Relic of Time (32 page)

Thus began, however unwittingly—the farsighted prelates had often gazed on the obscure woods of the future and got lost in the trees around them—the politicization of the outrage that had been committed when the sacred image of Our Lady of Guadalupe had been spirited away by a band of gunmen. That sacred image, wherever it was, was of the patroness of all the Americas. God forbid that she should become a cause of division among her devotees.

A resolution was introduced in the Senate that stated the sense of that body that Our Lady of Guadalupe was not a symbol for Latinos alone but for gringos as well. (The resolution used these designations.) It was, of course, defeated.

The Rough Riders of Theophilus Grady rode again, their number swollen with ardent new recruits. Paul Pulaski spoke from Constitution Hall in Philadelphia, an informative presentation of the role that the original Minutemen had played in the establishment of the United States. They had been menaced by British loyalists, but in the end freedom had prevailed and a new country was born. There are counterparts of such British loyalists among us now, he warned, and they are in high places. They had hijacked the republic. The time for decisive action had arrived.

In Richmond, an assembly hurriedly gathered to declare that the original secession of the southern states was once more effective, given the manifest ineptitude and lack of patriotism on the part of the federal government. An addendum to the declaration was hastily added, stressing that this did not mean the reinstitution of slavery. Gray uniforms began to appear on the island in Charleston Harbor that held Fort Sumter.

In all this Sturm und Drang, the actual location of the original sacred image of Our Lady of Guadalupe seemed no longer of primary concern.

Miguel Arroyo had moved his headquarters to the Justicia y Paz buildings in San Diego, on the alert for developments.

“Where is Vincent Traeger?”

Ignatius Hannan put the question to Laura and Ray Whipple, letting them in on the carefully prepared plan that Don Ibanez had confided to the founder of Empedocles. Smiley had signaled Hannan from Catalina and again from the Mexico City airport, from the latter saying,
“Finito,”
and that was enough. Then, after a short stay in Miami, he had headed north with Steltz at the controls, napping in the cabin. But it had been Smiley who brought the plane into the Manchester airport and taxied to the Empedocles hangar. Hannan was not there to meet him. News of a disastrous sort was coming in from Mexico City.

Hannan got in touch with business counterparts there to find out what on earth had happened. He listened in disbelief. Traeger had brought the wrong package! All that careful planning, and flawless execution—he was proud of Smiley and Steltz and he would tell them so once he cooled down—and then, after a triumphal procession to the shrine, alerting everyone what was under way, the bishop had been presented with a copy of the portrait and collapsed on the floor of the basilica. Pandemonium broke out. There had been hours of chaos. They were lucky to get the bishop out of the basilica in one piece. His crosier was in several pieces.

“What about Traeger?” Hannan asked.

None of his informants knew, hence Hannan's question to Laura and Ray, who sat across from his desk. Ray did not look pleased that they had been left out of the loop. But Laura, seeing what was coming, was glad.

“He double-crossed us,” Nate said, trying the thought.

“That makes no sense.”

“None of it makes sense.”

“Why would he go through with the plan you've now just told us of for the first time if he didn't intend to deliver the original?”

“You think he was double-crossed?”

“That makes more sense, Nate.” Ray crossed his legs, which in his body language meant that he was ready to be attacked.

What made no sense to Laura was that Don Ibanez had been in possession of the original all along. Riots had taken place, blood had been shed, the whole country seemed to be coming apart at the seams, and he could have stopped all that in a minute. She said all this aloud.

“He must have had his reasons,” Hannan said.

“I would love to know what they were.”

Nate picked up the phone, thought better of it, put it down. “I'm going out there.”

“What in the world for?”

“Just to be there. When I talk to Don Ibanez I want to look him in the eye.”

Did Don Ibanez now occupy the role of double-crosser? Who would be next? Thank God she and Ray had just learned of this complicated plan. Once he had delivered the original, Traeger had been scheduled to give a public account of what had happened. The assumption was that the wild joy greeting the return of the original would cover any gaps in the explanation. But after the great hoax, Traeger had simply disappeared.

“Does Don Ibanez still have the original?”

Nate Hannan looked vacantly at Ray. “You two coming with me?”

Laura called Smiley, apparently waking him, and asked if he were up to a return flight to the coast.

