Agnes Among the Gargoyles

by Patrick Flynn

  New Yorkers, though terrified, are taking the Minotaur in stride. The feeling is that the Minotaur is more frightening than the Laughing Man was in 1971, but still not as frightening as 1977's Son of Sam. "Sam still gives me nightmares," said one woman who asked not to be identified, "but I think the Minotaur is a comer."

  Chapter Fifty-One

  Tommy and Agnes go to Tommy's apartment to pick up his last few odds and ends. At the same time, Father Chris is moving in. All of Father Chris's possessions take up about as much space as Tommy's odds and ends. The priest's bed looks like an army cot. Agnes sweeps while Father Chris hangs up his crucifixes, his portrait of the Pope, his framed parchment copy of St. Ignatius Loyola's "Norms of Orthodoxy," a certificate of completion of five-hundred hours of devotion as the shrine of Sainte-Anne-De-Beupre, and a photo taken with another wild-eyed frightening-looking priest at the Passion Play at Oberammergau.

  "Will you still be at St. Basil's?" says Agnes.

  "I'd love to continue teaching, but I'm sure Father Clarence has asked the chancery to assign someone else as his assistant," says the priest morosely. "I came to God very late, you know. Ritual throws me. I can never seem to lay out the right vestments, and I think Father Clarence loses patience with me."

  Tommy moves one of Father Chris's boxes. The bottom falls out, and out spill a dozen copies of Variety, the show business bible.

  Father Chris tells them that before he became a priest, before he thought about religion at all, he was an actor. He worked in television. He wasn't famous, but he worked steadily. He was successful. He was also an emotional wreck, and a drug addict. One morning, hung over and racing on Dexedrine, he was thrown from his horse and trampled while on the set of either The Virginian or Cimarron Strip—he doesn't remember which; he did lots of oaters in those days—and woke up in Cedars of Lebanon with a broken back.

  "It got me thinking," he says.

  He shows them a 1966 Variety. There is a photo spread on the upcoming season of Bonanza. Sure enough, there Agnes recognizes Father Chris. He wears a black hat and brandishes a shooting iron. In his youth he looked even more skeletal and malevolent, though Agnes thinks his eyes now seem more greasily lustrous.

  Agnes reads the caption:

  DOWN TO TWO BROTHERS? Bent on revenge, twisted outlaw Clanton Casey (Christopher Cruise) takes aim at the youngest Cartwright boy in the special two-part episode, "A Bullet For Little Joe." You may remember Chris as the mean hombre who plugged Marshal Matt Dillon in last season's Gunsmoke wrap-up, "Requiem For A Man Of Honor." Chris, you sure do get around!

  "Lorne Greene was a saint," says Father Chris mistily.

  He heats up a meal of oats and rice cooked into a paste. He offers some to Tommy and Agnes. They settle for tea. He spreads out the tea things on his footlocker. He roots around in a suitcase and comes up with a brassiere, which he wraps around the teapot.

  "There's no better tea cozy," he says.

  He whispers a brief Grace, then digs into the gruel.

  "I also did a lot of cop shows," he tells them. He always played the psychotic killer. He wasn't acting, really. All he had to do was look menacing.

  "Now I remember you," says Agnes as the realization dawns. "You were on Perry Mason. You almost raped Della Street."

  "We didn't call it that, but yes."

  "You were terrifying," says Agnes.

  That's an understatement. Christopher Cruise still pops up in Agnes's nightmares, though she had long since forgotten who he was. His image was imprinted upon her as the ne plus ultra of the dangerous maniac. Now he sips his tea and eats his mush and giggles foolishly and Agnes is still a little afraid of him.

  There is a knock at the door.

  "Pizza!"

  Father Chris looks worried. "I didn't order pizza. Did you? I hope it's not a practical joker."

  Father Chris reluctantly opens the door.

  "Surprise!"

