Forbidden Sanctuary (4 page)

He strode quickly toward the rectory, crunching through the crisp snow. As usual, the sound seemed impossibly loud, and he thought: they are following me, matching their footsteps to mine. He wanted to look behind him. If he looked, they would not be there. If he didn't look, they would be there. That was how it was.

But if he looked (as he always did), and they weren't there (and they never were), then he would be a childish coward for giving in to such idiotic reasoning.

He looked. No one.

He sighed and went inside the rectory, double-locking the door behind him. He thrust the dirty parka onto the coatrack and made his way down the hall to the kitchen.

No good living alone, he thought as he made himself a cup of tea. That was the real problem: the big old house with just him in it. Not that he needed a wife, of course. What he needed was another priest. Someone to watch TV, have a beer with. Ed Finnegan, Charlie Connolly, Al Bernardi, any of them. All of them. The rectory had been built for four priests, but there hadn't been that many in it for half a century, probably, since the '50s, when they still had the school, the nuns, First Communion classes, May processions, the works. And now there was just him, saying a last-another-winter prayer over the furnace and going slightly crazy in the long, lonely evenings.

He snapped on the radio to exorcise his morbid thoughts. Not much luck. On the talk show they were discussing the aliens—there was no escaping them. The UN said they were leaving soon. Would they be coming back? Would any humans be going with them? Was the UN trying to hide something? No one had any answers, of course, but that didn't stop the questions.

And that was so very familiar: the old ladies clutching at him after Mass, calling him late at night, bursting into tears during confession. Are they going to destroy us, Father? Will they make us slaves, Father? Is this part of God's plan? What does this mean to our faith? They looked to him for guidance, and he had none to offer. Beneath the reassuring façade was bewilderment and, yes, fear. And while his parishioners had mostly gotten used to the fact of aliens in their midst, his own fear continued, and grew. There was so much people expected of you, and only so much you could do. If only—

The sound of the doorbell shattered his meditation. "Idiot, it's not the aliens," he muttered to himself, but his hand was shaking as he lowered his teacup to the table. He shut off the radio and hurried back down the hall to the front door.

Was he presentable? Fly zipped, collar straight? You forget these things sometimes when you live alone. The doorbell rang again. He opened the door a crack, leaving the chain on.

It was a woman, knitted cap pulled down over her forehead, looking cold and worried. "I'm sorry to disturb you, Father, but do you have a few minutes you could spare?"

He slid the chain and opened the door, then stepped back to let the woman in. It was only when she removed the cap that he recognized her. It was the
Woman from the Alien Study Team
, the
Woman with the Guard
. What did she want with him?

"Are we alone, Father?"

"Yes, yes. No one around here at night much. Won't you come in, uh, Ms.—"

"Summers. Angela Summers."

"Ms. Summers." Her features were thin, dark, vaguely Mediterranean. Her black hair was pulled back severely from her face. She could have been anywhere from thirty to forty-five; she had that antiseptic, ageless look of a professional scholar, or a nun. And she must be a scholar, of course, one of "them so-called experts" his housekeeper referred to. Beyond that—and the fact that she was obviously a devout Catholic—he knew nothing about her. "We can go into my office if you would like to, ah, talk."

"That would be fine."

His office was a mess, but the rest of the place was messier. It was a small room, cluttered with overdue bills and unread diocesan reports. On the mantel was a half-full bottle of sherry. Oh dear. Just a glass before dinner, but no one would believe him. "I'm sorry it's so chilly in here. Old heating system, you know."

"It's fine. Especially after walking up from the center of town."

"Oh, yes, certainly." What was she doing downtown? And where was her guard? "Please sit." He scooped yesterday's newspaper off a dusty wing-chair. She took off her coat and sat down, laying the coat on her lap.

She seemed quite nervous. That made two of them. She fiddled incessantly with her cap and avoided his gaze, obviously unable to begin. He sat down opposite her, and tried to help. "Well, Ms. Summers, what can I do for you?"

She looked up from her cap at him, and he knew she was judging him, trying to decide if this overweight, not very bright priest was the one to tell her problem to. As he squirmed under her gaze he suddenly found the right pigeonhole for her. Not a nun, but one of those fanatical lay-people who knew more about religion than he could ever hope to, the kind who come up to you after a decent homily and ask how you reconciled your position with Thessalonians 1:5 or something. And this, oddly enough, put him somewhat at ease, because, no matter how great their intellectual superiority, those people always had an implicit faith in priests. Direct channel to God and all that.

Finally she thrust her cap aside, leaned forward, and began. "The reason I'm so hesitant in starting, Father, is, well, I'm not supposed to be here. I'm on the Alien Study Team—you perhaps knew that—and we had to sign things when we joined, and I think I may be breaking a law by leaving the compound and telling you what I'm going to tell you. It's not easy for someone like me to break the law."

"Take your time," Father Gardner said uncomfortably. He had no desire to be involved in law-breaking himself.

"Well," she said. "I'm an interpreter—one of four people who speak the alien language. So I am involved with the aliens day in and day out. You know, I guess, how similar they are to us in many ways."

"I've read whatever the UN has put out, of course."

"Yes, well, there is another similarity.... Perhaps it would be easier if you just read." She fished in the handbag at her side and withdrew some carefully folded sheets of paper. She handed them to him.

He moved the junk around on his desk and found his glasses. He put them on, acutely aware of the intense gaze directed at him. It made him feel as if he were taking a test, and as soon as he was finished reading the teacher would start asking unanswerable questions. But there was no escape. He read.

It only took him a few minutes to finish, but he continued to gaze at the last page for a while afterward, trying to sort out his thoughts. Then he silently offered the sheets back to her.