“Flying is my job.”

“How about Steltz?”

“I'll ask her.”

He seemed to have covered the phone with his hand.

“We'll be ready in an hour,” he said a moment later.

“You can take turns napping on the way.”

“Good idea.”

The two pilots seemed to be fooling around as she and Ray had before they married. But Steltz had a husband somewhere, grounded because of incompatibility. They had better be discreet, or Nate would give them the old heave-ho. The founder of Empedocles seemed to be missing a cylinder or two when it came to women. Had he ever even had a girlfriend? He certainly had none now. A eunuch for the kingdom of Empedocles' sake? That had covered it until the big conversion, brought on by watching Mother Angelica on EWTN. Now it was for the kingdom of heaven's sake, at least as Nate understood it.

Boris was abject when Laura told him they would not be eating the dinner he was preparing.

“No! Impossible! Does he want me to throw it out?”

“Ask a few friends in.”

“Friends? I have no friends. I'm a chef.”

“You and Lise then.”

“Bah. She eats like a bird.”

“I'm sorry, Boris.”

“Sorry!”

“Can we take it along?” Nate asked when Laura told him of Boris's reaction.

A picnic on the plane? Boris would slash his wrists at the idea that he could just pack up the five-course dinner whose preparation had occupied him for much of the afternoon. “Don't suggest that, Nate. Please.”

Commercial airlines offered bonus miles so that passengers could suffer through more hours like those that had earned the bonus points. The last time Laura had flown commercially had been a revelation. The idiotic security precautions, the interval between the seats that made crossing one's legs impossible—business class and first had been full up when she booked the flight—a little bitty pack of peanuts and a plastic cup of the soft drink of your choice to stave off starvation. There hadn't been an empty seat on the plane. They had been delayed an hour and a half on the runway before the plane was cleared for takeoff. With pretty smiles, the cabin crew ignored the discomfort of their passengers. To think that once all this had been romantic.
Fly the ocean in a silver plane, see the jungle when it's wet with rain.
. . . In an aisle seat, Laura had been lucky to see the clouds. Okay. She was spoiled.

“We'll have to get our own plane, Ray. Eventually.” The remark had the suggestion that some far-off day they would retire. Maybe not so far off if she could get pregnant, a condition that so far had eluded their best efforts. Sometimes Laura thought they were being punished for having anticipated the joys of marriage.

Ray put his arm about her waist. “After the baby comes.” He wanted to be a father almost as much as she wanted to be a mother. Was that their ticket out of bondage? Like Boris, they served at the whim of Ignatius Hannan. Like now, off to California on a moment's notice.

It was Nate Hannan, not Smiley, who slept his way across the continent. He never slept while flying. Or being flown. Sometimes he went up front and took the controls, no automatic pilot for him. Laura always knew when Nate was at the controls. The wings would make little dipping motions, the plane would climb out of its assigned altitude, then dive back to recover it. He was like a kid. Well, the planes were his toys. He had three of them and was always on the alert for something better. Maybe she and Ray could buy one secondhand from Nate.

God knew, they would be able to afford it. Once their astronomical packages were pooled they were as rich as Rock-efeller. Well, not quite. Not nearly as rich as Ignatius Hannan, of course. But according to the statistics Laura had seen, they were up there in the top three percent. And, oh, the taxes.

“What's the exemption for a baby, Laura?”

“I'll look it up when I'm pregnant.”

Had he been fishing? Did he think she could keep a thing like that to herself?

“We can name it Ignatius.”

It? “She wouldn't like that.”

Laura had started a novena to Our Lady of Guadalupe, Saint Anne not having come through. She had had to vary the original prayer: “Good Saint Anne, get me a man, as quick as you can.” Well, after all, Saint Anne had gotten Laura a man, not quickly maybe, but no matter. What saint was the patroness of pregnancy?

When Smiley said they were approaching the Oakland airport, Nate stirred.

“Did you arrange for a car?” he asked Laura.

“Of course.”

When had she ever let him down? Smiley brought the plane in, landing gently as always. On that commercial flight Laura had been shocked by the way the huge plane hit the runway, then threw its engines into reverse, so passengers had to put their hands on the seat ahead to avoid pitching forward.