  A delegation from St. Basil's School for the Blind pours into the apartment. Teachers carry pizzas and bottles of soda; some of the students follow guide dogs. Two deliverymen cart in a brand-new desk. Father Clarence hoists a bottle of champagne and a garment bag.

  "Happy, housewarming, Christopher!" he booms.

  Father Chris, deeply moved, doesn't know where to turn first.

  Father Clarence points to the bowl of mush. "Hey everyone—Chris is having his penitential stew. Only it doesn't look like there's enough for all of us. We'll have to have pizza."

  Father Chris accepts his gifts. The desk is from the Seniors, Class of 198_, St. Basil School for the Blind. The hand carved Mexican holy water font is from Mrs. Criswell. There is also a box from the parents of a student whom Father Chris recently tutored. The gift turns out to be a replica, in Belgian chocolate, of the book they studied together, Great Expectations.

  "Isn't that a riot," says Father Chris. "I wish I still ate chocolate."

  Father Clarence unzips a garment bag and presents Father Chris with two brand-new cassocks.

  "And of course, you'll be staying on as my assistant," says Father Clarence.

  Someone turns on a radio. The cake is cut. One of the teachers steps over a clutch of guide dogs to talk to Agnes.

  "I've seen that videotape of you saving Ronald Wegeman a million times," says the woman. "What a great move! My name is Jo Bailey. I'm kind of into Tae Kwon Do."

  "That was all pretty embarrassing, but thanks," says Agnes.

  "It was fantastic." Jo has a not-from-the-city twang. She has dazzling blue eyes and a mobile mouth. Blond curls spill over the collar of her rugby shirt. She can hardly contain her excitement at meeting Agnes in the flesh. A moment later she is demonstrating a hold on Tommy. "If you get 'em by the midsection, here, then apply the pressure, here, the increased torque'll immobilize him completely. If you've got a set of house keys, you can kill him."

  Tommy stands up and shakes Jo's hand. "I don't believe we've met."

  Jo teaches social studies at St. Basil's. She is interested in presenting positive role models to her students. She talked about Agnes in class. She is also directing this year's student theatrical, Scenes from Shakespeare.

  "I wouldn't think this kind of school could do something like that," says Agnes, trying to be tactful.

  Jo points to Father Clarence. "That's him. The big man. He wants a normal high school experience for the kids. It's marvelous. Did you know we have a marching band? We sit on a float, but the kids play."

  Agnes wells up with tears. "That's so nice."

  "Don't do that—I'll be crying in a minute," says Jo. "Come meet my three witches."

  Jo introduces Agnes to Grace, Perri, and Doreen and their respective guide dogs Bob, Arthur and Snowflake.

  Grace says matter-of-factly to Agnes, "I don't know how you could have saved that pig's life."

  "Gracie...." says Jo.

  "It's true, Miss Bailey," says Grace. "I don't know who I hate more, Wegeman or his wife Madelaine or Clark Ho."

  "Who's Clark Ho?" says Doreen.

  "Wegeman's architect. Jesus, Doreen, don't you ever read the paper?"

  Perri asks to feel Agnes's face. She pinches Agnes's nose and probes her eye sockets and strokes the planes of her cheeks.

  "You're quite attractive," she tells Agnes. "Gracie, feel her face."

  "Let me," says Doreen. Once again, Agnes submits.

  Agnes is not quite at her ease with blind children. "So you girls are doing a scene from Macbeth?"

  Doreen squeals. "Don't say it! Don't say the name! It's bad luck."

  "Oh Jesus," says Grace, rolling her sightless eyes.

  "Sorry," says Agnes.

  "Please call it Teaspoon," says Doreen merrily. "We called it The Scottish Play for a while, and that got shortened to TSP so now we say Teaspoon."

  Parties built on pizza and soda and a single bottle of champagne come to an abrupt end. Everyone mills about on the sidewalk. A yawn passes from guide dog to guide dog. Jo organizes the students and leads them off
toward the van. Doreen has a panic attack. She is absolutely convinced that she left a textbook in the apartment. Grace insists that she didn't have a textbook with her.

