The Bishop's Man

by Linden MacIntyre

  Under the cab light his face was pale. Looking straight ahead, he turned the key, and the sound and smell of the engine restored a welcome normalcy to the sinister night.

  And it occurred to me, as he backed away, that I had seen that face before. The unusual concentration of the self-absorbed, the isolated. Despair, suddenly revealed. I watched as he drove away, tail lights fading.

  “Be careful, my friend,” I said to the darkness.

  I could not have anticipated Alfonso. I didn’t understand the history, the sociology, how people place themselves in the path of inevitable disaster, even if they don’t want to. I didn’t understand the politics. I didn’t even understand the language properly. I was a stranger there. I am not a stranger here, but I am no less impotent.

  There was no weapon to be found, only its effect. The fatal entry was behind his right ear. There was no note. Only afterwards did I realize that the message was embedded in the deed itself, a message from some other hidden source. Beware.

  This I learned from Jacinta.

  That desk, she said, is his Calvary. He died for all of us. Like his friend Rutilio. Crucified.

  She was calm. Her anger now was everything, no longer obscured by her goodness. She gathered him up and went away to bury what was left of him in Aguilares, where he was born, where at least his memory will continue.

  † † †

  After Sextus left, I sat and watched for the promised sunrise, but I must have slept. His last words in the church: I wish you’d told me about it; it would have explained so much. And I said, I don’t think so.

  When I woke, the room was full of light. I heard the quick, ringing roar of a passing pulp truck on the road below. I knew Stella was at work by then, but I rang her house anyway. Got the answering machine. Can you come by after work? I need a favour.

  Then I called the bishop.

  Danny seemed to sag with weariness as I explained briefly. Things were getting dodgy with the liquor, I told him. There’s a facility in Ontario. I went there for forty days to dry out. Did a little thinking. It was a good break.

  “You were tough,” he said. “You just up and checked yourself in?”

  “Actually, I talked it over with the bishop first.”

  “I’d never have suspected.”

  “No, no, no,” I said, forcing a laugh. “It wasn’t that far advanced. We just wanted to nip it in the bud before it got serious. It’s something I have to watch. It’s in the genes.”

  “Well, yes. We all have that.”

  “This is just between us, Danny.”

  “Oh, Jesus. You don’t have to worry about me,” he said.

  “I know that.”

  “Forty days, eh? You can claim credit for two Lents, skip next year.”

  I laughed. “You never know. I might start skipping a lot of things.”

  He seemed to be chewing on the inside of his cheek. “Like … I wouldn’t even want to think about that,” he said, eyes fixed on mine. He turned and started toward his truck, then paused. “Why don’t you come up sometime. To the house. I think it’s time we had a talk. Man to man.”

  “Sure,” I said, sudden anxiety rising. “Is there anything in particular?”

  He ignored the question. “What did you call that … facility? In Ontario?”

  “Braecrest.”

  Stella stood in the middle of the kitchen with her hands on her hips. Her face was a blank. “You obviously had company.”

  I just shrugged. I was standing in the doorway to the living room in the T-shirt and jeans I’d worn the day before. I could smell the rankness of my own body, sour internal gases and the alcoholic sweat. I could have cleaned up, my kitchen and myself. I considered doing so half a dozen times. But I was unable to rouse myself from the stupor that held me in my chair in a kind of paralysis all day. Maybe I wanted her to see my place like this. See me in my moral nakedness.

  “Sextus came by,” I said.

  “That explains a lot.”

  “It got out of hand, obviously. I don’t remember much after a certain point.”

  “Okay,” she said, slipping out of her jacket.

  “I didn’t ask you to come here to do housework.”

  “Oh?” she said, arching her eyebrows.

  “I need you to drive me over to Antigonish. I have to see the bishop.”

  “I see.”

  We just stood and stared at each other for a long time.

  “First I think you should take a shower,” she said. “I’ll be back.”

