Faith

“You’ll be served with papers,” Gilman said briskly. “I imagine they’ll go to the rectory. Take care of that today, if you can. Have your mail forwarded to the new address.”

Art stared across the room at the man’s empty desk, behind it an idyllic view of trees and lilac bushes and rolling lawn. How strange that His Eminence worked with his back to the window, as if he had no interest in the world beyond him. It was more than strange—it was somehow not quite human—that he preferred looking in.

“What about the parishioners?” Art asked. “It’s Easter, for God’s sake. What on earth do I say to them?”

“Nothing,” said Gilman. “I’m serious, Arthur: you don’t say a word to anybody. You leave that to us.”

“And this afternoon? I’m supposed to do the Passion at two.”

“No worries. We’ll send a substitute,” Gilman said.

At that moment His Eminence got to his feet. Bishop Gilman did the same, and Art understood that the interview had ended. He took a final look around the room, the walls hung with more portraits of the Cardinal.

Again His Eminence clasped Art’s hand.

ART DROVE away from Lake Street, past the news vans on Commonwealth Avenue. His dusty gray Honda attracted no attention. For the moment anyway, he was alone with his shame.

Mindlessly, mechanically, he drove to Dover Court, a bank of brick buildings opposite the highway—the sort of apartment complex that, if you live in a North American city or suburb, you pass every day without noticing. The grounds were landscaped, the curving driveway studded with speed bumps. The property was larger than it appeared from the road—four identical structures, each three stories high, wide and deep enough to house dozens of apartments. The one closest to the road was hung with a bright green banner: NOW RENTING, SHORT OR LONG-TERM LEASE.

He parked behind a small outbuilding marked OFFICE. Inside, a young Indian woman sat behind a desk. Her hair was long enough to sit on. She wore thick glasses and a colorful blouse.

“Hello,” said Art. “I think you have some keys for me.”

“Oh, yes. Mr. Breen.”

He blinked, startled by the Mister. The Roman collar was a symbol everyone recognized: Sikh cab drivers, Muslim women in headscarves. But the morning was cold and damp; he wore a trench coat over his clericals, a plaid muffler at his throat.

She reached into the desk drawer and handed him a bright green envelope, labeled Welcome. “You’re in the A building, the first on your left. The smaller key is for the mailbox. I left a copy of your lease there.” Her voice was low and soothing, with a musical lilt.

Art took the envelope. Outside a brisk wind had started. Rain blew across the parking lot in sheets. He crossed to the A building. The front door was propped open, the lobby piled with cardboard boxes marked BEDROOM, STUDY, KITCHEN. He spotted a hive of mailboxes and turned his key in the one marked 310. Inside was another green envelope.

As he stood waiting for the elevator, a man came through the door carrying another box. A young guy, big and red-haired, in a Boston College sweatshirt.

“Jesus,” he breathed, setting down the box. “I picked a great day to move.” He eyed the green envelope in Art’s hand. “You too?”

Art nodded.

The man offered his hand. “I guess we’re neighbors. Chuck Farrell.”

“Art Breen. Let me give you a hand.”

The elevator doors opened. Together they piled the boxes inside.

“That’s it, I guess,” said Chuck. “I don’t have much. I got kicked out of my house,” he said out the side of his mouth, like a comedian telling a secret.

“Me too,” said Art.

Chuck grinned sheepishly. “Lot of that going on. They call this place Divorce Court.” Again he offered his hand. “Thanks, man. I’ll see you around.”

“Good luck to you,” said Art, heading for the stairs.

Apartment 310 was on the third floor, halfway down a long hallway. The corridor was very dark, the carpet and wallpaper navy blue. Art turned his key in the lock.

He stepped into a large, empty living room. The blinds were closed, the carpet and walls an identical shade of beige.

He tore open the envelope in his hands. A sheaf of stapled papers, legal sized. Stuck to the top sheet was a yellow Post-it note, inscribed with feminine cursive, the sort of round, buoyant letters the nuns had deplored.

Rent paid through Oct. 1.

Six months? Art thought.

It was the first clue he’d been given about his future.

THAT AFTERNOON, desperate to escape the empty apartment, he drove around aimlessly. By habit or instinct he found himself in Grantham. To his relief, Ma’s Escort was gone from the carport. Well, of course: on Good Friday she’d be in church. Her parish, St. Dymphna’s, had a Passion service at three o’clock. Home alone, Ted McGann rarely answered the door.

