The Clowns of God (9 page)

They had been conditioned for so long to regard this timeworn edifice as the navel of the world, its ruler as the sole, authentic legate of God to men; to whom would they look when the house and the man were reduced to a glaze on the pavement?

These were no idle questions. They were possibilities v 67 hideously imminent to Jean Marie Barette, to Anton Cardinal Drexel, to Carl Mendelius, who knew the apocalyptic literature by heart and saw it rewritten in every line of the daily press. He felt sorry for Drexel, old, still powerful, but bereft of all his certainties. He felt sorry for all of them:

Cardinals’, Bishops, curial clerics, all trying to apply the Codex Juris Canonicus to a mad planet, whirling itself towards extinction.

He turned away and strolled, in leisurely fashion, through the crowd of pilgrims, across the Victor Emmanuel Bridge and down the Corso. Halfway along the thoroughfare he found a bar, with tables spread along the pavement. He sat down, ordered a Campari and watched the passing show.

This was the best time in Rome: the air still soft, the flowers fresh on the vendors’ stalls, the girls flirting their new summer finery, the shops filled with bright baubles for the tourist season. His attention was caught by a young woman standing on the kerb a few paces to his left. She was dressed in dark blue slacks and a white silk blouse that displayed high tilted breasts. Her black hair was held back by a red scarf. She looked like a southerner, slight and olive-skinned; with a calm, madonna-face, singularly beautiful in repose. She carried a folded newspaper in one hand, and in the other a small handbag of blue leather. She seemed to be waiting for someone.

As he watched, a small red Alfa backed into the space near her. The driver parked it awkwardly, with the nose pointing out into the traffic. He opened the door and leaned across to speak to the girl. For a moment it looked like a pick-up; but the girl responded without protest. She passed her handbag to the driver and, still holding the newspaper, turned back to face the pavement. The driver waited, with the door open and the engine running.

A few moments later a man, middle-aged, fashionably dressed and carrying a leather brief-case, walked swiftly down the Corso. The girl stepped forward, smiled and spoke to him. He stopped. He seemed surprised; then he nodded and said something which Mendelius could not hear. The girl shot him three times in the groin, tossed the newspaper into the gutter and leapt into the car, which roared away down the Corso.

For a single, stunned moment, Mendelius sat shocked and immobile; then he lunged towards the fallen victim and rammed his fist into the man’s groin to stanch the blood pumping from the femoral artery. He was still there when the police and the ambulance men pushed their way through the crowd to take charge of the victim.

A policeman dispersed the gaping onlookers and the photographers. A street-sweeper cleaned the blood from the pavement. A plain-clothes man hustled Mendelius into the bar. A waiter brought hot water and clean napkins to mop his bloody clothes. The proprietor offered a large whisky with the compliments of the house. Mendelius sipped it gratefully as he made his first deposition. The investigator, a young, poker-faced Milanese, dictated it immediately over the telephone to headquarters. Then he rejoined Mendelius at the table and ordered a whisky for himself.

“That was most helpful, Professor. The description of the assailant, detailed and closely observed, is very useful to us at this early stage. I’m afraid, however, I’ll’have to ask you to come to headquarters and look at some photographs maybe work with an artist on an identikit picture.”

“Of course. But I’d like to do it this afternoon if possible.

As I explained, I have engagements to fulfill.”

“Fine. I’ll take you down when we’ve finished our drinks.”

“Who was the victim?” asked Mendelius.

“His name’s Malagordo. He’s one of our senior Senators, socialist and Jewish. A filthy business, and we’re getting more of it every week.”

“It seems so pointless a gratuitous barbarity.”

“Gratuitous, yes; but pointless, no! These people are dedicated to anarchy, a classic and total breakdown of the system by a destruction of public confidence. And we’re getting very close to that point now. You may find this hard to believe, Professor. At least twenty other people saw the shooting today; but I’ll bet a month’s salary yours will be the only deposition that tells us anything concrete… and you’re a foreigner! The others have to live in this mess; but they won’t lift a finger to clean it up. So,” he shrugged in weary resignation, “in the end they’ll get the country they deserve.

