Eminence

by William X. Kienzle

  True, what Tully did not know about Catholicism could fill volumes. Nonetheless he found all this behavior puzzling. He filed these questions away in his busy mind. Chief among the things that rendered Tully restless were unanswered questions. It was part of his job, which, in turn, was part of his personality, to solve puzzles. St. Augustine held that our hearts are restless until they rest in God. In Tully’s case, his spirit remained troubled until puzzles were resolved, loose ends were tied, and files were closed.

  Others in his position might simply have been grateful for the miraculous event that had cured their loved one. While that sentiment did not entirely escape Tully, he could not forget or disregard the remaining puzzles.

  And, finally, he realized that in all this confusion, he had missed the departure of Pat Lennon. For she surely was gone.

  In fact, she had left several minutes earlier. Pat needed no statements from Alice to flesh out her story. She knew what the lead and thrust of the story would be as she would write it.

  She could not swear to it, but Pat felt reasonably sure that none of the other reporters had caught that singular remark of Father Robert’s. No one else had seemed to react to it—with the possible exception of Brother Paul. And, bundled as he was in his habit from head to toe, it was difficult to read his reaction.

  The noteworthiness—and her scoop, if she guessed correctly—lay in the priest’s counseling the woman to abandon her doctors and to put all her trust in the priest and, through him, God. That, unless she missed her guess—and she was certain she had not—would prove to be the straw that would break the Church’s determination to accord the Congregation of St. Stephen hands-off treatment.

  The way she figured it, one of the very last things the archdiocese—or any institution, for that matter—wanted, was litigation. In litigation, the worst that could happen would be to lose the case and become liable for an astronomical sum, especially in Wayne County. The best that could happen would be to successfully defend the case. And even then, tons of money would have to be spent on attorneys’ fees and court costs. Either way there was a monumental loss of money.

  Lately, there had been an increasing amount of litigation over priests charged with pedophilia. On a moral basis, these cases were tragic and needed much understanding, compassion, and healing treatment from all sides. As for litigation, no one could hold the Church directly responsible for these acts. Every relevant tenet of the Church stood in complete opposition to the pedophile. There were times when litigants could and did charge the church with inaction in some cases when remedial action should have been taken. But in no sense could the Church be charged with direct complicity.

  Not so with alleged miracles.

  She would check it out just to make certain all bases were touched, but she was sure these monks were functioning legitimately in the Archdiocese of Detroit. That would mean, in effect, that the archdiocese endorsed the sacramental functioning of the Congregation of St. Stephen. It also meant that the archdiocese accepted responsibility for what the Congregation did sacramentally.

  So, she reasoned, if Father Robert decided to use pizza and Coke at Mass instead of bread and wine, it was the archbishop’s responsibility—nay, his duty—to step in and say that that was a no-no.

  She further reasoned that if the monks took on faith healing, that would spring from their sacramental ministry. If he wanted to—and apparently he did—the archbishop could look the other way if Father Robert were to pray with people and bless them with relics. If it works, it works. If it doesn’t, it doesn’t. Simple.

  But what happens when the miracle worker counsels a client to tell the doctors and the whole damn medical world to bug off? Suppose the “cure” doesn’t work, or works only temporarily? Suppose that without medical attention the person gets worse or dies? Somebody is going to get sued for everything and then some. In this case, the somebody would be Mark Cardinal Boyle, Archbishop of Detroit.

  God, they’d probably have to sell the Sistine Ceiling to pay the bills!

  Just for one moment, as she drove back to the News to research and write her story, she thanked God her daddy had shelled out the dough for her to attend that nice Catholic Mercy College in Detroit. For once, all that education was going to pay off.

  It had started with her research into faith healing, followed by her exclusive interview with Mrs. Whitehead. This angle—the archdiocese being forced into an investigation of the matter—would be the frosting on the cake.

  This was her story! Her story! And it was a good, newsy, interesting story that could extend through several days—maybe a week or more.

  As far as Pat Lennon was concerned, this was what reporting was all about. The thrill of beating everyone else to a story, and then, by dint of diligent hard work, staying on top of it. Nobody could beat her now. It was her story. She knew it.

  So did Brother Paul. His caper was fast getting out of hand. That crazy Father Robert and his “miracles”! At this point, there wasn’t anything he could do about that. But the girl, the reporter: She had to be stopped. He sensed—he knew—what she wanted to do. He had to stop her no matter what!

  Meanwhile, outside the bank converted into a monastery, a Channel 2 reporter was finishing his taping for the 5:30 p.m. newscast.

  “. . . and so the miracles continue at this modest little monastery. We’ve made repeated attempts to interview Father Robert, Detroit’s own miracle worker. But the good father remains in seclusion, unavailable to the public”-pause, grossly sincere expression, zoom in to catch intensity of the sincerity—”except when he steps out of his monastic cell to bring”—eyes up—”the Lord’s healing power—Goddam!”

  The rain, which had been falling steadily if lightly, abruptly became a cloudburst. The reporter and the technicians, hastily grabbing up their gear, fled pell-mell to the van and dove inside. They were all soaked. The reporter’s jacket and tie afforded him little protection.

