Prince of Peace (50 page)

"What if the man who takes my desk is you?"

"What?"

"You, Father." O'Shea smiled. "Bishop Swanstrom and Cardinal Spellman both agree. You're the man for the job, Head of the CRS Refugee Project. Spelly was going to tell you himself."

Michael was flabbergasted. After director, it was the most important job in the agency. He was far too junior. "God, Tim, you're not serious."

"Sure am. I expected an argument, but everybody agrees. You've done a hell of a job with the Fund. And the bishops you've dealt with are at Spellman all the time, how good you are. And I told Swanstrom frankly that if he didn't give you the Refugee desk I was going to ask Spelly to transfer you to the Ordinariate."

"And when was I going to be asked?"

"What?"

"Am I the pawn in your chess game, or what? You expect me to be grateful, don't you? I'm not surprised when the cardinal plays God with his priests' lives. I don't expect that from you. Why wasn't I the first person you talked to about this?"

"Well, because, of course, I knew you'd want it."

"But I don't, Tim."

"Oh, God!" O'Shea slapped his desk and pushed away from it, slamming back in his chair. His eyes went to the immaculate ceiling, and he muttered, "Give me patience." Then he bent forward and pulled a drawer open for a cigar. He calmed himself by trimming, licking and lighting it. "All right," he said through the smoke, "what's up?"

"I want you to send me back to Vietnam. While you still have the clout here, resurrect my old position or create a new one. Onsite relief administrator, liaison with the local Church, liaison with AID, an appointment through Caritas, I don't care. But I want to go back to Vietnam, and I want a Church position."

"Good Lord, Michael! You know I can't do that. You've done your bit over there. And the last thing they need now is another American."

"But the buildup would justify it. If there are two hundred thousand military, there will be thousands of AID and State people. Nobody would think twice if you sent me back over."

"What for, Michael? What the hell for?"

"To find those children. The ones who were supposed to be on that airplane last night, and to get them out. And to get the others out."

"Don't be ridiculous. That's the most foolish thing I ever heard."

"You said I'm your barometer. I'm telling you the pressure is falling fast. Johnson has decided to wind it up, and it's going to be vicious. I'm not talking moral theology, Tim. I'm not talking right and wrong. That's for your chaplains to do. I just want to get those kids out. I want to get them to hospitals that can treat them. It's a goddamned outrage, what was pulled last night, and they're not getting away with it. Terre des Hommes says there have been a million child casualties since nineteen sixty-one, in just four years, and that was before LBJ decided to make the goddamned war..."

"You're a priest, Michael! Watch your language!"

"Oh, it's language that seems obscene, is it?"

"Your overreaction is what disturbs me. A million casualties? Where does that figure come from? What do a bunch of Swiss do-gooders know? Take it easy."

"So maybe it's
half
a million! Maybe it's only a hundred thousand! Okay? But why the hell are they sending us polio victims? Don't tell me to take it easy!"

"I
will
tell you to take it easy, Father. And I will tell you to remember who you're talking to."

"I'm talking to you, Tim." Michael checked himself. "You were there last night. You heard what the Vietnamese doctor said. They're going to hide what's happening now. They're going to deny it. Imagine what that will mean to the children. They'll have to bury them alive. They won't even get to field hospitals. They won't get first aid. Tim, somebody has to get over there. Somebody has to find those children and get them out."

"Monsieur Hurot is way ahead of you. Isn't that what Terre des Hommes is doing?"

"But to what effect? You said it yourself, a bunch of Swiss do-gooders. But I'm an American. I'm a decorated veteran; I'm a war hero, and I'm a Roman Catholic priest. I work for Francis Cardinal Spellman. Let the army try to flick me aside!"

O'Shea snorted and waved his cigar. "And let Francis Cardinal Spellman find out what you're up to."

"How can he be against saving children?"

"If they become a dove cause célèbre?"

"They won't. You know me better than that. I'm no dove."

"I was beginning to wonder."

"And my purpose is to help Vietnamese kids, not the SDS and not the Fulbright Committee."

