by Anne Emery
“Oh come on! That’s laying it on a bit too thick, isn’t?” someone called from the crowd.
“Look it up,” Brennan responded. “That threat didn’t get them anywhere, so they took Jacinta away and left the other two with the administrator. A guard returned sometime after that and told Lucia and Francisco that Jacinta had been put in the oil and cooked. The two little kids believed it, and believed they were next. But still they wouldn’t tell. Then Francisco was taken to be ‘boiled,’ leaving Lucia by herself with the boss. In the face of what she believed was certain death, she refused to reveal the secret. The authorities had to admit defeat; the three were eventually released.
“I make no comment on the secrets of Fatima,” Brennan said, “or on the timing of what were very political messages recounted much later by Lucia. But I have no doubt whatsoever about the miracle of the sun. This was a miracle announced three months in advance. ‘It’s happening at noon on the thirteenth of October at Cova da Iria. Be there.’
“At least fifty thousand people witnessed the event. That’s the estimate given by Avelino de Almeida, who was there to report on the event for his paper, the liberal, anticlerical O Seculo. The paper had been mocking the claims all along, and Almeida expected that nothing would happen. Most historians say there were seventy thousand people there.
“Of course there were the usual claims that this was a situation of mass hypnosis or religious fever. Well, if so, it affected the anti-religious press as well as the supposedly gullible peasants, because they all saw it at the same time. As did a devout socialist who had gone to debunk the whole thing, but instead ended up in a state of shock in a hospital for three days afterwards. It was also seen by many who could not have been part of any kind of group hypnosis, people miles away from the site.
“So here’s what happened. The seventy thousand people, rich and poor, educated and simple, pious and skeptical, trooped to the site. It was bucketing rain the night before, and the ground turned to muck. Everyone’s clothing was soaked through. But the people stuck it out, determined to see the promised miracle. The three children were brought by their very nervous parents. Twelve noon came, and nothing happened. People waited. Nothing. The children’s families were terrified that, if nothing happened, the crowd would turn on the kids and tear them apart.
“Then just around one thirty — which, by the way, was solar noon in Portugal at that time of year — the rain stopped abruptly and the sky cleared. The sun appeared as a clear-edged disc. A scientist present, Dr. Almeida Garrett, described it in unscientific terms as looking like a gaming table. It kept its heat and light but you could look directly at it without hurting your eyes, without damaging the retina. The O Seculo reporter, Avelino de Almeida, likened it to a silver disc. Then it began to turn on itself at a dizzying speed, throwing out light in all the colours of the rainbow. All those brilliant colours were reflected in the faces of the people, their clothing, and the earth itself. This went on for some time, then the object seemed to detach itself from the firmament. It turned blood red and came hurtling towards the ground. People were terror-stricken. But it veered away.
“The previously skeptical journalist, Almeida, described it this way.” Brennan reached into his pocket for a photocopy of the news clipping. “‘Before the dazzled eyes of the people, whose attitude transported us to biblical times, and who, dumb-founded, heads uncovered, contemplated the blue of the sky, the sun trembled, it made strange and abrupt movements, outside of all cosmic laws, “the sun danced,” according to the typical expression of the peasants . . .’
“He took photos of the crowd with their faces upturned. Once people got their breath back, they noticed that their clothing was completely dry. It had dried in seconds.
“When, as expected, Almeida was attacked for reporting such a thing, he responded: ‘I saw . . . I saw . . . I saw . . . Miracle, as the people shouted? Natural phenomenon, as the experts say? For the moment, that does not concern me, I am only saying what I saw. . . . The rest is a matter for Science and the Church.’
“Was it really the sun?” Burke asked. “Apparently not. The Greenwich Observatory did not record anything out of whack. But it was a celestial display of some kind. Almeida, quite rightly, left open the question of whether this was a natural phenomenon. But how often do we have a never-before-seen natural phenomenon, appearing on schedule as announced by three peasant children after a conversation they claim was with the Virgin Mary?
“A well-attested event, in that case. But all of us should be a bit like Avelino de Ameida when we hear reports of supposedly miraculous events or appearances. Be skeptical, check it out, weigh the evidence pro and con, and then describe the findings without embellishment.”
A number of people asked questions, and Brennan did his best to answer them. Some of course were unanswerable. But he had another mission now that he was among the pilgrims. He surveyed the crowd looking for suspicious behaviour on the part of the visionary’s boyfriend. Was he out there, taking money off the deluded and the desperate? Brennan would take a stroll through the grounds. In the absence of the boyfriend — Gary was his name, Brennan remembered — he decided to seek out a familiar face or two in the crowd and ask whether there had been anyone taking up a collection recently.
