Relic of Time (12 page)

“Nate wouldn't balk at that. His original idea was to add a million each week until the reward was claimed.”

“Good Lord.”

“I know. He saw that was foolish.”

Clare offered to put the two men up in the hacienda, but they preferred staying in town. First they wanted to see the replica of the basilica. When they came back, Traeger asked if the picture there was an exact copy of the original.

Clare paused, then said, “Oh yes. Everything there is on a smaller scale, except that the picture has the exact dimensions of the original. He went to Mexico City when it was done. The artist worked in the basilica there at night, and my father and others were always with him. Afterward, he arranged to have it shipped here. The bishop came for the installation.”

They went off to Pinata, saying they would be back the following day when Don Ibanez returned.

Her father arrived on an early flight and several hours later came up the drive. He took his daughter in his arms and thanked Laura for coming to be with Clare.

“Will you be going back now?”

Laura told him about Traeger and Crosby and the claim that had been made for the reward. The old man did not react as Laura had expected.

“A million dollars?”

“Surely it is worth that to get the image back. Mr. Hannan won't miss the money.”

“Couldn't they just arrest the thief?”

“Such exchanges can be dangerous enough without trying that.” Laura remembered the shoot-out on the roof of the North American College in Rome where the recovery of the third secret of Fatima was to take place.

The old man went out to his basilica, to make a visit, as he said. When he came back he was in good spirits. Traeger and Crosby arrived and Laura left the three men together, calling Ray so he could keep Nate posted, as he had asked.

“How will they make sure it is the original?”

“That is the first question they put to Don Ibanez. They're discussing the matter now.”

The answer to the question, it emerged, was that Don Ibanez would accompany the former agents. He dismissed the warning that it could be dangerous.

“It would be worth dying for,” he said solemnly.

When she approached the door of the Minneapolis Athletic Club, where she had a date for lunch, Catherine looked up at the skyway above. All the buildings in downtown Minneapolis were connected by such skyways, forming a vast network that enabled shoppers and workers to avoid the heat of summer and, more important, the arctic cold of winter. Then her eyes drifted to the right, to Saint Olaf's Church. The door of the club had been opened at her approach, and she hurried inside, as if to escape temptation.

Myrna Bittle, an anthropologist, and a colleague when Catherine had taught, was waiting in the lobby.

“You're a member here?” Myrna whispered. Her hair was cut unattractively short and she looked at her old friend through the round lenses of her heavily rimmed glasses. Of course a mere academic wouldn't dream of a membership in this club.

“I think you'll like it.”

They were led through the dining room to their table. “White wine okay?” Catherine asked.

“White wine is okay.”

Catherine was beginning to wish that they had met in the faculty club as Myrna had suggested. But she had wanted to treat her old friend, the better to enlist her help.

Ever since the funeral in Indianapolis Catherine had been assailed by temptation. She had tried to exorcise it by the remedy of drink, and she had actually called one of her old lovers, but that hadn't led anywhere. She couldn't imagine herself in bed with Mark. He seemed to be having the same trouble. So they parted with a quick kiss on the cheek and she fled into her building. All Catherine could think of were those days she had spent with Lloyd in Chicago. The fling after which he had gone off to Mexico City, apparently on pilgrimage, and been cut down during the theft of the image from the basilica. It seemed he had tried to stop the gunman who shot him.

A pilgrimage. Which meant that Lloyd thought of what they had done as sinful, something of which he must repent. Catherine had a vivid image of his silver chain and the medal on it, which she had gently mocked. She had tried very hard to recall his reaction to that. Had she offended him? Did he honest to God still believe all that nonsense?

But was it nonsense? Of course it was. But after the shock of Lloyd's death, and the circumstances of it, after seeing his devout daughters at the wake and funeral and interment, the nonsense began to seem just something ordinary people believed. What she herself had once believed. It became almost attractive and she fought the temptation with all her might. Myrna represented another effort in that direction.

“So what's this all about?” Myrna asked, sipping her wine.

“How long has it been since we've gotten together?”

“God only knows.”

“God?”

“A
façon de parler.
”

“For a moment, I thought you had got religion.”

“Ha.”

So she had been right to ask Myrna to lunch. Myrna was president of the local Hemlock Society, and she lectured often on the way so many societies had eased their elderly into what they thought was the next life. She had reviewed the books of Dawkins and Hawkins for the local paper, applauding their dismissal of Christianity, of theism, of superstition. She was especially enthused about Christopher Hitchens's
There Is No God.
Once she had gotten Myrna going on those books, all Catherine had to do was listen. It was like a purge listening to that bright, dismissive voice.

“I've been reading about that theft in Mexico,” Catherine said tentatively.

“Our Lady of Guadalupe!”

“You know about it?”

“Catherine, I have files on shrines like that. Did you know there are books about supposedly incorrupt bodies, people dead for years, sometimes centuries, and there they are, all pink and pretty.”

“Really?”

“Of course they're fakes.”

“Can't that be proved?”

“It doesn't seem to matter. The poor fools keep showing up at the shrines.”

“Were you raised atheist?”

Myrna's loopy earrings swayed as she laughed. “God, no. We were Episcopalians. That's sort of Catholic lite.”

“I was raised Catholic,” Catherine said.