"Don't be ingenuous, Michael. Suppose the army fights you. Suppose they make the not unreasonable case that the sovereignty of the Vietnamese government in caring for its own people has to be respected. Or suppose your worst suspicion is true and there's a conspiracy to keep the condition of wounded children secret and therefore out of treatment. You're telling me that at that point you wouldn't go to Fulbright about it? Or the press?"

"If that was the case, of course I would, and you'd help me, right? But you believe like I do that our military people are decent, and that all any of us need is a little moral clarity. Well, this is a way to get some."

"Don't be racist about it. Maybe Saigon cares about its own citizens too. Maybe the ARVN are decent too."

"I'd like to think that what happened last night was just a foul-up, some timid bureaucrat's decision. There's no set policy on evacuating victims yet, and I want to get there before there is one. If I can find out the facts—how many war-wounded children, where they are, what they get for treatment—and if I can take the facts to the right people, then we won't need a patched-together Swiss airlift. The army itself will get those kids out, on military aircraft and to military hospitals. Hell, Tim, I'm talking about something bigger and better than the Berlin Airlift!"

"But you're not the U.S. Air Force, Michael."

"That's right. I'm the Catholic Relief Service, and I know that people working in this office helped generate this war. By God, people working here now can at least get the wounded taken care of."

"You've just made the case for why you must stay here and take my job. CRS needs you at the top."

"I can't."

"Why?"

"Because half a dozen guys can do this job, and no one but me was on that plane last night. I made a promise to those children, Tim."

"You've made a prior promise, Michael. A solemn one, a vow."

"'Obedience and respect.'"

"That's right."

"Tim, I'm asking you to help me keep that vow. You can do it. You know you can."

"You want to be the new Tom Dooley."

"Why not?"

"Actually, it's not a bad idea. There's only one problem with it. The brass won't let you in, not if they know what you're up to."

"That's why it has to be a Church job. We don't ask the brass, remember?"

"Spelly would. He wouldn't send you over there without checking it out with Washington."

Michael stared at O'Shea. "When the cardinal refused to let me go back before, he made it seem like the issue was how much more good I would do from here."

"And he was right."

Michael shook his head. "He slid one by me, Tim. He just didn't want me over there. He was afraid of what I'd see and what I'd do."

O'Shea thought for a moment, then nodded. "He still would be, Michael."

"That's why I need you, Tim. I'd like to slide one by him."

"What, I'm supposed to lie to him?"

Michael said nothing.

O'Shea turned away, swiveling toward the window. "Michael, God ... I don't believe you're asking me to do this."

"Tim, I'm only asking you to let me go."

He swung back abruptly. "Rubbish! You're asking me to sponsor the next Don Quixote! You think you're Tom Dooley? Do you know who you'll be? Father Coughlin! It's always a disaster when priests involve themselves in politics, and that's what you'll be doing. You know it too, otherwise you wouldn't be asking me to cover for you with the cardinal. Good God, Michael! I'm about to be made a bishop!"

"I know that."

"Well, why are you putting me in this position then?"

Again Michael remained silent. He had to look away from his old friend.

O'Shea smoked his cigar. Finally he said quietly, "It's my first stack of real chips, and you want me to bet it all on you." He looked at Michael. "I owe you, don't I?"

"You owe me nothing, Tim."

"Except my life. You don't think I've forgotten that, do you? You've never asked me for anything before."

"I want you to let me go because you think it's the right thing to do."

"It's the most foolish damn thing I ever heard of. You have no business over there. And if you step on toes, it will reflect on CRS and embarrass me, and bring the cardinal down on both of us. Hell, I've just begun allowing myself to look forward to a nice career in the hierarchy. You could finish it before it gets off the ground."

"Tim, you're not responsible for what I do."

"The hell I'm not. At least give me credit for the risk I'm taking." Michael smiled.

O'Shea said, "There's an opening on the Indochina Council of Volunteer Agencies. You'd represent Caritas. We could justify it by saying you're the only one with experience in the field. Actually, it's been a problem, trying to think of whom to send."

"Do you think I'm nuts?"

O'Shea answered carefully. "No, I think you're right, Michael. I think you're courageous and right and your feeling about it moves me. And I'm glad you pushed me. I can handle Spellman. But I'd appreciate it if he didn't read about you in the
Times."