"Keep them," she said. "I'm afraid to bring them back with me."

Reluctantly he held onto them.

"What do you think?" she asked.

He wished Al Bernardi were here, Al would be able to handle this. He certainly couldn't. "Well," he replied slowly, "there is a religion on—on—"

"Numos."

"—on Numos which is sort of like early Christianity." He paused.

"Yes, of course," she said. "But what can we do about it?"

He looked at her blankly. First unanswerable question. "What do you mean?"

She reached for her cap and crumpled it impatiently. "I mean: the followers of Chitlan are being persecuted. Their religion is in danger of being snuffed out. One of his followers asks for our help. Shouldn't we give it to them?"

"But how can we help?" he asked, exasperated. "And why should we? Just because this religion is
like
Christianity doesn't mean it
is
Christianity."

Angela abruptly tossed her coat and cap onto the floor and stood up. She turned to look out the window behind her at the mounds of snow and the dark outline of the church beyond. She's trying to control herself, he thought. She's reminding herself that I'm a priest and therefore worthy of respect.

She turned back to him finally but remained standing. "What you say is true," she said, obviously straining to be calm. "But I think we have an obligation to find out more about it. On another planet, among another race of beings, a religion develops in a way that is startlingly similar to Christianity. Isn't it possible that this is more than a coincidence—that Christ brings His hope of salvation to every intelligent race in the Universe? Isn't it possible that the Numoi finding our planet, and Tenon finding
me
are more than just coincidences? Tenon called it
vomurd,
a coincidence that is part of a pattern. You see, I think that God is giving us an opportunity here, to save a new religion and revive an old one. Because if we discover that their faith is identical to ours, then it will help Christianity as much as it will help the followers of Chitlan."

Father Gardner looked at her helplessly. "You may be right. I have no idea. But I still don't know what you want from me."

She sat back down. "I think we—the Catholic Church—must do what Tenon asks of us. We must put pressure on the UN to make religious freedom on Numos a condition for further discussion with the aliens."

"But that's impossible. Even supposing Catholic pressure would have any effect, only the Pope could speak for the Church."

"That is why I have come to you," Angela said simply. "I want you to help me get in touch with the Pope."

Father Gardner leaned back in his chair and stifled a sigh. Lay people never understood. They assumed if you were a priest you knew every other priest, and a few bishops and cardinals besides.
This is Ed Gardner from Most Precious Blood in Greenough. Massachusetts. Would you put me through to his Holiness?
Thanks a lot. Couldn't she see he was just an anonymous priest in a decaying parish, unknown outside the diocese and only vaguely recalled within it? How in the world could she expect him to—

With a start he realized that that wasn't true, not exactly. He knew Al Bernardi. And Al had gone to school with—what was his name? Collingwood? The Pope's personal secretary, at any rate. Al had a couple of funny stories he told about that fellow. Yes, it was possible, he supposed, somehow or other.

And that made him more nervous than ever, because if he really could help her, then that meant he had to make a decision. He could hear Al's big booming laugh over the receiver:
she says what? you want me to what?
Damn it, why was this his problem? Why couldn't the aliens have landed in Japan, or Nicaragua, or Vatican City? Why did
he
have to decide?

"Look," Angela said, leaning close to him, "I don't know what you can do for me. Probably nothing. I came here because I didn't know what else I could do. I just knew I wouldn't be able to live with myself if I didn't do anything. The Church is dying, we both can see that. There are no more vocations, no more schools. People don't want a religion that's against all the trendy things: abortion, birth control, casual sex. What future do we have? The Pope himself certainly doesn't seem to know. But here we may possess the ultimate argument in our favor: the proof that our religion is true. Can we afford to just forget about it? Oh, I grant you these notes give us very little. But isn't that all the more reason we should try to study Chitlan's religion—to see how far the similarities go? And if they go far enough, maybe the world will finally be convinced."

Her intensity smothered him. Suddenly, in the chilly house, he was sweating. Perhaps the short chain of acquaintances that led him to the Pope was another in her pattern of coincidences. Perhaps he was a minor but necessary part in the working out of some immense cosmic plan.

Perhaps she was right: it might all be pointless, but how could you stand to do nothing?

He found himself praying, an activity that usually did not come very easily. And when he had finished he wondered why the decision had been so hard. "Let me make a call," he said, "and then we'll see."

* * *

"Al, this is Ed Gardner."

"Hey Ed, how's it going? Any of the aliens join your parish yet?"

"Listen, Al. I've got to talk to you about something pretty important. Could you come over right away?"

"Oh Ed, hey, I'd love to, but I'm
really
busy. And besides..."

"It's about these aliens, Al. I wouldn't ask you if it wasn't urgent."

"Jeez, you sound serious. Can't you spill it over the phone?"

"Not really, Al. Please."

"Well, okay. Give me a few minutes—I'll have to steal a car somewhere."

"Thanks. Thanks a lot, Al."

* * *

Father Bernardi strode in twenty minutes later, wearing a Russian hat and flopping overshoes. "Better be good, Ed," he warned as he flung his hat and overcoat onto the coatrack. "I had to pull rank on one of the scholastics to get the car. Good Lord, what if he leaves the order because of it? He's a quarter of the Jesuits' future in the New England Province."

"You be the judge, Al." Father Gardner took him to the office, where Angela sat sipping a cup of tea. "This is Angela Summers. She has a story to tell you."

Father Bernardi sprawled in a chair and listened, then read, then listened some more. "Fascinating," he murmured finally as the other two sat awaiting his verdict. "Probably a hundred different ways of explaining it, of course, if you're an anthropologist or something. All depends on the premises you start with. You want the Pope to push it from Catholic premises?"