Notorious (48 page)

‘Paradise,’ said the Monsignor sharply. ‘I hope you are not presuming . . . ’ His voice ran away like water, as though her arrogance was too much for him.

She rounded her shoulders further. ‘Never, Monsignor.’

He was staring at her intently. She saw the black sandals made of finest Italian leather, the solid gold buckles, the robes spreading like a dark stain across the tiles. She imagined the flesh spilling away beneath. These greedy men, she thought. Always less to them than meets the eye.

The faint creak of the fountain wheel ground into the silence. ‘Good,’ said the Monsignor. His hands were curled into fists on his knees. ‘We are here for your well-being, child.’

She half-bowed and said, ‘May I offer you mint tea? Grapes and dates?’ He waved his hand dismissively. ‘And your colleague?’ She turned to the other man, who was still standing.

‘Laforche will have nothing,’ said the Monsignor. ‘We will not be long.’ The small man gave her a smile which turned in on itself at the corners. He bowed again, sardonically, and sat, putting his hat under his chair.

The Monsignor cleared his throat, a sound which made her think of rotting leaves in muddy water. ‘Our paths may not often intersect,’ he said, ‘but everyone at the Papal Office watches over our hardworking brothers and sisters at the Mission.’

‘Of course, Monsignor,’ she said. She placed the fingers of her left hand on her cross, felt the reassuring roughness of the wood. The fine splinters pricked her skin. She pressed in. She said, ‘I know that Ville Nouvelle is a long walk from Quartier Negro.’

The dark coin reappeared in his face. ‘Your behaviour . . . ’ His words boomed across the tiles. Laforche raised his eyebrow. The Monsignor frowned, gathered his voice, as though catching mud in a sieve. ‘We are worried about you, Sister. Your health – ’ he gestured at her misshapen hands – ‘is not helped by the extra duties you have taken on.’

She lifted her head.

‘Succouring the local women,’ said the Monsignor. ‘Clearly a toll on you.’

‘Is the Church displeased?’

Laforche smiled. The dark coin in the Monsignor’s face became a falling crescent. ‘Of course not. But boundaries must be kept. For your own good.’

She waited. Laforche examined his nails. She saw they were polished; manicured professionally. A gold bracelet slid down beneath the starched cuffs, past the mother-of-pearl cuff links. He pushed it back, saw she was watching him and raised his eyebrow again.

She said to the Monsignor, ‘I would not disappoint the Fathers.’

‘Your way of dress offends,’ he said. ‘This robe and headscarf, not the veil and surplice. This shroud the local women wear.’

‘The djellabah,’ she said. ‘It gives me protection.’

‘Your habit should be enough protection.’

‘Sometimes it is not.’

He breathed heavily through his nose but said, mildly enough, ‘And the markings on your hands? There is no adornment before God.’

She looked at his gold buckles. ‘I won’t accept money from the local women. So they pay me with small gifts, services.’

He stared at the intricate circles and dotted stars etched on her wrists, the blue crosses on her knuckles. ‘You cannot be inked like a native.’

‘Are you telling me not to help them?’

‘Our duty is not to encourage the more backward superstitions.’

She spread her hands. ‘What can I do, Monsignor, if the women keep coming? They think I have luck with finding things. Small things, yes, but valued. I cannot turn them away. That would not be Christian.’

‘Yes,’ said the Monsignor. ‘Well.’

‘The Arab women will not come to the Church,’ said Agnieska gently. ‘Not after the revelations of Father Thomas’s visits to Quartier Rouge.’

There was a small sound. Laforche’s face was impassive. But she was sure he had sniggered. She wondered what he was thinking. The trickling water seemed louder – steel pins in the throat of God – drops here and there struck the wet air in hard blows. She saw a faint black shadow at the base of the cherub. The turtle with the scarred shell peered out. She could see its dark eyes, the small bubble at its mouth. One of her flock.

The Monsignor’s flesh had finally escaped him. His robe slid over the stone rim into the water. A damp stain climbed steadily towards the red silk sash around his middle.

‘It is still not known,’ said the Monsignor sharply, ‘how the Father’s visits – ’ He stopped, blew out his cheeks so they were shiny balls pricked with red. ‘It seems strange that the Prefect was misdirected to that street at the very same hour.’

‘It must have been God’s will,’ said Laforche.

‘Don’t be sarcastic, Laforche,’ said the Monsignor, and for a moment the harsh flat vowels of the Bronx sawed beneath the phlegm. ‘And now this,’ he said to Agnieska. ‘Your remarkable ability to find these things: a lost chicken, stolen clothing.’