"He never reads the
Times."

"I'm serious."

"I don't have an ax to grind, Tim."

As Michael stood up to go, O'Shea got off one last shot. "Are you sure you don't want to take twenty-four hours and think it over? Whoever takes this desk..." His cigar hand idled along the edge of it. "...gets made monsignor. You'd be the first in your class, Michael. A leg up."

"For my career in the hierarchy?" He grinned.

"It's priests in power who can do the most good. Don't forget that."

By the time they get there, though, Michael thought, after a lifetime of toeing the line for the sake of their next promotion, they've forgotten what "good" is. From many years before he heard O'Shea's lilting, Irish voice saying on that battlefield, "God will not have his work made manifest by cowards." But O'Shea was no coward. He'd just proved that once again. Michael said, "The sooner you come to power, the better, Tim."

"Monsignor Michael Maguire. I like the alliteration."

"Hell, Tim, a monsignor's a 'Domestic Prelate,' right? A former one yourself, you know what that is. He's the guy that makes the pope's bed."

"No, Father, that's the 'Papal Chamberlain.' The 'Domestic Prelate' makes the cardinal's bed."

N
ICHOLAS WILEY
was waiting for Michael at his office.

Goddamnit! Michael thought, when he saw him. He hadn't called Dorothy Day yet. It was more important than ever to get Wiley off the story.

"How you doing, Nicholas?" They shook hands. The kid seemed nervous and ill at ease. "I'll be right with you."

Michael went into his office and closed the door. Now what? Damn!

He crossed to his desk, sat and picked up the phone. He got the
Worker
number from information, dialed it, asked for Dorothy Day and waited. When she came on the line he said, "Miss Day, this is Father Michael Maguire at the Catholic Relief Service."

"Yes, Father?"

"I'm a friend of Eileen Egan's, Miss Day."

"I know that, Father. She has spoken of you."

"She and I have often talked about the admiration we share for your work."

"Thank you, Father."

"Miss Day, I have a problem, and I need your help."

"Yes?" In her firm, quiet voice, the appropriate deference—no more—was implicit.

"I have Nicholas Wiley here. He wants an interview about a certain CRS project having to do with Vietnamese refugees."

"I know about it, Father. Nicholas told me. He didn't indicate there was any problem."

"I can't have him writing about it, Miss Day. Publicity will bring the government down on this. You understand about finessing authority."

"I understand about speaking the truth to power, not finessing it."

Michael told himself to be careful. With her "Yes, Father, no Father," it was easy to think of the woman as a Legion of Mary type. She was a Catholic Emma Goldman. "I can't give him the interview, Miss Day."

"But he said you promised it to him."

"I did, yes."

"Well then." She said nothing else. A silence fraught with sanctimony.

"I was hoping you'd take my word for it, my word as a priest, that right now publicity would destroy our ability to help these desperate people. I was hoping you would take him off the story."

"I can't do that, Father."

Oh, Christ, he thought, the principles! Which would it be, freedom of the press or the rights of laymen in the Church? "May I ask why, Miss Day?"

"I have no authority over Nicholas Wiley."

"If I can respectfully disagree, your authority over him is absolute."

"Nicholas Wiley doesn't work for me anymore, Father. He's no longer with the
Catholic Worker."

"He told me you'd made him managing editor." Was the kid a liar? "He said that only last night."

"He was my managing editor, but he's not now."

"Well, when...?"

"This morning, Father. As of this morning."

"Why?"

"I don't feel free to say. You'll have to ask Nicholas."

Michael was too surprised to respond, and Dorothy Day didn't help him. "Well then," he said finally, "I guess that answers my question."

"Was that all, Father?"

"Yes, Miss Day. Thank you very much."

"You're welcome, Father. And Father...?"

"Yes, Miss Day?"

"Would you pray for us, please? Particularly today we could use your prayers."

"Certainly, Miss Day. I'll put you on the paten at noon." He looked at his watch. The archdiocesan seminarians were touring the U.N. that day, and he was scheduled to say Mass for them at the U.N. chapel. She'd think it an awfully establishment place for worship.