His first few inquiries were met with a tentative “no” that did not quite convince him. Had some of these people been taken in, and were they embarrassed to admit it? Or was it more straightforward than that: nobody had been tapped. But an elderly woman in a brown wool coat and hat overheard the conversations and came up to him. She said she had given money to a young man a few days ago. What did he look like? The description matched Gary. No surprise there.
“How did he get the money from you?”
“He asked me.”
“What did he say?”
“He told me that in eighty percent of appearances by the Virgin, her message had included instructions to be good to the poor and homeless.”
Gary and Befanee’s attempt at sophistication, Brennan assumed. They knew better than to claim that the BVM always demanded a shakedown. Somebody could check on that. But if a person looked into an apparition story and found no reference to money, well, that would be one of the twenty percent in which filthy lucre was not mentioned.
“He used the word ‘homeless’?” Brennan asked.
The woman looked confused. “Well, I think he did. That’s the way I remember it.”
“Please go on. I’m sorry for the interruption.”
“Oh, that’s quite all right, Father. That’s all there was to it. This young man felt called to do what he was doing. And he said not to worry, that he was not stealing it for himself, because he didn’t need it. He said he was just here at the church while on a break from his work as an assistant manager. And he told me to watch him, and I would see that he was indeed giving the money to poor homeless people. So I did watch, and he gave money to a couple of poor souls who were just lying on the ground, ill or perhaps even drunk or on drugs.”
“I see.”
“I of course was worried that they were in cahoots with him, pretending to be poor but really his buddies in disguise.”
“And you don’t think that was the case?”
“I could be wrong, but I don’t think so. One of the fellows got up and hit him! And really hit him, I mean. There was a fight, and it wasn’t staged, let me tell you. It didn’t last long, but it was the real thing.”
Maybe it was, thought Brennan. Maybe part of Gary’s performance was to go up to “real people” in the crowd, the poor and disadvantaged who were always attracted to this type of spectacle, and hold money out to them. Or hold pieces of paper out. Or perhaps even give them part of the take to cement the cover story into place, should anyone go around asking. The fellow who hit him might have been ticked at the miserly sum and been angling for more. Who knew?
Was this robbery or
fraud, or just panhandling? Should Brennan be calling the police? He could not quite bring himself to do it; the Burkes were not police informers. He would deal with this petty crime figure in his own way.
He thanked the woman, urged her to hang on to her money and to consider carefully what she thought was going on in the churchyard.
“Do you believe this is really the Blessed Virgin, Father?”
He hesitated for a few seconds, then said, “No.”
She took a moment to think it over. “That’s too bad. I’d like to think she is really with us.”
“She may indeed be with us, but not physically and not as reported by Befanee Tate.”
“Or by the murdered girl, Jordyn. Do you think that’s why she got killed, Father?”
“What do you mean?”
“Killed for her religious beliefs.”
“By Podgis?”
“Well, he certainly is anti-religious. I heard him mock the Blessed Mother on that show of his.”
“I don’t think Podgis would kill over a religious disagreement. I’d say the antics around this place would be more likely to offend a deeply religious person than someone who dismisses it all out of hand.”
“So you’re saying it was a person of faith who killed her, for her statements about the Virgin?”
“No, no, I was just speaking off the cuff. I don’t think that at all. I think she was murdered for some other reason. Known now only to the killer.”
“And to God.”
“And to God.”
†
Brennan left her then because he had another duty to perform. For the next couple of weeks he would be spending more time than usual in the confession box, not as a penitent but as a replacement for Father Bernie Drohan, who had gone on a retreat. He walked into the church, brushed the snowflakes off his hair and clothing, genuflected deeply, and made the sign of the cross. Then he went up to the confession box, replaced the “Fr. Drohan” name plate with his own for the evening, and entered the booth. He donned the purple stole he kept in the box and closed the door. He knew he could expect the usual litany of minor, barely sinful transgressions, the occasional report of serious misbehaviour, and the rambling life histories of the lonely. For most of the penitents, he felt the sacrament was necessary and valued.
“Bless me Father, for I have sinned. It has been, well, a shameful number of years since my last confession.”
The voice was soft, raspy, but vaguely familiar. Brennan looked through the screen but could make out nothing but the silhouette of a hooded jacket.
The man fell silent.
“Yes?” Brennan prompted him.
“Well, it’s about that girl, Father.” Silence again.
“Girl?”
“That poor young girl who was found dead in your backyard.”
Brennan felt all his senses going on alert. “Yes? What about her?”
“I keep thinking about her.”
The last thing Brennan wanted to hear was the role sin played in this man’s thinking about the murdered girl. But, again, the silence compelled him to prod the man to get on with it.
“What sins do you wish to confess?”
“My thoughts about her.”
“What kind of thoughts?” His voice was sharper than he intended.
“I . . . I imagine what she might have gone through.”
