The Good Shepherd (35 page)

He sighed, finished his coffee, and signaled the waitress for the bill. She smiled politely and told him that his American sister had already paid for it.

“Your Eminences - if you’d just stand over here so that we get St. Peter’s in the background.”

The five new American Cardinals were in the garden of the North American College on Janiculum Hill. The luncheon and the speeches were over. The physical man and the spiritual man had been well fed, but the photographers remained insatiable. Matthew Mahan felt exhausted. A new kind of pain, less alarming but more depressing, throbbed in his stomach. He had eaten practically nothing at lunch, causing Cardinal Dearden to ask him in his genial way if he knew that Lent was over. He and Dearden had chatted amiably about priests’ synods and parish councils, which Dearden, as the president of the National Council of Bishops, had done his best to urge on every diocese. So far, only about half had responded. Listening to him, Matthew Mahan wondered why and how Dearden got the nickname “Iron John.” He was an essentially shy man, who rarely looked you in the eye when he spoke.

“When I told my suffragan bishops to start parish councils, old Eddie O’Neil stopped me in my tracks,” Matthew Mahan said. “He said to me, ‘I’m just too damn old to get mixed up in that stuff, Matt.’” This led to a discussion of aging pastors. Matthew Mahan topped everyone with the case of Monsignor Aloysius Dunn, who had ruled St. Malachy’s with a harsh Irish hand for fifty-one years. Wright amused them with some stories about Cardinal Cushing. His favorite was one about a priest who came to Cushing and told him he had lost his faith. Cushing replied, “Don’t talk nonsense, Father. Neither you nor I have brains enough to do that.”

Cardinal Carberry of St. Louis, the oldest of the five - he was sixty-four - murmured as they lined up for the photographer that he was beginning to feel like the victim of a firing squad that couldn’t shoot straight.

Cardinal Krol of Philadelphia now appeared in the garden with another photographer. He and Cardinal Wright shook hands and beamed into each other’s faces, doing their best to scotch rumors of jealousy between the Archbishop of Philadelphia and his suffragan. It was very unusual for a suffragan bishop to be made a Cardinal, and everyone knew it meant that Wright could not return to Pittsburgh. Numerous reporters kept asking Wright where he was going, and the bulky Bishop of Pittsburgh kept insisting he didn’t know. “I have no address. I am among the unemployed,” he said. But at the luncheon they had discussed the virtual certainty that Pope Paul would appoint Jean Cardinal Villot of France the new Secretary of State. Since he had been prefect of the Sacred Congregation of the Clergy, it was almost equally certain that Wright would take this job, which would make him supervisor of 280,000 priests around the world. The mere thought of the headaches involved made Matthew Mahan shudder. There was something to be said for being an outsider.

Watching Cardinal Krol, who would probably be the next president of the Bishops’ Conference, Matthew Mahan suddenly felt uneasy. Krol was the kind of man the Vatican wanted to see running things in America and everywhere else in the world. He was an outspoken theological conservative, who hailed the birth control encyclical with trumpet blasts of rhetoric about the sacredness of human life. But at the same time, he was a genial man, essentially likable. Was the Pauline line veering toward public relations to sell its bad judgment and worse theology? Stop, Matthew Mahan reproached himself. That was more than disloyal; it was almost heretical.

Riding back to the Apostolic Chancellery after lunch, Matthew Mahan told his driver to stop at a newsstand, and he bought several newspapers, including the Communist daily,
L’Unita.
All of them had extensive coverage of the consistory with profiles of the
neo porporati
and many paragraphs of speculation about the promotion of Villot, a moderate progressive, to the key post of Secretary of State.
L’Unita
doubted that it signaled any substantial change in the Vatican’s direction, pointing out that conservative Archbishop Giovanni Benelli remained Substitute Secretary of State, and he was far more influential with the Pope.

Summing it all up,
L’Unita
dismissed the Villot appointment as another piece of Vatican window dressing, a sop thrown to the liberals.