  "Don't be a fleidermaus, Doreen," says Grace sharply.

  When the girls are out of earshot, Father Chris explains: "It's an insult. When your blindness conquers you, if only for a moment, then you're being a fleidermaus. Isn't it heartbreaking?"

  Father Clarence comes up behind Agnes and puts his arm around her waist. "We didn't have a chance to talk," he says. "I want to thank you for finding Father Chris a home."

  "Don't mention it, Father. It was Tommy's apartment."

  "Ah, but you were the guiding energy. Madelaine may be right about you."

  "What does she say?"

  "That you're a positive force. That only good happens when you're around."

  "I've had to do a lot of mopping up lately," Agnes concedes. "But it could be that I'm a force for bad. Nobody ever took a shot at Madelaine's husband until I was around."

  "Perhaps," says the priest. "And my nephew—did he leave for Eftsoons?"

  "Not exactly. He got cold feet."

  "I suspected as much," says Father Clarence. "He stayed in the rectory the other night. He thinks I don't know. Clarence has been a great trial to his mother."

  He turns to Father Chris. "Are we all set for tomorrow?"

  "Everything's in order," says the younger priest uncertainly.

  Father Clarence gets into his gleaming fat-assed illegally parked and unticketed Cadillac and drives off.

  Father Chris looks particularly mournful. "Everything isn't in order. I forgot that tomorrow is Laetare Sunday.. It's the only day in Lent that the vestments can be rose-colored. I have to lay everything out all over again."

  Agnes and Tommy give him a lift to St. Basil's. Traffic is congested; several streets are closed off because of the Wegeman renovations. Father Chris jumps out of the car and darts into the church. Agnes and Tommy sit in the same spot for twenty minutes. Agnes gets out of Tommy's car and peeks into St. Basil's. Father Chris is on the altar. He is changing the linen. He storms around angrily, balling up altar cloths and heaving them to the floor. He mutters to himself. Agnes can't make out the words; she can only discern an indistinct rumbling, as though someone had pressed the lowest key on the organ.

  "He's an odd one," Agnes reports to Tommy.

  On the site of the old Latin Quarter grows the OFFISQUARE component of the Wegeman complex. "When we build, let us think that we build forever," said John Ruskin. "Architecture aims at eternity," said Christopher Wren. Agnes can only look at this latest Clark Ho travesty and sigh. Are they making it up as they go along? Why those strange belts of marble encircling each tower like a beauty contestant's sash? Is that intentional, or was a coffee stain on the blueprints accidentally incorporated into the work?

  Agnes cranes her neck out the window for a better look at what Ho has done. She gets a surprise. There, poised on a girder on the tenth floor or thereabouts, is Madelaine. She wears a gold sheath dress and a gold cape and a gold construction helmet. She looks like a statue come to life. Locked in conversation with a man in a boiler suit, she conveys her idea to him by pointing up and up and up, justifying the erection of her personal Tower of Babel. Who does she think is going to rent all those offices? The vacancy rate at One Grand Central is near fifty percent, yet still the Wegemans build and build. They seem to think they can get around the Law of Supply and Demand through sheer strength of will. Maybe they can. Maybe someday every person in the city will inhabit a Wegeman construct; maybe New York will see Wegeman basement conversions and Clark Hodesigned mother-daughter houses.

  Agnes and Tommy abandon the car. They stroll hand in hand down 42nd Street. The jackhammers beat a tattoo of destruction. As part of its agreement with the city, the Times Square Redevelopment Corporation has agreed to the mounting of large electric signs of an eye-catching or exciting nature, employing chaser lights and/or illuminated animation and/or physical animation of fixtures; bright and conspicuous colors, with a preponderance of reds, greens and blues; a mixture of graphic designs and approaches....Street-facing ground-level signs should not be less than forty-five (45) feet in height, and of a width proportionate to the width of the building, the proportion of sign-to-facade width to be not less than 3:4....the famous "honky tonk" feel of Times Square is to be maintained to the extent possible.