“It's not your fault. Were you consulted?”

“Before my baptism?”

“That's just my point.”

“How did you get over being an Episcopalian?”

“Could I have another glass of wine? This is going to take time.”

The short answer to Catherine's question was: anthropology. The study of other cultures had enabled Myrna to get out of her own and see it with new eyes.

“Where did you get your doctorate?”

“Berkeley.”

“In anthropology.”

“Catherine, I studied under Jason Phelps! Let me rephrase that. Well, that, too. You've heard of him, of course.”

“Myrna, my field was microbiology.”

“Was?”

“I'm retired.”

Myrna sat back. “Already? You must have made a pile.”

“Enough.”

Myrna looked around the dining room. “Enough for this?”

“And other things.”

“Lucky you.”

“Tell me about Jason Phelps.”

Her mentor was a militant atheist, a renowned anthropologist, but more famous for his debunking books on Catholic superstitions. Myrna went on and on about his book on the shroud of Turin.

“What's that?”

“It's supposed to be the cloth in which Jesus was buried, and wouldn't you know, there is his image on the cloth. People actually believe this. Some scientists who were in the group that examined it believe it! Well, they refused to say their tests established that it's a fake. That is what really gets Jason's goat. The nitwit scientists who give aid and comfort to superstition. You must read his little book
Descartes and the House of Loreto
.”

“What is the house of Loreto?”

“Are you ready? It is the house in Nazareth in which Jesus was raised and which was miraculously transported to Loreto, Italy! The whole damned house flying through the air like a magic carpet. René Descartes, the father of modern philosophy, the inventor of methodic doubt, made a pilgrimage there in gratitude for his philosophical insights. Jason is marvelous on all that.”

“Is he still alive?”

“He's retired now. He has a place in Napa Valley, where he is sorting out his papers. When he's done, he'll check out.”

“Die?”

“Assisted suicide. I will never forget a lecture he once gave on Seneca. Those old Stoics had it right.”

“He's your hero?”

“Jason? Call him that, I don't mind. If I could afford to, I would go out there and help him with his papers.”

The lunch had been everything Catherine had hoped for. The fresh breeze of pure reason blew through her soul. Her brain. Whatever. Myrna sent her copies of Jason Phelps's books. They helped even more than Myrna's lunch table account. Nonetheless, from time to time, when she least expected it, temptation struck. So she wrote to Jason Phelps, told him a little about herself, mentioned her friendship with his former student Myrna Bittle, and asked if she could come see him. She had mentioned Myrna's wish that she could help Phelps with his papers, and when he replied, he seemed to think Catherine was volunteering to do that. She decided not to correct him. She booked a seat on a flight to Oakland.

Jason Phelps received an e-mail from Myrna before the letter from Catherine Dolan came. He sat now at the outside table where he ate most of his meals and looked across the valley. How green everything was, all new and vital. The scenery provided a mocking contrast to his aging self.

Oh, he had aged well. The great hawk nose, his face lined and tanned, and the shock of white hair still impressed, he could see that, but it was his eyes under luxuriant brows that remained his great weapon. Weapon! He was still attractive to women—young women—but what did it matter? Memories of Myrna brought a wistful smile. It was all over, that sort of thing. So many things were all over now. Still, Catherine's letter had stirred his spirits and he invited her to come see him. After a single conversation, he accepted her offer to help put order into his papers. She was in the house now, under Clare's tutelage, learning the ropes.

Had he become a guru, the refuge of those plagued by superstition, eager to be relieved of their burden? It was inevitable, he supposed. Think of Seneca's
Letters from a Stoic
. Spiritual direction, that was what those letters were, in the same literary genre as
The Imitation of Christ
. How much stronger our convictions become when we see them mirrored in others.

“Catholic,” Catherine had said the night before when the two of them were sitting on this very patio, getting acquainted.

“Good.”

She was surprised. So he quoted Cardinal Newman. There is no point, in logic, between atheism and Catholicism.

“A pardonable exaggeration, which Newman had to explain over and over again. He meant that everyone is drifting toward the one extreme or the other. If he is not already there. And he was right. Only the extremes tempt us.”

“Were you Catholic?”

“No, but I often wish I had been. My parents were Unitarians, believing there is at most one God, in the old joke. It's no religion at all, which makes it harder to lose. And of course every sort of Protestantism defines itself with reference to Catholicism.”

“It still haunts me,” Catherine said. She was a handsome woman, but troubled.

“Of course it does. No human state is entirely stable. There are times, sitting out here, looking at that magnificent valley, when I find myself praying.”

“And what do you pray?”

“I disbelieve. Lord, help my disbelief.”

She had a nice laugh. “You sound like a priest.”

It was his turn to laugh. He thought of Frater Leone, who had come to visit shortly after he settled in here. The monk had acted as if he thought he had a new parishioner. Phelps had tried to shock the priest, but nothing worked. The man just nodded through the attacks on his absurd beliefs. Leone was not much younger than him and, like himself, was beyond surprise. That one session of confrontation had been enough. Since, they had become friends of a sort. He had learned to look forward to Frater Leone's pastoral visits. Know your enemy. That adage seemed to guide them both. It was from Leone that he had gotten a better understanding of his aristocratic neighbor, Don Ibanez.