At the consistory, Pope Paul had appointed a theological commission, a recommendation that had been made by the first synod of bishops in 1967. The bishops’ suggestion had been aimed at getting better representation for all schools of theological thought in Rome. Matthew Mahan winced to see how Paul had twisted it into a negative framework. The commission would, the Pope said, “set a limit to theological speculation,” and define where speculation ended and heresy began. Three days ago, Matthew Mahan mused, he might have agreed with this approach. But now he heard only too clearly the harsh ring of the judicial gavel. But he did not want to go any further with that kind of thinking now. No, he sensed danger in it.

At the chancellery, the afternoon passed in a blur of faces and handshakes with dozens of diplomats, Cardinals, monsignors. Most were strangers to him; all were ill at ease in his presence. He was clearly a supernumerary. It was Wright and Cooke and Dearden that they came to see. Each of them had power, actually or potentially; it amounted to the same thing. He was an oddity, the accidental American friend of John. Matthew Mahan could readily imagine the whispered exchanges as they approached him. He could see the puzzlement in their eyes as they shook hands and extended suave congratulations. For a while, he found himself wishing Davey Cronin was with him, to give them his outrageous explanation of why Mahan was here.

The visits of Cardinal Jean Villot and Archbishop Giovanni Benelli were the only ones that caused Matthew Mahan to grow tense. Villot was now the second most powerful official in the Vatican. If Davey Cronin was right, and Romanita was the answer to his elevation to the cardinalate, here was the man who might tell him. But there was not even a hint of such a possibility in Villot’s smooth very Gallic conversation. His thin face seemed animated by nothing but good humor as he talked of their mutual friendship with
neo porporato
Jean Derrieux. Benelli, a stocky intense man of medium height, had the same job Pope Paul had held under Pius XII. By reputation, he was a tough operator, who often served as Paul’s hatchet man. Today, he had left his executive style in the Vatican. They joked about how well Cardinals Mahan and Wright spoke Italian. If the habit spread among American bishops, Italy would be accused of cultural imperialism, Benelli said. Again, there was not the tiniest hint of politics. But Romanita included the art of making the political remark at precisely the right moment. Perhaps this was not considered the time or the place.

Not until the end of the afternoon did Matthew Mahan see a face that he recognized as a friend. “Giorgio,” he exclaimed when he saw the small, shy man in the doorway. It was Giorgio Bartoli, Pope John’s valet. They shook hands enthusiastically, and Matthew Mahan inquired eagerly about his present status. “Oh,I’m well taken care of,” he replied.

What was the name of John’s secretary? He groped for a moment and found it. “How is Monsignor Capovilla? I hope they have taken good care of him, too.”

“Oh yes. He is Archbishop of Chieti now.”

“Chieti. I don’t even know where that is.”

“It is directly east from Rome, a few miles from the Adriatic coast.”

“Is it what we call in America the sticks, the boondocks? An obscure place?”

“Very obscure,” said Bartoli. “But that is what they want. All of us must be obscure. There is great fear of a cult, you know.”

“Really?”

“Oh yes. I was warned that under no account must I sell any article of clothes or religious goods, a Bible, a rosary, that sort of thing, that were given to me by the Holy Father. If I did, it would mean my head,” he said, drawing his fingers across his throat. “You heard, of course, about the dedication of the doors?”

Matthew Mahan shook his head.

“The Manzu doors at St. Peter’s, the bronze doors by the great sculptor. They were dedicated at sunset one day. No one was there but Manzu and his family and the Pope and a few monsignori. No one else. I was not invited, Monsignor Capovilla was not invited. The Holy Father’s nephew, Monsignor Roncalli, was not invited. It was as if they wanted to keep the doors a secret.”

Bartoli sighed and shook his head. “Some popes are as jealous as women. Do you know what Pope John said to Manzu? ‘Let me know when your doors are finished and we will have a
festa.
We will invite everybody to come to St. Peter’s to look at them.’”

Bartoli sighed again. “It is a poor way to do things. It has nothing to do with God, do you think, Eminence?”