  The first of these signs is partially completed, the illuminated G&H logo for Gephardt and Hooten, the insurance underwriters. There is a pornographic bookstore about to be closed down for demolition. Agnes and Tommy go inside. The clientele seems like a typical cross-section of male society. Agnes sees no drooling perverts. No one paging through the magazines seems to be enjoying himself except for a pair of exuberant Japanese businessmen.

  "I'll wait outside," says Tommy.

  "Afraid you might enjoy yourself?" says Agnes.

  "I get sick to my stomach," says Tommy. "But that might be from the disinfectant they use in the jerk-off booths."

  Agnes looks at the magazines. The narrow casting of individual perversions is a precise business.

  Two ravaged looking women wearing sweatsuits and carrying gym bags come in. They head for the live show upstairs. The one with bleached hair sees Agnes and waves.

  I have that kind of face, thinks Agnes.

  The owner, an Indian man in a Lacoste shirt and turban, is not happy. "You cannot stay," he tells Agnes. "Please go."

  "What's the problem?"

  "You are making my customers uncomfortable. I cannot have women in here."

  Her observation of the system has changed the system.

  "Now I understand," she says. "Heisenberg."

  "He is no longer the owner. I have my own rules. Come, come."

  Outside the shop, Tommy sits perched on the edge of a trashcan.

  "Would you like to see me in a dog collar?" she asks him.

  "We have to walk before we can run, honey,"

  "If you're unhappy, we can end it now," she says meekly.

  "I'm not going anywhere."

  "Good."

  "I'm perfectly happy here on my dumpster. And I'm afraid to get up because I'm sitting in some Chinese food."

  THE THIRD LETTER

  A. "real bangers and mash, that one"—the Minotaur's description of the shocking condition of the Slade/Ripkin scene points up his British

  Isles connection. "Bangers and Mash" is a slang term for a dish made with

  fried sausages and potatoes. It is a kind of hash.

  B. "I will die violently, in a desalvo of gunfire."—a play on the name Albert DeSalvo. the Boston Strangler.

  C. "I am like the lurer of little boys, fat and bulbous, clownfeet splayed, red pointed smile like a crescent from hell."—A reference to John Wayne

  Gacy, who kidnapped and killed little boys, and who worked occasionally as a clown.

  D. "Creeping down the apples and pears with a shiv in my hand."—More Britishisms. "Apples and pears" is rhyming Cockney slang for "stairs"; "shiv" is English slang for "knife."

  E "...working under the gaze of the little Jewish fella in Brooklyn. My luck has been bad, you see. Stickman the Raghead and the Girl in the

  Polka Dot Dress nearly foiled me at Burr's pad."—"Fella" as slang for "fellow" has not been in use since the late 1950s. "Stickman the Raghead" is Marvin McQuade, a homeless man who does occasional work on the grounds of the Morris-Jumel house. He picks up trash with a sharpened stick, and often wears a rag on his head to cover the bleeding sores. Mr. McQuade has been questioned in connection with the killings; he does not appear to be a witness. "The Girl in the Polka Dot Dress" refers to a prostitute named Vanessa K., who works that area of Washington Heights. She favors polka dot dresses with large bows in the back. She is currently being sought for questioning. "Pad" as slang for "living quarters" is a relic of the

  1960s.

  CONCLUSION

  We believe the Minotaur to be at least 40
to 50 years old. He came of age in the late 1950s or early 1960s. He is well educated, and seemingly knowledgeable about poetry, literature and history, particularly the history of criminality. He has spent at least some portion of his life in the United Kingdom, probably England and perhaps Central London. He has a high opinion of his own literary skills. He hates women, possibly as a result of a childhood spent in a female-dominated environment.

  Agnes receives an upsetting phone call from a friend of Barbara's named Joy who has been living in Europe. Agnes breaks the news to her; Joy can hardly believe it. Agnes's dormant grief awakens.