The priest had stood up, slowly, large and big and still. His broad Slav face was very white. He came to Lorry and the doctor, and contemplated them speechlessly. Dr. McManus grinned at him wolfishly. “Well, Father John Kanty, there’s your miracle for you. But you always believed in miracles anyway, didn’t you? Maybe I do now.” He turned to Lorry, who was trembling. “Honey, what made you go? I’m curious.”
She said, “I don’t know. I can’t remember. I don’t know.”
The priest said, “You were right. His Mother sent him her image. Through you.” And he crossed himself and went our of the room, his head bent in meditation.
15
Even the air conditioning of the fine office of MacDonald Summerfield could not completely exclude the poisonous effluvium of what the Press lightly called “a harmless downdraft of normal industrial smoke and heavy autumn air.” The acrid and stinging stench of it seeped through the most minute of openings, and the air-conditioning equipment battled valiantly with unusually loud whirrings. The valley view from the broad windows had disappeared in a foggy unreality; only the highest dark ridges of the distant mountains peered through the uneasy and shifting gray vapor like island crags. But the gray sea of poisoned moisture and air was not uniform in color; here and there it gushed upward in yellowish fountains, from hidden chimneys, or a monstrously large black coil, like a serpent, raised itself through the silent waves of grayness.
Mr. Summerfield blew his nose repeatedly in one of his delicate linen handkerchiefs, as he angrily read the article his daughter had written about the new minister of that miserable Church of the Good Shepherd. It was a well-written article, with much color and vividness, which increased Mr. Summerfield’s anger, and it was prominently displayed on the second page, with certain paragraphs in bold-faced type.
“Yesterday marked Mr. Fletcher’s return to his pulpit after the attack on him by some young hoodlums, still unidentified, four weeks ago. He was still pale and thin, and a long red scar ran horizontally from his right temple far back into his hair. That scar stood out flagrantly in the light of the few candles in the little bleak church, and this reporter noticed that the congregation repeatedly glanced at it. Perhaps it was only curiosity which had filled the church to the doors, with at least twenty standees after emergency seating could no longer accommodate the remarkable influx of worshipers. But those who came out of curiosity remained to listen. Though this reporter has covered many services before in many other churches, she was greatly impressed by the deep attention everyone gave to Mr. Fletcher’s sermon. When the congregation rose at the conclusion it was less a mechanical gesture prefacing the responsive reading than a grave ovation.
“Mr. Fletcher is an eloquent speaker, but without histrionics or actorish inflections and gestures. Perhaps it was because he spoke less to impress or fascinate than to speak the truth. It is the conviction of this reporter that truth, in itself, has such power that it is not necessary to add flamboyance to it, or pyrotechnics.”
Well, thought Mr. Summerfield, with a little sour satisfaction, at least here Lorry got out of the depth of understanding of the filthy masses.
“Mr. Fletcher is practically an anachronism among the Protestant clergy, especially of the more ‘progressive’ and ‘enlightened’ type,” the article went on calmly. “He is not an evangelist, or a fundamentalist, so his sermon was, therefore, even the more remarkable. In a way, it was a scholarly sermon, worthy of some theological seminary president, and distinguished, here and there, by his deep sincerity and quiet passion and belief in what he was saying. And he convinced his congregation, and those there who were not of his congregation. None of the men and women crowding the pews could be called fashionable worshipers. They appeared to be of the smaller-income groups, skilled laborers, artisans, shopkeepers, and white-collar workers. They understood Mr. Fletcher completely.”
Did they? Mr. Summerfield asked. That rabble?
“Mr. Fletcher, whose sermon was entitled ‘The Ancient Tyranny,’ was a chaplain in the United States armed services during the last war. During those years he had ample opportunity to gather information for this sermon, and he delivered it starkly. According to Mr. Fletcher, the era which culminated in a war that ended hardly more than a year ago was just another outbreak of a despotism which goes back to the very cloudy fringes of past history. And he believes the present ‘peace’ is only a strength-gathering interval for tyrants to renew their ancient assault on mankind.
“‘The new assault may break out in 1947 or 1949 or 1950 or 1957,’ Mr. Fletcher said. ‘This time the secret despots will stake everything they have, everything they cynically believe, and all their hatred for men and their lust for power, on the mightiest blow to come. The atomic bomb is only another weapon in their arsenal of hatred and destruction, for they know that no weapon, however terrible, can bring peace to mankind unless mankind demands peace.’”
The article continued more somberly: “However, Mr. Fletcher wasted little time on the immortal despots, whose history he outlined briefly. He said, ‘The people, themselves, are responsible for despots. They will them. They give them what they want, eagerly in most cases, passively in others. The people are guilty of their tyrants; they furnish the environment in which tyranny can grow, by their demands, their appetites, their mass-hatreds and envies, their loathing for their fellow man, their prejudices and ignorances and lack of virtue, their atheism which invades even their churches, their obstinate determination to have what they have not earned and are not worthy of, their mad greed and their absence of charity and love. They exalt those who will promise to satisfy the evil in them, either by confiscation or revolution or murder.’”