This time it was the priest who was silent.
“Maybe she was . . . violated. By this guy Podgis. Or whoever else did it. Father? Are you there?”
“I am.”
“The kind of guy who would smash a young woman in the face and drive a knife into her . . . a man like that is a monster.”
An all too common kind of monster, Brennan thought: another in an infinite succession of corrupt, evil, fallen human beings.
“Wouldn’t you agree, Father?”
“I am here to take your confession.”
“I’m just saying a guy like that gets a young girl on the ground. What’s he gonna do, you know what I mean? She’s right there for him.”
“What is your point? If you are not here to confess your sins, but to commit more of them, get out of here and come back when you’ve examined your conscience and are remorseful about whatever sins you have committed. Until then there is no point in your being here.”
“I’m sorry, Father. Please forgive me.”
There was something about the man’s grating speech; it sounded as if he was disguising his voice. Well, it wasn’t the first time that had happened. “Please get to the point.”
“This TV asshole, Podgis. Excuse my French, Father. But Podgis. Do you think he really did it?”
“Do you?” What was going on here?
“Oh, I wouldn’t know one way or the other.”
“Why are you bringing this up?”
“I’m just wondering what kind of a sicko he is. They let him have his television show all these years, he’s famous across the country, and it turns out the guy is really a killer. If he is.”
“Did you yourself have something to do with this girl’s death?” Brennan made an effort not to raise his voice. “Is that what you’re trying to say?”
“No! I didn’t have anything to do with it! How can you say that?”
“Because there is something distinctly wrong with your so-called confession here today and, if you had something to do with this murder, I urge you to turn yourself in.”
“Because you can’t. You’re not allowed to.” A priest could be excommunicated for breaching the seal of the confessional, which this fellow well knew. “But I told you. It wasn’t me.”
“Then either get on with it, or leave the confessional. There are other people waiting.”
“You’re a guy yourself, Father.”
Brennan didn’t bother to reply.
“You must have thought about it too.”
Again, Brennan kept his silence. But he wasn’t going to be able to maintain his patience much longer.
“You read the news about a young, hot-looking female lying there, helpless. And if you’re anything like me, you’re forming a picture in your mind of what the guy might have done to her. What you’d have done yourself. Or what you’d like to do. And it’s a sin. Because it gives you a big — ”
“Get out of this confessional! Get out of here now, before I get up and throw you out. If you know anything about this crime, take yourself off to the police station right now.”
The man made a noisy departure. A child’s voice said, “Bless me Father . . .” and the priest decided to stay put rather than cause a scene in the church, in front of this child and whoever else might be in the nave. Whoever had whispered those sick thoughts into his ear must surely have had nothing to do with the crime. The killer wouldn’t dare come in here. And the police had Podgis for it, with the victim’s blood on his shoes, and a witness who saw him leaving the scene. This man in the confessional was just a sick, twisted pervert who . . . Brennan shook his head and tuned in to the little fellow confessing his theft of a tub of chocolate ripple ice cream from the school lunchroom refrigerator.
He granted absolution, but the boy did not leave. “Uh, what’s my penance, Father?”
“Ah. Right. Next time they’re giving out ice cream, take the plain vanilla. And only one scoop. That sound about right?”
“Yes, Father. Um . . .”
“Yes?”
“So I don’t have to say any prayers?”
“I assume you’d be saying prayers anyway. Part of your regular interior life. Right?”
“Uh, sure, yeah. Yes, Father.”
“And you’d never commit the sin of lying in the confessional.”
“No!”
“All right. Off with you then.”
“Yes, Father.”
Chap
ter 11
Monty
Monty attended a discovery examination on Friday morning with a client who was a snow-removal contractor. He had been named as a third party in a lawsuit by a woman who had slipped and fallen in the icy parking lot of a shopping centre. After that, Monty had an appointment with a private investigator he employed from time to time on his cases. Moody Walker was a retired police detective who had gone into business for himself after leaving the department. He had been on the opposing side all during his police career, but he was a good investigator and worked as hard for the defence as he did for anybody else who retained him.
The former sergeant arrived at eleven thirty, and Monty welcomed him into his office. Moody had short bristly grey and white hair and penetrating brown eyes. You would make him for a cop anywhere on the planet.
“How’s it going, Moody?”
“Everything is copacetic.”
“I’m hoping you can do something for me.” Walker waited for the assignment. He was not a man for small talk. “As you know, I’m representing Pike Podgis for the murder of Jordyn Snider.”
“Oh, yeah. I know.”
“You’re not a fan?”
“When I walk out of here, is he my client as well as yours?”
“I’m hoping so.”
“Then for the duration of the contract, I’m his biggest fan. Can’t wait till his show is on the air again, and I can sit there with a jumbo bag of Cheezies taking it all in.”