Which reminds me, you’d better be prepared to see yourself spread all’ over the newspapers.”

“That’s the last thing I need,” said Mendelius glumly.

“It could also be dangerous,” said the detective.

“You will be identified as a key witness.”

“And therefore a possible target. Is that what you’re telling me?”

“I’m afraid so, Professor. This is a propaganda game, you understand black theatre. They have to shoot the leading man. The girl in the ticket-office has no publicity value. If you take my advice you’ll move out of Rome, preferably out of Italy.”

“I can’t do that for at least a week.”

“As soon as possible then. Meantime,change your address.

Move into one of the bigger hotels where the tourists congregate. Use another name. I’ll arrange the passport problem with the management.”

“It wouldn’t help much. I’m booked for lectures at the German Academy. So I’m still exposed.”

“What can I say then?” The detective shrugged and grinned.

“Except watch your step, vary your routine, and don’t talk to pretty girls in the Corso!”

“No chance of police protection, at least for my wife?”

“Not a hope. We’re desperately short of manpewer. I can give you the name of an agency that hires bodyguards; but they charge millionaire rates.”

“Then to hell with it!” said Mendelius.

“Let’s go look at your photographs.”

As they drove through the midday chaos, he could still smell the blood on his clothes. He hoped Lotte was having a good lunch at Tivoli. He wanted her to enjoy this holiday;

there might not be too many more in the future.

Later in the afternoon, while he waited for Lotte and Hilde to return from their outing, he sat on the terrace and taped a memorandum to Anneliese Meissner. He set down the new facts he had learned from Georg Rainer and from Cardinal Drexel and only then added his own comments.

Rainer is a sober and objective reporter. His medical evidence though second-hand proved reliable. Clearly Jean Marie Barette was under great mental and physical strain.

Clearly, too, there was no consensus on his mental incapacity. As Rainer put it: “Had they wanted to keep him, the most he would have needed was a decent rest and a reduction of his work-load.”

Cardinal Drexel’s point of view surprised me.

Remember I was under inquisition for a long time, and I knew him as a formidable and quite relentless dialectician.

However, even in our worst encounters, I never had the slightest doubt of his intellectual honesty. I would love to see you and him lock horns in a public debate. It would be a sell-out performance. He rejects utterly any idea of insanity or of fraud on Jean Marie’s part. He goes further and puts him in the category of the mystics like Teresa of Avila, John of the Cross and Catherine of Siena. By inference, Drexel commits himself to a belief not yet clearly categorised in the authenticity of Jean Marie’s visionary experience. So now it is I who am the sceptic or, at least, the agnostic.

I am to see Jean Marie next Wednesday and Thursday and I shall report to my assessor after those meetings. I give my first Academy lecture tomorrow. I am looking forward to it. The Evangelicals are an interesting group. I admire their way of life. And, of course, Tubingen has always been one of the heartlands of the Pietist tradition, which has had such a huge influence in England and the United States. But I forget. You are tone-deaf to this music. None the less I trust you and am glad to have you as my Beisitzer. My most affectionate salutations from this wonderful, but now very sinister, city. Auf Wiedersehen.

The audience was already seated when he entered the auditorium; twenty-odd Evangelical pastors, most of them in their early thirties, a dozen wives, three deaconesses, and half a dozen guests whom Herman Frank had invited from the local Waldensian community in Rome. Carl Mendelius felt comfortable with them. The theological faculty at Tubingen had been one of the early forcing-grounds for the Pietist Movement in the Lutheran Church; and Mendelius was personally attracted by its emphasis on personal devotion and works of pastoral charity. He had once written a long paper on the influence of Philipp Jakob Spener and the “College of Piety’ which he founded in Frankfurt during the seventeenth century.

When Herman Frank had finished his introduction and the applause had subsided, Mendelius laid out his papers on the lectern and began to speak. His manner was relaxed and informal.