Mr. Summerfield clenched his fists on his desk, and white lines appeared about his mouth. So she lied to me all the time, he thought. And then he was desperately frightened, thinking of Swensen and all his other friends. What had she found out in these offices? What had she heard, and overheard? There, on that page, his daughter repudiated him, dissected him, tore him apart, with bitter scorn and detestation and understanding. There she had made clear the reason she hated him, and he saw her face and her eyes, turned to him in cold accusation.
And yet, while he stiffened with his fear and his rage, there was a cry in him: Lorry! Lorry! My daughter! And then, with less—but only a little less—yearning: Barry, my son, my son!
“‘This has always been the history of despotism,’ Mr. Fletcher said. ‘The history of despotism is the history of the godlessness, materialism, and hatred of the people. Implanted in the human soul is the ineradicable instinct for worship, sealed in it by God Himself. A man must always worship something; he cannot evade the dynamic of his soul. He cannot be an atheist, in the true sense of the word. He cannot even be an agnostic. He cannot, not even for an hour, be indifferent to the urge of his spirit. If he will not worship God, he must worship something else. There can be no vacuum of adoration in him, no empty place. If he will not worship God, he must worship Satan. He must belong to the Mystical Body of God or to the Mystical Body of Satan, which is absolute evil.’”
Why, the idiot! thought Mr. Summerfield with some relief. If anyone who heard him yesterday has any intelligence, his sermon will make him a laughingstock, even in this Godforsaken town.
“‘In each bloody era of despotism the people have worshiped’a different manifestation of the immortal Evil. With the Manifesto of Karl Marx in 1847 they began to adore another manifestation: materialism in its most profound, allinclusive form.
“‘All men, from the very beginning of history, have had some normal interest in materialism—which is the things of the flesh—for man, though a spirit, is clothed in animal garb, too, and it is necessary to satisfy the hungers of the animal with food, shelter, clothing. It was God Himself who multiplied the loaves and the fishes, who fed the multitude, who rebuked those who oppressed the widow and the orphan and made them homeless, who declared that a laborer was worthy of his hire, and who said that no one shoul
d muzzle the ox who treads out the corn. God Himself, who became man in His love for us, needed to eat and drink, to find shelter from the storm, to clothe Himself and to warm Himself. Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s, and unto God the things which are God’s, He sternly admonished the people. All that was unjust, all those who set the people to hungering miserably for actual bread, or paid them little for their labor, or forced them to shelter themselves in wretched hovels, or drove them starving upon the highways, or exploited them, received His anger. For the spirit of man must manifest itself to its neighbor through the medium of flesh, and so flesh itself has sanctity. God had made man from the dust, and had blessed that dust, and had breathed into it the fire of life.
“‘But one hundred years ago materialism suddenly emerged as a total object of worship, unleavened by the spirit. It became an absolute thing in itself, and the absolutism was the invention of Satan. And this doctrine was unique in history, and the despots, who are always being born anew in each generation, saw in it their final and most powerful opportunity.
“‘Out of this doctrine of dialectical materialism was born Hitler and Mussolini and Stalin, and many others with the mark of Satan upon them. But it was not Satan who created the power of these men. It was the people, in every nation of the world. Materialism suddenly became for them an object of adoration, and they adored the men who promised to give them what they wanted. Somewhere, in the red blaze of the industrial revolution, man lost God, or abandoned Him, for goods, for the things of the world. The factory and the mill, and not the church, contained the holy of holies. The altar was no longer surmounted by the Cross; it no longer held in itself the sacred Scrolls. Above the thunder of the anvil, which was the new altar, rose the new incense of industrial smoke, and from the acid cloud peered the brutal faces of the new gods which the people had created unto themselves.
“‘The new gods offered the people “security” from a violent and unpredictable universe, which only God can control. They promised them the knife of revenge on those they envied or hated. They promised to give them benefits they had not earned. They raised up false enemies out of nothing, for the people’s rage and destruction. They offered them the rule of the world, in the name of fascism, Nazism, or Communism, or Statism in some other form. The State, they all said, was the protector of the people. They needed only to adore the State, absolutely and with the devotion they had once given the “myth” of God, and all their natural problems would be solved. The milk and honey of the Promised Land were here before them, for the taking, through their new gods, and not as a reward for living virtuous lives.
‘“In short, the new gods asked only one thing from the people—the surrender of those inalienable rights and liberties which only God could give them, but which evil men could take away if the people let them. And the people would never have let them if they had not first assented to the most unholy bargain in history. “Give us goods, and still more goods,” said the people to their tyrants, “and in return we will surrender God and all things of the spirit.”
“‘Yes, the people consented, everywhere in the world, with one loud voice, with one long devotion, with one mighty consent.
“‘Do not think,’ Mr. Fletcher cried to the congregation, ‘that fascism was different from Nazism, or Nazism from Communism! They are one and the same thing—they are the manifestations of Satan, the manifestations of materialism. If the despots appeared to attack each other, it was their individual madness. The men behind them, the all-powerful real despots, had no quarrel among themselves. If one ostensible despot was defeated tomorrow, the secret men could replace him easily, while the work of subduing and destroying liberty and the dignity of man could go on uninterrupted. For Evil was becoming more and more victorious, and never had Satan, throughout all of history, attained such a victory, in every nation in the world.