  After she was gone, the bishop called. Bring a bag, he said. Plan on a few days away. Okay?

  I sat for a long time on the stern of the Jacinta after Danny Ban had gone, legs dangling, chores forgotten. The water just over the dunes and beyond the waving marsh grass danced and flashed. Inviting. Its roughness concealing merriment, hard, glittering blue under the cloudless June sky. There was a sudden racket above my head, and when I looked into the sky I saw a heron flapping furiously high above, pursued by a screaming bald eagle. The lumbering heron, unaccustomed to speed, was well in front, but slowly I watched the gap between them close. There was no evasive action by the larger bird, just resolute, long-winged strokes, until the eagle was upon him. They locked in a brief, savage encounter that lasted only a few seconds. The heron fell, broken, fluttering slowly toward the shore. The eagle soared away in angry triumph.

  I jumped from the boat and walked toward the water, eyes scanning the beach. He was nowhere to be found. I walked the shore for an hour, determined to find him. He had disappeared, as all broken creatures inevitably do.

  Finally I just stood, facing the sea and the distant islands. The breeze was turning colder as the sun melted down, the foamy surf tumbling in the sand, inching closer to my feet. I asked myself: Did that really happen? Did I imagine that?

  A party of gulls seemed to take up the search, swooping low along the beach, banking seaward then returning for repeated passes closer to the sand and stone.

  † † †

  Stella noticed the overnight bag and raised her eyebrows.

  “The bishop told me to bring a bag. He implied I might be gone a few days.”

  “I see,” she said.

  “What do you see?”

  “It’ll all be for the best.”

  Driving up the long hill on the far side of the causeway, I asked, “What if I don’t come back at all?”

  “You’ll come back.”

  “I’ve packed for more than a few days. I have a hunch.”

  “A hunch.”

  “I have some experience in these matters.”

  “What matters are you talking about?” she asked, squinting at the empty road.

  “You’ll know soon enough.”

  “Are you in some kind of trouble?”

  “Yes.”

  “I won’t ask what. As long as you know … I’ll be here.”

  The bishop listened quietly, nodding, fiddling with a pencil as I spoke. Occasionally he made a note. Once he opened a desk drawer to study something. Then shut the drawer again. I was trying to get what I wanted without sending up too many warning balloons. Keep it in the realm of vagueness. It certainly wasn’t overwork. But undoubtedly a lot of stress. Nothing I couldn’t handle, he was sure.

  “But maybe Creignish is the wrong place right now. A bit too close to home,” I ventured. “Maybe I should really get out of the way. Go—”

  “Maybe,” he said. He seemed distracted.

  “It occurred to me that a real change might be what I need. Something far away, like Latin America.” I tried to smile.

  “I do think you need a rest.”

  “A rest? I don’t need a rest. I need an exit.”

  “I disagree.” He was working at avoiding eye contact, distracted by the desk drawer. He kept opening it then easing it shut.

  I decided to try a different tack. Was there anything new on the legal front?

  “Don’t worry about that,” he said. “It’s under cont
rol … more or less. Anyway, you’re out of it now.”

  “I am?”

  “I think that’s half your problem. I loaded too much on you over the years. Let you get too involved in things I should have handled myself. I’m sorry about that.” He didn’t sound sorry. “Anyway. You’ve lost perspective and it’s my fault.”

  I tried to speak, but he raised his hand.

  “I’m not going to defend Roderick. He isn’t perfect. But who is? Are you?” The blue eyes were glittering. “Am I?” he asked, then looked away. “But he isn’t what you think. I know him as well as I know myself.”

  “I’m told there are affidavits,” I said, braced for the backlash.

  He sighed. “I’ve seen them. It’s all fantasy. Not a concrete fact in the pile. Vague allegations. I saw something on TV the other night. False memory, or something like that. False memory syndrome. There’s a lot of that around now. People accusing their fathers of all sorts of things. Teachers. Look at all that residential schools business. They’re even after a bishop out west somewhere. People who can’t defend themselves.”