  “Hey, we didn’t get your signature on that piece,” Sid observed.

  “If you think I’m going back out there in this stuff just to say, ‘This is Donald Duck, Channel 2 Eyewitness News reporting,’ you are as loony as the jerk who insists we wear jackets and ties in the middle of summer.”

  “Hey,” said Maurie, “why don’t we go see the priest? Maybe he can make it stop rainin’.”

  They laughed as Sid dug from the cooler the six-pack he’d picked up earlier. Sid was always thinking.

  CHAPTER

  14

  John Reid sat in the car, a predator, waiting. For this enterprise, he didn’t need to be Brother Paul. If anything, the religious identity would hinder him. He needed to be John Reid with no complications. He had a job to do. It had to be done with dispatch. No frills.

  It was the way he liked to work. He did not favor the exotic twist, the poetic turn. Do it quickly, efficiently, conclusively.

  He could not recall ever having been in a more severe storm. Lightning crackled at incredibly close intervals, the thunder rolled and roared almost continually. The rain fell in sheets. The car, standing idle at curbside, shuddered in the gale.

  Reid rarely smoked, but he wanted one now. He was nervous, very nervous. Tense. Keyed up. A cigarette would not have had a relaxing effect. It would have intensified his mood. The more he thought about a cigarette and how good it would taste, the more he wanted one.

  But it would have complicated things immeasurably. The downpour was so heavy, there was no possibility of cracking a window even slightly. The smoke from even one cigarette would have coated the panes and the windshield in an impenetrable film. He would have to wait it out.

  Instead of smoking, and to keep his hands busy sans cigarette, he drummed his gloved fingers on the steering wheel and thought the whole thing through for the umpteenth time.

  From the very beginning it had been a plan requiring enormous personal involvement on his part, meticulous timing, much cooperation from the fates, plus a healthy dollop of luck.

  N
either fate nor luck had been kind to him in the past. But then, what was it that crazy Chicago shrink had written about him in the seminary evaluation? Something about a pattern of failure. Yes, that was it: The idiot said that Reid seemed involuntarily to seek disaster.

  What bullshit! Who would seek failure? Certainly not he. Hell, he’d had his share of successes.

  That he couldn’t offhand think of even one unmitigated success meant nothing. After all, he had to concentrate on the present problem.

  Hey, here was a good case in point! Yes, this was an excellent example: Even with all that had gone wrong, everything was still on track. He just had to accelerate the schedule a bit, that’s all.

  If he lived to be a hundred, which was not likely, he would never figure out what got into that Robert. He was under the strictest orders to follow the script and not deviate from it. A little prayer, a little explanation of why this saint is relevant to this problem, a little blessing with the relic. The odds definitely favored the system to work at least some of the time. There surely were enough psychosomatic disorders around for a psychosomatic cure to work at least occasionally. Add to that the power of suggestion and the odds got better. Going for a job interview? It couldn’t hurt to have Saint Whatchamacallit in your corner. The guy goes into the interview if not all that confident of his own abilities at least trusting in the power of the saint and the good Father’s prayers to get him the job.

  And it had been working well enough, if slowly, before that idiot decided—on the spur of the moment, he claimed—to try an honest-to-God cure.

  Reid could have killed the old fool on the spot, but of course that was impossible with all those people around.

  Then—incredible but true—it had worked! And along came that fat donation from the old broad’s husband. That had pretty well raised their accumulated balance to a satisfactory level all by itself. So what’s all this talk about courting failure? Far from that. He had been able to manipulate a potential major setback into a big win.

  Of course he did have to keep the monks in line. So he’d had to discipline Robert. Reid shook his head at the memory. Almost went too far; yesterday the old man was next to useless—had to keep telling people that expending all those curative powers had weakened the old man.

  Reid wondered now, parenthetically, if that’s how it really worked: Does a real faith healer expend his own power when he cures somebody?

  He laughed out loud. No one could hear him. He was alone in the car, and there was no one, not a soul that he could see, on the street.

  Taking faith healing seriously—what a gas! This masquerade must be getting to me.

  Reid kept his gaze fixed on the front doors of the Detroit News. She would have to exit the building through those doors. Sooner or later, she would have to come through them. From his vantage, he could survey Lafayette Boulevard, east and west. The downpour limited his visibility, but his range was sufficient to see the street was deserted. He expected no less. Ordinarily, no one was on these streets of downtown Detroit in midevening. There was even less chance of passersby in this weather.

  His fingers continued to drum a meaningless message on the steering wheel as he continued ruminating.

  Even though he had probably gone a bit far in disciplining the old man, it was all working out. Donations were coming in from all over the country, Canada too.

  Yeah, it was all working out—until today. What could have possessed the old man to try it again? And why in the world would he ever advise someone to forget about the doctors?

  The only conclusion Reid could reach was that the role must have taken possession of the man. The bullheaded geezer must have come to believe that he actually had the power. Reid chuckled mirthlessly. He stopped abruptly when he recalled the consequences of Father Robert’s seeming self-delusion.