“‘Do not believe, not even for an instant, that Hitler or Mussolini or Stalin, or anyone else, caused the last war, and do not think that any other one man will cause the next holocaust. These men are only symbols—of you, the people. They are only your images. You created them! You put the guns in their iron hands; you gave them your motivations, and your hatreds, and your godlessness. You threw your sons into their fiery arms; you sacrificed your children to them on your altars of materialism. The graves that fill Europe, the concentration camps, the wrecked cities, the weeping children, the lost mothers, the agony and anguish of a whole world—these are your deeds, and yours only. Contemplate them.
“‘Yes, contemplate them. Look at your young sons beside you, your lovely little daughters. They are already forfeit to your greed, your materialism, your abandonment of God for “security” and glittering gadgets and goods. Tomorrow they will be absent from your side. Tomorrow your cities will be smoldering again. Tomorrow you will raise up new despots, in your name and in the name of Evil.
“‘For you have driven out of your schools and your lives and your homes the shining Name of God. And may God, whose Face you have covered with smoke, have mercy on your souls!’”
“Mr. Fletcher,” the article continued, “did not join in the responsive reading which followed. He left the pulpit-abruptly, and did not appear again. This was without precedent, but the men and women who packed the church seemed to understand. The responsive reading was very faint, as if the congregation was thinking. They left the church with very subdued faces. It is the opinion of this reporter that that sermon will be echoed in every home for a long time to come.”
Mr. Summerfield sat for a long time in deep thought, the fine skin of his forehead wrinkling and furrowing. All that this fool of a Fletcher had said was true. Therefore he must be destroyed, driven out. He was more dangerous than an army. He had been stoned. Very good. He must be stoned again. Mr. Summerfield began to write rapidly in his tiny, precise hand. When he had finished his editorial he stood up and went to look for his daughter.
He paused, his hand on the doorknob of her office. Again he was assaulted by his sick yearning. He had started for her in anger; now he stopped. He would just laugh at her gently, in ridicule. And forever after, he would know that for her own reasons she had deceived and betrayed him. He would ask her why; he had to know. He, himself, was in peril because of her. His friends would know everything; copies of this article would reach them almost immediately. But more than anything else, he wanted to know why his daughter had betrayed him, and used him, and despised him:
He opened the door. Lorry was standing beside her desk. Her father did not at first notice that she had piled her desk with objects from the emptied drawers. He saw only her slender figure in the close black dress, the gleam of her smooth head, the ascetic profile of her face. “Lorry,” he said.
She turned to him with that swift movement of hers, and he saw her eyes, large glittering ovals of repudiation. She said, “I’m leaving. Now.”
And then he saw the objects on her desk—her purse, her cosmetics, her notebooks. There was the finality of departure about her.
“What?” he muttered, stupefied.
“I said, I am leaving. Now. Forever. I’m never coming back. I’m going away. I don’t want to hear from you. If you write me, I won’t answer. If you come to see me, I’ll shut my door in your face.” She paused, and there was a blaze in her eyes. “Don’t you understand? I’m not your daughter; you’re not my father. Forget I ever lived, just as I’m going to forget I ever knew you.”
She stood before him, straight, tall, rigid, and looked at him, and there was no mercy in her, no love, no regret.
“Lorry, are you out of your mind?” He forgot her article. This was his daughter, the creature he loved more than anything else in the world, and she was denying him, leaving him, and she would never return.
“Why?” he asked, when she did not answer.
“Because you are what you are. Because I have found out all about you. Because I can’t stand you any longer. I began to know about you five years ago. That’s when I beg
an to hate you.” Her voice was loud and harsh in the room, and she threw the words at him like stones. “Don’t ask me any more questions. I have an idea you know exactly what I mean.”
He put his hands on her desk and leaned on them, for he was suddenly stricken and undone.
“Don’t worry how I’ll get along,” she said scornfully. “Remember, I have three thousand a year which my grandfather left me—your father. And two thousand my mother’s father left me. And I’ll be working with Barry; I’ve already talked with him.”
Mr. Summerfield’s shoulders sagged. All that I’ve done, he said to himself, believing himself, I’ve done for you, my daughter. I wanted the world for you.
She started to pass him, and he caught her arm. “Lorry,” he pleaded. “Listen to me a minute. No, I can’t explain, I’m afraid. I am asking you to stay here because of me, because I love you, Lorry.”
But her face was more like marble than ever, eternally shut to him, her mouth white and still.
“I can’t let you go, Lorry,” he said.
She pulled her arm from his hand, and without a word she left the office.
He stood there alone. The morning paper was in his hand. He saw her article again. And now he was an icy avalanche of hatred. In some way this detestable and stupid minister was responsible for his daughter’s going. He, that minister, had enslaved Lorry with that mystical trash of his, had driven her from him, her father. He had precipitated something in Lorry which might have lain dormant all her life.
“I’ll get him,” said Mr. Summerfield, aloud and quietly, “if it’s the last thing I ever do.”
A Tender Victory Page 26