  “There’s the suicide …”

  “Suicide. You of all people should understand that suicide is completely subjective. There’s no shortage of reasons for suicide.”

  “But Father Roddie—”

  “What I’ve decided,” he said, clearing his throat and coughing slightly, “is that you need a spell of rest. Institutional rest. Not like the last time. Honduras was another mistake. This time you need to be where things are controlled, where you don’t have to think about anything … outside yourself.”

  “Wait a minute—”

  He opened the drawer again and this time he drew out a large brown envelope. “You’ll find it all in here. Plane tickets, brochures and a bit of cash for spending. You leave for Toronto tomorrow.”

  “Toronto …”

  “You’ll be picked up there. At the airport.”

  “Braecrest,” I said.

  “A good place. You’ll get what you need there.”

  “I know all about Braecrest,” I said bitterly.

  But the meeting was over. I’ve heard people trying to describe their emotions upon being fired, or getting life-altering news from a spouse or a doctor. Now I know the feeling. Part fear, part confusion. But also relief. The locked gates of inevitability represent an inverse kind of liberation. Freedom from freedom. Suddenly my head was aching.

  Braecrest.

  “You’re booked in for forty days,” he said. “You’ll be surprised how quickly it’ll go by. Then we can talk about the other matters.”

  “Forty days. Forty days in the desert and then … crucifixion.”

  “Come on,” he said, smiling at last. “You’re overreacting.” He stood. “I’ll show you to your room.”

  “My room?”

  “You’ll spend the night here. I have a student coming in the morning. To drive you to the airport.”

  I shrugged. “I’d like to go home, actually,” I said, overwhelmed by a feeling of loneliness.

  “No,” he said firmly. “It’s begun. The rehab has begun.”

  “Someone brought me here,” I said.

  “Sure. He’ll understand. I’ll go out and tell him.”

  “No. I’ll go.”

  “Suit yourself.”

  “Forty days?”

  “Forty days.”

  Everything will seem different after a spell away, he promised. Then we’ll see.

  “By the way,” he said, as if he’d just remembered, “MacLeod is planning to run his story. Any day now. I got that from the lawyers yesterday. I think it’s written and ready to go. It’s up to his bosses to get the nerve to print it. You haven’t heard?”

  I stared. So this is it.

  “You’ll be thankful to be away from it. One thing to be grateful for—I gather he isn’t touching that Hawthorne suicide business. Apparently there’s nothing about Bell at all. At least not now.” He was studying me carefully. “We’re obviously not going to just sit by and let it happen. But you’ll be safe and sound when we counterattack.”

  And the truth dawned: he doesn’t trust me.

  “Does Braecrest have to know that I’m … a priest?” I asked.

  He was taken aback. “You’ll not be the first clergyman to pass through there. But I know what you mean.”

  “I’d like to keep a low profile.”

  “The institution will know. As far as the others are concerned, that’ll be up to yourself.”

  “Good,” I said.

  “Morality resides in motivation. No point in advertising our problems. But … remember Peter in the garden.”

  I must have seemed confused.

  “Denying the Saviour,” he said. “Three times he did it, fulfilling the prophecy. ‘And the cock crew …’” Then he laughed and whacked my back. “Go out and get rid of the poor fellow we’ve left sitting out there. Give him my apologies.”

  Stella seemed to be asleep. The car seat was pushed back and tilted. Her hands were loosely folded on her lap. Her face was turned in my direction, a trace of a smile around the mouth. A stray lock of hair fell across her brow. A hand moved automatically to brush it back. She wriggled her shoulders, pressing herself deeper into the seat. Life, I thought. Barbara. Jacinta. Stella. They all have that in common. Life hammering within them. The incessant call of life, drowning inhibitions.

  I suddenly wanted to turn and walk away, never to be seen again.