He waited until dark before driving to the rectory. Upstairs in his bedroom, he unplugged the portable television, its screen the size of an index card. He filled a duffel bag with shaving gear, socks and underwear and a random selection of secular clothes: a few odd shirts, a single pair of blue jeans, a windbreaker emblazoned SACRED HEART BASKETBALL. He left behind a garish Hawaiian shirt and a closetful of black clericals, unsure when—or if—he’d wear them again.

Chapter 6

It’s time, now, to turn our attention to Aidan Conlon and his mother. It may seem strange that I have avoided speaking of them until now. I will admit that I find the subject difficult, as Art himself did. Three years ago, without warning, Art turned up on my doorstep in Philly; and late that night, over many glasses of wine, he spoke of them at length. His stammer, his flushed cheeks, unnerved me. He seemed uncomfortable and yet—I have to say it—strangely animated. It was an emotional state I had never sensed in him, a heated and fluttering excitement.

He’d met them in the spring, had been working in his office when Fran brought them by the rectory. Art described the scene so precisely, in such great detail, that I felt uneasy. I sensed that the particulars mattered tremendously, that this was a memory he had replayed many times.

It was a bright morning in April, unseasonably hot, the room filled with sunlight. He sat at his desk writing a letter to the regional school administrator, Monsignor Gerard Mooney—Father Money, as Art had come to think of him. In a few short weeks, the Confirmation class would be treated to a day at a local amusement park, a parish tradition. This year’s class was unusually large, and the cost of admission had increased. Experience had taught him the proper way to frame such requests: the stilted diction, the supplicating tone. To simplify matters on the day of the excursion, I ask that the funds be disbursed as soon as possible so that tickets might be purchased in advance, he concluded, a sentence he quickly deleted. Father Money moved at his own glacial pace and would not be hurried. An insistent tone was never acceptable, not if the church itself were on fire.

Hunched over his desk, Art butted a cigarette and lit another. He was aware of the hot breeze through the open window, the green smell of cut grass. That, at least, was good news: Joe Veltri had managed to get the old mower running, and petty cash would cover the gas and parts. A new tractor would have meant more begging, a longer and far more obsequious letter that would have taken all morning to compose.

He stared out the window feeling like a restless schoolboy, trapped in the classroom on the first, long-awaited day of spring. Fran had filled the feeder in the courtyard, and a flock of small birds—robins? wrens?—had descended, trilling rapidly. In one corner stood a waist-high statue of St. Francis, arms outstretched in welcome. Birds lit briefly on its hands and head. Art closed his eyes, feeling pleasantly drowsy. For a minute or two he drifted. He was roused by a sudden brutal squawking, an airy rush of wings.

Blinking, he saw that the courtyard had been invaded by seagulls, gray and white and insistently cawing. They were a chronic nuisance, persistent as pigeons, large as cats. Every few weeks Joe Veltri cleaned their droppings from St. Francis’s tonsured head.

“Fran?” Art called absently. “They’re back again.”

Then he went to the window and saw the cause of the commotion: a small, dark-haired boy stood in the courtyard with a bag of potato chips. He wore shorts and a Red Sox T-shirt and was, Art noted, the exact height of St. Francis. His expression was rapt, his eyes wide.

Art watched, fascinated, as the boy doled out the potato chips. The gulls swarmed around him, squawking madly: six, ten, a dozen, more. Finally the boy threw down his bag and backed away from the mass of shrieking birds. He looked both delighted and terrified.

Art was standing at the window when he heard a knock at the door.

“Father?” Fran opened the door a crack. “Can I bother you a minute?”

He turned. She stood in the doorway, a young woman behind her. “I’d like you to meet my daughter, Kathleen.”

Art blinked, confused. Fran had been at Sacred Heart longer than he had. He’d met her two sons, their wives and children; but she had never mentioned a daughter.

“Hey. Hi.” The girl was young and slight, half as wide as her mother. She wore tight blue jeans and an abbreviated pink T-shirt; a diamond stud twinkled in her navel. Her hair was dark at the roots, the ends streaked platinum blonde.

“She’s back from California,” Fran said.