“I don’t want to give a lecture. I should prefer, if you agree, to explore our subject in a Socratic dialogue, to see what we can tell each other, and what the historical evidence can tell us all. In broad terms we are dealing with eschatology, the doctrine of last things: the ultimate destiny of man, of social organisations and of the whole cosmic order. We want to consider these things in the light of both Old and New Testament writings, and the earliest Christian traditions.

“There are two ways of looking at the doctrine of last things. Each is radically different from the other. The first is what I call the ‘consummatory view’. Human history will end. Christ will come a second time, in glory, to judge the living and the dead. The second is what I call the modificating view. Creation continues, but is modified by man working in concert with his Creator, towards a fulfilment or perfection, which can be expressed only by symbol and analogy. In this view Christ is ever present, and the Parousia expresses the ultimate revelation of His creative presence. Now I’d like to know where you stand. What do you tell your people about the doctrine of last things? Show hands if you want to answer and let’s hear your name and your home-place. You sir, in the second row …”

“Alfred Kessler from Koln …” The speaker was a short sturdy young man with a square-cut beard.

“I believe in continuity and not consummation for the cosmos. The consummation for the individual is death and union with the Creator.”

“How then, Pastor, do you interpret the Scriptures to the faithful? You teach them as the Word of God at least, I presume you do. How do you expound the Word on this subject?”

“As a mystery, Herr Professor: a mystery which, under the influence of divine grace, gradually unfolds its meaning to each individual soul.”

“Can you clarify that perhaps express it as you would to your congregation?”

“I usually put it this way. Language is a man-made instrument and therefore imperfect. Where language stops, music, for example, takes over. Often a hand’s touch says more than a volume of words. I use the example of each man’s personal consummation. Instinctively we fear death. Yet, as all of us know from pastoral work, man becomes familiar with it, prepares himself, subconsciously, for it, understands it through the universe about him the fall of a flower, the scattering of its seeds on the wind, the rebirth of spring.

In this context, the doctrine of last things is, if not explainable, at least conformable to physical and psychic experience.”

“Thank you, Pastor. Next …”

“Petrus Allmann, Darmstadt.” It was an older man this time.

“I disagree totally with my colleague. Human language is imperfect, yes; but Christ the Lord used it. I think we err when we try to turn His utterances into some kind of doubletalk. Scripture is absolutely clear on this subject.” He quoted solemnly: ““And immediately after the tribulation of those days, the sun shall be darkened and the moon shall not give her light and the stars shall fall from the sky and the powers of heaven shall be moved. And then shall appear the Sign of the Son of Man in Heaven…” What else does that mean but consummation, the end of temporal things?”

There was a surprising burst of applause from one section of the audience. Mendelius let it run on for a moment then held up his hand for silence. He gave them a good-humoured smile.

“So now, ladies and gentlemen, who would like to decide between these two men of good-will?”

This time it was a grey-haired woman who held up her hand.

“I am Alicia Herschel, deaconess, from Heidelberg. I do not think it matters which colleague is right, I have worked as a missionary in Muslim countries and I have learned to say “Inshallah’. Whatever is the will of the Lord will be done, however we humans read his intentions. Pastor Allman quoted from Matthew twenty-four; but there is another saying in that same chapter: “But of that day and hour no one knoweth; no, not the angels of heaven, but the Father alone.”” She was an impressive woman and there was more applause when she sat down. She was followed by a young man from Frankfurt. This time he addressed a question to Mendelius.

“Where do you stand on this question, Herr Professor?”

He was pinned now, as he had expected to be; but at least it forced him to some kind of definition. He paused a moment, collecting his thoughts, then outlined his position.

“As you know, I was ordained a priest in the Roman Catholic Church. However, I left the ministry and engaged myself in academic work. For a long time, therefore, I have been absolved from the obligation of pastoral interpretation of scripture. I am now an historian, still a professing Christian, but dedicated to a purely historical study of biblical and patristic documents. In other words, I study what was written in the past, in the light of our knowledge of that past.

So, professionally speaking, I should not make predications on the truth or otherwise of prophetic writings, only on their provenance and authenticity.”

They were silent now. They accepted his disclaimer; but if he ducked the issue of a personal testimony they would reject him out of hand. The knowing was not enough for them.