  The liquor store is open, I thought. It is next to a motel. The bus terminal is a short walk through town. I’ll get through one more night with the help of the alcohol, then … tomorrow … start fresh. I will disappear. I will go south again. El Salvador is relatively peaceful now. Pick up where I left off. Become useful this time, because I am different now. Knowledge has overtaken faith.

  I realized that she was watching me. She leaned across the front seat and unlocked the car door. I opened it.

  She didn’t seem surprised when I told her I was leaving for Ontario in the morning. I told her that I’d be gone for a while. She nodded.

  Then she got out of the car and put her arms around my shoulders and buried her face in my neck. I could imagine the bishop watching from a window. But I didn’t care.

  {27}

  Stella told me: “I wish you’d talk to Danny. We’re worried about him.”

  “I saw him at the shore yesterday,” I said. “I went down to check the boat. He showed up. He seemed okay to me.”

  She raised her eyebrows. “Maybe it’s your effect on him. He’s more comfortable with you. If you feel up to it, you should just drop by. I think he’d like that. He seems to be drinking a lot. You might be able to help. He talks about you. He seemed to go adrift when you were gone.”

  “Maybe I can talk to him now that I’m all rehabilitated myself,” I said, trying to sound amused.

  “I didn’t mean that,” she said with a trace of impatience, and turned away. “Only if you’re feeling up to it … It was just an idea we had.”

  “We?”

  “Jessie is awful worried about him.”

  He said it himself: It’s time for a man-to-man talk. And I was ready for it. But the planned words and ideas all fled the moment I walked into his kitchen. I’d been avoiding people. I don’t know why. I’ve heard recovery does that sometimes. Total withdrawal. From booze. From drugs. From other people.

  “It never used to rain in June,” Danny said. He was standing, staring out his kitchen window. “At least as I remember it. June was always hot days … You’d be in school chomping at the bit to get outside. You’d already be in swimming every chance. Now look. It’s damned near sleet out there.”

  “It’s still early June,” I said.

  “I suppose.”

  The rain-streaked window distorted the bleak countryside. Wind thumped the house. An old clock clicked away the long seconds.

  “The way I figure it,” Danny said, lowering himself into his chair at
the end of the kitchen table, “they have to be gone for at least as long as they were here before you can start forgetting them.”

  I was studying my empty teacup.

  “It’s like you’re missing a tooth.” I noticed that he pronounced it thooth, the way the old man did. “You’ve got a missing thooth and your tongue keeps going to the blank spot … as if one of these times the thooth is going to be back where it was. Do you know what I’m saying?”

  I nodded.

  “I expect it’s going to be like that. Indefinitely. We had him here near twenty years. This house was basically for him. It’s all about him, actually. I don’t think the house will ever get used to it. The change. I figure it’ll be years before we stop hearing him and feeling him … and waiting for him to walk in the door, or come galloping up out of the basement looking for food.”

  He stood again, walked slowly to the stove. Studied it for a moment. “The wife and I have actually been talking about selling the place. That’s when we can talk about anything.”

  I cleared my throat. “I wouldn’t make any hasty—”

  “The big discovery was how little else we ever talked about, over the years … outside of himself. Now we don’t dare talk about that. That’s pretty well off limits. Which means it’s kind of hard to find anything to talk about anymore … anything that matters to the both of us.”

  “You need time,” I ventured.

  “It’s always harder for the mother,” he said. He returned to the table then. “But what about yourself, Father? You didn’t come all the way out here for a rehash of all that.”

  “Well …”

  “Tell me all about your trip to Ontario. That whatever-it-was-called. Where you disappeared to.”

  “Braecrest.”

  At the Toronto airport there was a pale, fat seminarian holding up a sheet of paper with MAKASKEL in large crude letters. I assumed he meant me and walked over. He smiled.

  “They told me to watch for red hair,” he said.

  I nodded. How much does he know?

  “You’re Father Duncan?”

  “I am.” The red priest, Pelirrojo.

  “I’m Ron. I’m to drive you to Guelph. They said you could give me directions once we get there.”