Agnieska bowed her head. He must know, she thought. These ambitious public men always had minds like accountants.

But he said, ‘I hope you do not think you are special in some way?’

She shook her head.

‘Yet you set out to embarrass the Church?’

‘No, Monsignor.’ Her surprise was genuine.

‘You give money, shoes, to the orphans in Quartier Negro.’

‘Yes, but – ’

‘Why should we not think that you consider yourself above us? You no longer carry the Word. You have no Bible in your room. That alone could see you dismissed from the Church.’

She raised her head. At last, they had reached the heart of the matter. Had cut into the heart of the cactus. She looked at Laforche. She wondered whether he had been the one to rifle through her belongings. She said, ‘I sold the book which tells me to sell everything and give money to the poor. So I gave the money to the poor.’

The Monsignor stared. Red rose in waves from his white jowls.

‘Jesus walked out into the desert,’ said Agnieska. ‘He surrendered in the tradition of the desert fathers. He reduced himself to absolute poverty, made himself as blank as the desert, as the unwritten page.’

‘How dare you lecture me,’ said the Monsignor, his voice breaking up into choppy waves which became part of the loud rushing in her ears. But she forced herself to look at him and saw the sun had shifted; the shadows on his face had gone. She thought, Finally, you have come into the light.

She said, ‘Jesus’s body was his text and his visions in the desert were written on his body and in his heart. He became the living book. The only book that matters.’

‘The Holy Book was not yours to give away, Sister,’ said the Monsignor loudly.

Agnieska looked up to the sky; chalk marks smeared the flat sheet of blue. She bowed her head. She saw the crosses inscribed in the tiles in the floor. She was compelled to go on. ‘In trying to be different I have become myself.’ His knuckles were white on his knees. She said, ‘I must shed my old identity.’

‘You can’t dispense what the Church decides,’ said the Monsignor, his voice swelling.

‘Saint Antony went into the desert and built the first great community – ’

‘There are protocols – ’

‘I cannot accomplish what I need to accomplish – ’

‘Devil talk,’ shouted the Monsignor. He heaved himself to his feet. ‘Devil talk.’

Blue shadows fell over the courtyard. Now the rushing water sounded like hummingbird wings in mist. Days I have held, she thought. Days I have lost.

‘Know this, Sister,’ said the Monsignor, beginning in a near bellow but quickly reining his voice in, so the noise descended like piano scales. ‘Some say you have been given a gris-gris by these local women. So you are compelled to give away everything you own.’ He raised a finger. ‘Possessed.’

Behind him, Laforche frowned.

‘Possession,’ said the Monsignor. ‘The only known cure is exorcism.’

‘Dangerous,’ said Laforche, standing up. ‘The Van Kleipers tragedy, still in the news – ’

‘Silence!’ shouted the Monsignor.

Agnieska shook her head at Laforche and said, ‘I want to be known as Sister Antony.’ When there was no sound from the Monsignor, she got up, slowly. They faced each other, she the taller by half a head, he oblivious to the wet robe clinging to his bowed and meaty thigh.

She wondered how he saw her, whether he ever pondered what she was like under her robe, whether he imagined her body. She couldn’t believe that the black cloth cut off all imaginings. She wondered whether secretly it sent them crazy – these men who thought they ruled the world – this act of denial, of refusing to be viewed. Whether they hated the women who denied them, the way they hated the desert when the dust storms rose. Maybe wearing the robe, the shroud, was power of a sort. A refusal to interact.

She clasped her hands before her. ‘I will be sure to apologise for my blasphemy,’ she said. ‘To Rome.’

The Monsignor gripped his ring. ‘Don’t even think of threatening me.’

‘And to my family.’

‘You gave yourself over to the Church. Your family cannot interfere in our decisions.’

‘I’m sure they would feel it necessary to inform His Holiness.’

The wheel creaked in the silence. The Monsignor became aware of his wet skirt. He slapped at his leg, sending water drops flying. He straightened. ‘You have ambitions. Why should the Church indulge them?’

She bowed her head. ‘I am happy to stay here, working – ’

He held up a hand. ‘Don’t bullshit me. You think you can do better. But there is no mission available. Fès, Rabat, Taghourit are taken.’

‘I had hoped for a small – ’

‘No,’ said the Monsignor. He stretched out his hand, admired the falling planes of light caught in the ruby.

