The Book of Q (33 page)

As he waited, his gaze settled on a mother and her two sons sitting on the ground, boys of about ten and twelve, the younger held close to her chest, the other long and lanky, his chin resting on two propped
fists, a worn leather satchel in his lap. The mother had somehow retained her impressive bulk, her boys not so fortunate, the older with a face well beyond his years. He was at that age when the nose grew too full, the ears too wide, a man’s features on a boy’s face. Awkward for most, it seemed sadly fitting here. The boy caught sight of Pearse, stared for a moment at his collar, then at his boots. He then looked directly at him.

“Koje ste religije?”
asked the boy.

Pearse was surprised to hear Serbo-Croatian. “I’m a Catholic,” he answered in kind.

The boy nodded, then pointed to the boots. “Those are good for walking.”

Pearse looked at his boots, then at the boy. “Yes. You don’t come from Kosovo, do you?”

“Yeah, Kosovo. Medveda. In the north.”

“Your Serbo-Croatian is very good.”

A hint of a smile. “It’s a good language to speak now.”

Pearse recalled the few encounters he’d had with Albanians eight years ago. All of them had spoken a second language. Often Serbo-Croatian. Sometimes German. Never English. “Are you a Catholic?” he asked.

“No. Muslim.”

“Then why did you want to know my religion?”

The boy straightened up. “When the Protestant priests came to our village to tell us about Jesus, they had lots of money, drove nice cars. The Catholic ones were poor, told us that that was the way they were supposed to be.” Again he looked at the boots.

Pearse understood. He glanced at the boy’s feet, roughly the same size as his own, his shoes with little life left in them. Pearse reached down, untied his laces, and tossed the boots across. “How about a trade?”

Again, the hint of a smile.

The shoes were a remarkably good fit, the patches of ventilation something he would get used to. “Do you know how long you’re going to be here?” Pearse asked.

The boy shrugged as he rubbed at a scratch along the toe of his new boots. “We can’t go back to Medveda—at least that’s what they say. Wherever they send us, they want the whole family together. My grandmother and sisters were sent somewhere in Turkey. They’re not sure if they’ve come through here or not. And I don’t know where my father and older brother are.” He looked up. “Are you here to save people?”

The question, laced with as much cynicism as a twelve-year-old could muster, stunned Pearse. He stared at the boy.

For the first time since leaving Rome, he had no choice but to confront his own hypocrisy, a priest using his clericals as a means of deception. The boy, of course, had meant something entirely different. His was a disdain for the words meant to soothe a people trapped in a reality with no place for such gestures. Either way, the remark had the desired effect, Pearse forced to reevaluate his own intentions. People were dying here; worlds were being torn apart. Here. Where a priest should be. Yet the Manichaeans were forcing him to ignore that, disregard the one aspect of his calling he’d never questioned.

“I don’t know,” he finally answered.

From his expression, the boy hadn’t expected that response from a priest. It took him a moment to answer. “Thanks for the boots, Father,” he said, then nodded toward the desk. Pearse turned, to see the woman calling him over.

He turned back to thank the boy, but the boots had already reclaimed his attention. More buffing. Something far more useful than a priest.

Pearse stood and made his way across.

At the desk, he realized the woman was still in the midst of countless other tasks. She pointed for him to take a seat. Another few minutes, and she finally turned to him. “You’ve been very kind to wait so patiently, Father.” Her English was tinged with a French accent, her tone genuinely apologetic. “Somehow, we’ve misplaced you, is that it?”

“Actually, I’ve misplaced myself,” he said. “I’m supposed to be with the ICMC.”

“Ah.” She turned to a pile of papers on the desk, then brought up a new screen on her laptop. As she sorted through it all, Pearse looked back at the boy. He had nestled himself into his mother’s side, eyes shut. Pearse watched, hoping to see even a hint of innocence slip across the face. None.

“You’ve missed them by three days,” she said as Pearse turned back. She held a small folder in her hand, several stapled sheets within, her eyes fixed on the screen. “I’m afraid I can’t tell you where they might be with any accuracy right now.” She turned to him. “Is there someone we should contact, Father?”

“Then where would I be the most useful?”

“Excuse me?”

“Kosovo, Albania? Where would I be able to help?”

Her expression told him she wasn’t prepared to deal with an overly eager priest. “Help? Father … it’s not really a question of where—”

“I’m sure one more pair of experienced hands, not to mention a priest’s presence, would be welcome somewhere,” he said, his tone firm, though not aggressive. “I was in Bosnia during the war. I know the region, the language, the people. There must be someplace where they could use me.”

The woman continued to look at him. Two of her coworkers suddenly descended, each one spewing rapid-fire French, the woman drawn into the exchange, her frustration more and more apparent as the debate went on. When they finally moved off, she turned back to him, her focus elsewhere. “You want to go someplace you can help,” she said offhandedly. “Right.” She placed her hands on the desk. “Look, Father, it’s not our usual policy—”

“I don’t imagine too much that’s ‘usual policy’ is going on these days. I don’t think I’m a threat to anyone.”

“Of course not, Father. That’s not the point.”

“And I
was
supposed to be with the ICMC.” He was actually beginning to believe it himself. “Doesn’t that mean anything?”