  Imagine telling someone to have nothing to do with the medical profession! The nerve! He had considered punishing the old man again, but, after some reflection, he had decided not to. The strongest argument against it was that Robert probably couldn’t have survived it. And then Reid had had immediate use for the old man.

  However, at this point, the way things were working out, Robert was no longer pivotal in Reid’s plans.

  The focal point now was this damn reporter. From what she’d said, she was hot on this investigation angle. She seemed fixated on triggering an investigation. Why? But then, it didn’t matter. The point was to stop her from carrying through with the idea.

  He had to admit he didn’t particularly like what he was going to do tonight. Of course he didn’t give a damn what happened to the girl. She was expendable, as was everyone.

  No, the thing he disliked about tonight was that he was deviating from his plan a lot further than he cared to. That bothered him. Oh, not that he feared for a moment he couldn’t handle any repercussions that might emerge from tonight’s work. Just that he couldn’t anticipate what they all might be. He had lingering doubts about that. But he tried to quiet those doubts by covering them with a heavy layer of self-assurance.

  He stopped drumming on the steering wheel, fingers poised in midair. He could feel his neck and shoulder muscles tighten. He blinked several times to clear his vision.

  There she was. He’d done his homework well, if hurriedly. He knew her raincoat. The hood was pulled up and she held a newspaper with which she attempted to shield her head from the force of the rain as she dashed across Lafayette to the News parking lot.

  This would be the definitive tip-off. Yes! She did it: She got into her car. He saw the rear lights go on, the white lights indicating the car was in reverse. A puff of smoke escaped the exhaust. The car had started immediately. Good.

  She pulled out of the parking lot, checking carefully but needlessly for traffic before turning left and heading east on Lafayette.

  Reid turned the ignition key and listened as the motor turned over several times before it caught. He suffered a momentary panic when the car failed to start at once. That his carefully laid plan might miscarry due to some mechanical failure! Well, never mind, the scenario had begun.

  He waited until he could barely make out her taillights through the downpour, then he flipped on his headlights, slipped his car into gear, and slowly began to follow.

  He had often thought that whoever had laid out downtown Detroit must have been drunk at the time. Either that, or it was the Indians’ revenge against Cadillac.

  Since there were any number of routes she could have taken, he had to stay on her tail closer than he would have wished. He hoped she wouldn’t notice a pair of headlights recurring in her rearview mirror. With the dearth of traffic, he would need some of that elusive luck in order to remain unnoticed.

  She zigged, as she had to, when West Lafayette dead-ended at Michigan Avenue. She followed the divided Cadillac Square to Randolph, moved north to Monroe, traveled through colorful Greektown, turned south at the Chrysler service drive, then onto eastbound Lafayette. So far, no surprises.

  She turned left at Orleans, heading straight for Lafayette Towers. Then she came up with her first unlooked-for turn: She drove into the shopping center just short of the Towers. He would have to check this out.

  She parked and dashed into Ye Olde Butcher Shoppe. Something for dinner, perhaps.

  Should he strike now? It was as good as anywhere.

  No. There were too many lights. Too many possibilities of passersby going into or coming out of one of the shops or restaurants. He waited. The next few minutes were crucial. But everything looked as if it was going to work.

  She had a difficult time returning to her car. Now, in addition to the purse hanging by its long strap from her left shoulder, she had to carry a large grocery bag. She managed to finally slide into the car after depositing the groceries on the far side of the seat.

  He followed her car around into the Towers’ drive, making certain she entered the private parking garage. He continued beyond the ramp, circling the building until he reached the driv
e that separated the car park from the East Towers.

  Cars illegally parked on either side of the narrow drive restricted the movement of any vehicle approaching the Towers’ entrance. It was like a straightened passageway. Fortunately for him, no car was stopped in the middle of the drive. He had access, even if only in a straight line, to the entire passage. He nodded once sharply. It was sufficient.

  His foot tapped the accelerator nervously. He would have to attain maximum speed in a very short distance. He watched the garage’s open portal, not daring to blink.

  There she was. She paused at the exit. She would have to run from portal to portal in the driving rain, still encumbered with the purse and the grocery bag.

  She broke for the shelter of the apartment overhang. Simultaneously, he floored the accelerator. There was a piercing shriek of tires; the engine roared. A couple about to enter the lobby, hearing the raceway sound, turned toward the noise.

  They saw a young woman frozen in a moment of terror in the rapidly approaching headlights. Then, instinctively, she spun about and tried to run in an attempt to escape.

  No sooner had she turned than she was struck.

  Later, describing the scene in all its horror for the police, the couple, the only eyewitnesses-or at least the only ones who would come forward-recalled the incident as if it had happened in slow motion.

  The wife said she would never forget the look on the victim’s face. It was as if the poor woman was hypnotized when she saw the car headed straight for her. She couldn’t understand, the witness said, why the woman had not run between the parked cars. She would have been safe there. She had been only a few feet from the cars parked on either side of the drive. Some elemental instinct must have betrayed her. An instinct that urged her to run from the clear and certain danger. At the moment of impact, the female witness had turned away and covered her eyes. She could not bear to see the rest.

  At that point, her husband took over the narrative.