“No,” Matthew Mahan said. “No. Only with men. Popes are human, don’t forget, my friend.”

Bartoli nodded and stood up. They really had nothing more to say to each other. They were bound only by the name he had just spoken in Italian,
Papa Giovanni.
It was amazing how much better it sounded that way.

Matthew Mahan rode back to his hotel through the Roman dusk. It took a half hour to travel thirty or forty blocks in the appalling traffic. His stomach continued to ache dully. In the hotel lobby, he saw Bill Reed sitting in a chair. Matthew Mahan was tempted, for a moment, to sneak past him. But he looked so forlorn, it would have been a sin against charity to even attempt it.

“Hello, Bill,” he said. “Giving your feet a rest?”

“More or less,” he said, good humor returning to his face. “Do you think maybe an atheist’s feet get tired quicker than a Christian’s feet tramping around all these churches?”

“I’ll have to check that one out with the theologians at the Vatican.”

One of the desk clerks touched Matthew Mahan on the elbow. “Eminence,” he said, “this cable arrived for you an hour ago.”

Matthew Mahan nodded his thanks and ripped it open. It was from Sister Agnes Marie at Mount St. Monica’s College.

“Look at this,” Matthew Mahan said, handing the cable to Bill Reed. “That spitfire of a daughter of yours is here in Rome.”

“Really,” said Bill in a stricken voice. He stared dully at the telegram, and the forlorn look crept across his face again. “Well, I’m the last person she’d get in touch with.”

“Now, that’s absolutely absurd,” said Matthew Mahan. “Let’s get in a cab and go see her.”

Bill shook his head. “No, Matt, I don’t want to waste your time. In fact, as your doctor, I’m inclined to tell you to go upstairs and go to bed. You look exhausted.”

“Baloney,” he scoffed. “I’m operating on sanctifying grace.”

“Sanctifying grace won’t heal that ulcer,” Bill said. “Only rest and quiet will do that. You’ve gotten damn little of either since we arrived.”

Bill shook his head as Cardinal Mahan started to argue again. “It’ll only be an unpleasant scene. And I’m not in the mood for one. Shelagh and I came here on our honeymoon, you know. I’ve been thinking about her ever since we arrived. I’m afraid it’s got me down.”

“All the more reason to see Helen. You used to say she was a carbon copy of her mother.”

“Well - I would like to see her.” But I don’t want to hear - what
I
’ll hear.”

“Let’s take a chance,” said Matthew Mahan, deciding Bill was just depressed. What could a daughter, especially a daughter who was a nun, say to her father that would be so terrible?

Bill let himself be hoisted out of his chair and led to a taxi. It was another half hour of inching and horn blowing and cursing before they reached the Pensione Christina. The affable lady at the desk assured them that the American sister was in her room on the second floor. They went up the stairs.

“Who’s that?” asked a young voice in response to Matthew Mahan’s knock.

“A surprise,” said Matthew Mahan.

Sister Helen opened the door. She was wearing a dark blue bathrobe and had her head encased in a towel. She had apparently just washed her hair. It made her face look stark and almost cruel in the shadowy hall light. Quickly, Matthew Mahan explained why they were here. “I thought you might want to have dinner tonight with me and this fellow,” he said, nodding to Bill Reed.

His good cheer produced no response. “I’m sorry,” Sister Helen said. “I already have a dinner date. With a friend of mine who left the order and is living here in Rome.”

“Do you have time for an aperitif?”

“Not really. I’m getting dressed as you can see. I have nothing to say to him,” she said, staring stonily at her father. “Or to you, for that matter.”

“Sister, this is no place for me to give you a lecture. But common politeness, not to mention Christian charity -”

“- has nothing to do with it,” she said. “Neither of them. You must think you can work miracles with a wave of your episcopal hand. The difference between him and me is fundamental. It goes back to the Gospel. Didn’t Christ say he would turn son against father and daughter against mother and so forth? That’s what’s happened here.”