“It’s just that we can’t take responsibility—”

“I’m not asking you to. I’ll be responsible for myself. I’m just asking where you think I could do the most good.” He could see she was beginning to teeter. “Or,” he added, “I could continue to pester you for the next few days or weeks or months, until you give in and let a priest do his job.”

“I see.” A resigned smile inched across her lips. “Months.”

“Months.”

Her eyes narrowed; she began to sift through a pile of folders on her desk. “It’s only because I’m a Catholic, Father.” A moment later, she held up a single sheet in her hands. “There’s a transport of medical equipment going out to Kukes in an hour. They’re short one person.” He couldn’t be sure if her willingness to accommodate him had as much to do with his pleas as it did with the harangue from her fellow workers; he didn’t really care. Again, she looked up at him. “You’re sure you’re comfortable with this, Father? Kukes is—”

“Far tamer than Omarska ever was.” The mention of the former Serbian camp stopped her short, a newfound respect in her eyes. “I was there in ’92. I think I’ll be able to handle Kukes.”

She pulled out another file, asked him to sign at several places, then
handed him a laminated card. “The truck will be at the west gate in an hour.” Before he could thank her, her two friends were back, more of the bluster. Pearse turned to go, the woman’s voice quick to stop him.

“Father,” she said, now standing, leaning into him as she spoke. “I was wondering … I … haven’t taken confession since I got here….”

Pearse smiled, aware of how long it had been since he had given it. “Of course. I’ll be outside.”

He would do what he could in Kukes. Spend a day. Token assistance. But the recollection of Angeli’s voice told him it would be all he could afford.

Two hours later, he sat across from a Red Cross official in the back of a truck, a young Indian doctor at his side. No one bothered to talk. The ruts in the road were seeing to that.

Somehow, they even managed to dampen the sound of the exploding mine.

“When?”

Blaney stared at the paintings on the wall across from his desk. He hardly noticed them, his focus so completely trained on the voice on the other end of the phone line.

“Yesterday. Around noon.”

“And I’m only finding this out now?”

“They thought they’d be able to pick him up again before—”

“Before I found out that they’d lost him?”

Silence on the other end.

“We believe he made his way to Athos and—”

“Of course he made his way to Athos,” said Blaney. “Even the cardinal knows that. The calls have been coming in since five this morning. And you’re sure he wasn’t hurt at the station in Kalambáka?”

“Yes…. I was told he got up at once. No injuries. But, as I said—”

“I know. No one was close enough to him at that point to be sure.” Blaney took a deep breath. He couldn’t let anger get in his way. “All right. We’ll assume he’s heading west. My guess is he’ll try for Bosnia, maybe Albania. He obviously knows the region. And he knows he can get lost in there. We just have to hope he makes a mistake.”

“Yes, Father.”

“And I want you to get in touch with me the moment you make contact. No one else, this time. And no delays. Are we clear on this?”

“Yes, Father.”

“Good.” Blaney waited. “Then go in peace, my son.” He hung up the phone and turned to the woman standing by the door. “You say he sounded well, Gianetta?”

“Yes, Father.”

“But you didn’t see him?”

“No, not really, Father. Only from the window as he walked off.”

“And he didn’t say why he wanted to see me? He didn’t mention a … something he wanted to show me?”

“No, Father.”

“All right,” he said. “Thank you, Gianetta. You may go.”

She nodded, then left the room, closing the door behind her.

Again, Blaney stared at the pictures.
No injuries
. At least there was some good news in that.

Pearse had been lucky, a few bruised ribs, some lacerations, a twisted shoulder. The worst of it was the concussion. At least four or five days before the doctors at Kukes would let him go.

The Red Cross man and the young Indian had also escaped relatively unscathed. The driver, however, hadn’t fared so well. He lay next to Pearse, a battery of tubes hooked up to his arms, little sign of life save for the slight rising and falling of his chest. The heat inside the tent wasn’t helping.

It had been a day and half since the accident, Pearse only now able to focus his thoughts and prayers on the man for more than a few minutes at a time. Still, it was an improvement. It was also enough to get him out of his own cot; he stood. With his head pounding, he walked to the flap of the tent and stepped outside.

What he saw made Blace look like a resort. Pearse could almost taste the stench with each intake of air, thousands upon thousands of bodies more animal than human everywhere he looked. During the war in Bosnia, he’d visited two or three such camps, nothing to compare with the sprawl he now encountered. Hundreds of small tents dotted the mud-filled pastures, patches of gravel here and there where ICRC engineers had tried to stem the drainage problems. The toilets stood in a row along a steep slope, gravity their best hope against blockage. Everywhere, webs of rope line stretched from tent to tent, clothes hanging from them, an open-air tenement at eye level. Pearse knew the drill. Nothing to wash with, save the rainwater.

The town itself—bombed beyond recognition even a year after the official cease-fire—blended into the morass of canvas landscaping, the few remaining buildings given over to medical facilities. Even so, he was told that the spillover into the camp was beginning to take its toll, especially with the hot weather. Humidity meant flies; flies meant the threat of epidemic. A section of the camp had been isolated for several weeks, though never quarantined, family members insisting they be kept together. There was little any of the relief organizations could do to dissuade them.

An hour walking. It was all he could handle his first time out.

As much as knew he needed to get moving—Angeli’s voice never far from him—he also knew the doctors were right. He needed to take the time to recover. What they probably didn’t realize, however, was how much more they had given him.