‘May I make a suggestion?’ said Laforche. ‘There is a derelict fort, a retreat for unfortunates, out past the Kabir plateau. A near ruin, early Islamic, maybe the Almoravids, but it has been occupied by the Spanish and French at one time or another. Now the Church has title.’ He bowed apologetically to Agnieska. ‘It is very isolated.’

‘Isolated,’ said the Monsignor.

‘Isolated,’ said Agnieska. She tightened the scarf across her face, withdrawing into its shadow. She thought of the way the turtle in the fountain withdrew into its shell. She tried not to smile. ‘Oh dear.’

‘I am sure it is possible for supplies to reach you regularly,’ said Laforche. ‘There has been talk of making the fort a rehabilitation centre. The King is very appreciative of our Casablanca drug clinic.’

‘Such a long way,’ said Agnieska, sighing into her scarf.

The Monsignor stared at her. ‘I think I will think about this. It is far, you said?’

‘Very,’ said Laforche.

Agnieska sighed again.

‘Yes, well,’ said the Monsignor. ‘We all make sacrifices.’ He gathered up a fold of his black skirt and rubbed the ruby with it, watching Agnieska with unblinking eyes. She thought it was taking all his strength not to rip the scarf from her face. ‘Perhaps you will fail,’ he said. ‘The times are in love with endings.’

‘Maybe I should stay here,’ said Agnieska. ‘To learn more.’

‘The Church doesn’t take kindly to masqueraders,’ said the Monsignor. ‘Those without a clear conscience.’

‘A clear conscience is usually the sign of a bad memory,’ said Agnieska. She saw Laforche wince.

‘You should learn humility,’ said the Monsignor.

‘You can teach me, Monsignor.’ She stepped forward and dropped to her knees. He gasped and backed away from her but was trapped by the rim of the fountain. She raised her palms. His toes curled in his sandals.

She said, ‘I know I have sinned. I should pay public penance. Saint John of the Cross was imprisoned for nine months – ’

‘I hardly think – ’ said the Monsignor.

‘Nine months in a cell with no room to stand up.’

The Monsignor dragged his sleeve across his flushed cheeks.

Agnieska said, ‘I am not worthy. Maybe an iron box. In front of the Grande Mosque.’

‘Enough,’ shouted the Monsignor.

Agnieska said, ‘Others could join me.’

He stared at her, breathing heavily. A thin hard word escaped through the rattling air. ‘Mad,’ he said. ‘Mad.’ He gathered his skirts and pushed past her.

She looked out of the corner of her eye. The Monsignor jerked his head at Laforche and turned. Laforche raised a forefinger at her and said loudly, ‘You are a dangerous fanatic.’

She stayed where she was, hands clasped.

As the Monsignor stepped through the doorway, she heard him say, ‘What is the place called again?’

‘Abu N’af,’ said Laforche. ‘The Asylum at Abu N’af.’

Agnieska stood on the chair and looked over the courtyard wall and down to the street. There was a small café on the corner, a few chairs and tables on the pavement, lunch just being served. The smell of spiced chicken and roasted dates and thick silted coffee wafted up.

The Sicilian was sitting with his back to the wall, directly opposite the entrance to her building. After a moment, the Monsignor walked past, taking short angry steps, smoking a cigarette, his hand moving back and forth, pummelling the air. The Sicilian did not move. There was no recognition that she could see, no glances between the two men.

Agnieska rested her chin on the hot stone. The flies were easier up here and she lifted her face. The smeared blue was giving way to an uncertain white, the sky breaking up into torn paper.

The noon prayers began. She closed her eyes against the sun. Always music here, she thought, always a celebration of God. It should be enough but it wasn’t.

The soothing repetitious phrases undulated through the bright air, climbing and falling, washing over the stone rooftops and patios, rooms within rooms, houses designed like puzzle boxes. Everything was designed to shut out the light: the narrow alleys, stairways, the material draped across doors and windows, the sheets hung over beds. Yet the rooms were never truly dark.

She opened her eyes and looked beyond the city, beyond the mountains, to the Western Sahara swathed in its blue veils. She remembered flying across the desert, low against the saffron moon. She flew over dark and jagged peaks, descended to the granite ground. She saw women walking in the shadows of their burdens, holy men moving backwards against the wind, their robes lifting as though plucked like flowers
.
I flew into the eternal silence, she thought. Landing, the plane’s vibrations merged with the rising heat. Night and day were reversed here: night was solace in the desert, the bright day deadly.