devout man and woman I had married quite some time ago, who had wanted nothing in the world as much as children, but the pregnancies had been in every case problematic; I knew not the details of the matter.

  When I arrived at the hospital, after quietly exiting the house, I walked immediately to the front desk and offered the name of this prior couple. The nurse recognized my attire, and directed me to the room where the wife had recently given birth. The couple received me gratefully, but they were not alone. A doctor was with them, as well as several others I presumed to be medical students, peering at a Polaroid photograph. My presence did not distract them from their concentration, nor their discussion, the focal point of which seemed to be the ascription of blame, and which became increasingly agitated. I was, I eventually realized, too late, although I blessed the recently departed child, gone to God no sooner had he exited the womb, strangled by the very cord which bound him to his mother’s nurture, in the act of being born. Ah, to witness life and death in such proximity; what more profound instruction could one receive? Although I was too late in one sense, the gift of this lesson was not denied me, and my duty was to offer it to those who could most profit from it. I granted myself permission to borrow documentation.

  I hastened from the room to the corridor to the elevator and so on, until I was once again at the Callahans’ residence. As I was the last to leave, the door had not been latched, so I let myself in; then, like a child, I took the steps two at a time until I stood before the door of the bride and groom. I knocked before entering and addressed them by their Christian names.

  “Kathleen,” I cried, “David. There is something I must show you. Something you must see.”

  “Where’s the midwife, Father?” the groom asked with little animation, concentrating on the pulsating cord that sustained mother and child as unity, clamped at two sites with paper clips, above which he held a small blunt scissors, moving them between two different sites only inches apart, unable to decide, it seemed, where to sever the bond, or simply unable to bring himself to make the cut. The thing which eluded him seemed to me some dense but slender fish, perhaps an eel, caught between sea and land, its respiration intact despite its dislocation. Through the power of grace, it had not been an infelicitous agent in this instance.

  “Here in my hand,” I replied, “in my very hand.” I held the picture to the light. “Kathleen,” I whispered tenderly to her weary form, her sweat-drenched face. I knelt beside her, conscious of, yet not repelled by, the odor of sweat and flesh that pervaded the room, the sight of the bright white linen stained with blood. “This is for you.”

  She squinted at the image I held before her, then gazed at me incredulously before releasing a sound whose frequency seemed almost too high for human ears. Hurriedly, I veiled the truth again, covering what had been for a moment visible. Moments of the truth are all we can bear. And in the next, the midwife arrived. (I heard the bride’s mother answer the bell, explaining that she refused to get involved; her participation had not been invited, and could anyone imagine how difficult it must be to listen to a daughter’s cries and feel so impotent?)

  The newest guest appeared before us, and promptly took charge. Regarding the bride’s glazed eyes and distorted expression (and no doubt informed by the shriek preceding her entry), she said, “What happened here?” The groom motioned toward me, using the scissors as a teacher might a pointer, but spoke no words. “Father, it would be better if you left me alone with her.” Then she addressed the groom. “I’m sorry I was delayed. A breech birth at the hospital involved unforeseen complications and I was called in to help.” After a pause, she added, “Unfortunately to no avail.” She gently released the rounded handles of the implement from his grip, then laid her hand on Kathleen’s forehead, and I was struck by how similar to a sacramental gesture was this contact. “David, you should accompany the Reverend, since Kathleen will need complete rest to recover from the trauma. I doubt she’ll be able to nurse.”

  After performing with expediency the maneuver the groom had been unable to execute, the midwife lifted the tiny form, wrapped it carefully in a blanket she had brought, and handed it to me, then quickly corrected herself, offering it to the groom. Once the bundle was dispensed with, she took the bride’s wrist between her thumb and fingers, feeling for a rhythm I suspected she feared absent. “If only I could have gotten here on time,” she said to herself, no longer communicating with the groom and myself, shaking her head with concern at the bride’s vacant face. Then she repeated it, like a dirge.

  Remembering our presence, she gave instruction and bade us depart, promising to send word when things stabilized. Who were we to doubt her? “It makes most sense for the baby to be cared for in maternity at the hospita
l, until Kathleen revives,” she clarified, gazing at the infant in its father’s arms, then whispered, “Such a lovely little boy.” The groom followed me, reluctant but obedient, out the door, while she set about with her humble instruments, wiping, sponging, disinfecting. We heard her strained but authoritative voice behind us: “And buy some formula, in the hospital pharmacy, in case we need it later.”