Sons (2 page)

When Jan didn’t move to answer the intruding bell, Kevin sighed.

“I’ll get it,” he said.

Heaving himself out of the chaise lounge, he jogged across the terrace and through the open double doors. Jan could hear Kevin as he spoke to the caller.

“What! No, no—do nothing! Le seigneur will be there right away.”

Kevin returned, slightly out of breath.

“What’s going on?” Jan asked.

“Big trouble. There’s a bulldozer about to raze the Chapel of the Transfiguration, and a crowd of protesters is blocking the way! The cardinal called the police. He wants the mob dispersed so the demolition can proceed. He’s on his way there now. That was Father Malreve from Saint Sebastian’s on the phone. He’s going down, and he wants you there too. I think the chaplain is making a speech. You know the French!”

“Well, if we can get one more priest to show up we can baptize a jackass,” Jan said sarcastically. “I knew this was going to be a problem as soon as I heard the rumor.”

“You know, sometimes you can be a real prick,” Kevin complained.

“Flatterer. All right, go get the car. I’ll change into my shining armor just for you.”

Situated smack in the middle of four hundred ninety-six acres of prime bottomland, stretching in a narrow band along the banks of the slow moving Rhône River, the Chapel of the Transfiguration was considered the soul, if not the heart, of the village. Farmers had planted wheat, barley, and lavender on this ground for hundreds of years. To the north and west, the land was bounded by church property. The Monastery of Saint Sebastian and a sliver of Jan’s estate shared the southern line. The only paved road cut across Jan’s portion. Built not long after the Roman Empire imploded, the chapel was a provincial, some might say ugly, attempt at recalling the architecture of a defunct order. Unlike churches of later design, the interior of the church was unadorned, while multicolored mosaics depicting the life of Jesus and the promise of a glorious afterlife clad its four exterior walls. The front wall featured adoring apostles surrounding the resurrected Christ. After nearly two millennia, it retained much of its original brilliance.

To the chagrin of the local cardinal, busloads of savvy tourists regularly siphoned themselves from the glitzy Arles Cathedral to see the village’s rare art treasure.

When they arrived at the site, Jan and Kevin saw a demolition crew of twelve beefy men arguing with an equal number of hysterical townsfolk. The chaplain stood in the church’s doorway defying anyone to move him. The milling mob, added to the heavy morning dew, made the usually hard packed dirt soft and muddy.

Jacques Malreve, the father abbot of Saint Sebastian’s, had pulled the village leader aside and was attempting to get her, and her followers, to leave before the police arrived and arrests were made.

Jan and the abbot had been friends since Jan was eighteen. Père Malreve was still as chubby as the day Jan had met him. Patting his stomach, Jacques would say, “It’s my one weakness… well, perhaps not the only one.”

“Jacques, you’re just making up for what His Arrogance doesn’t eat,” Jan would joke.

“Jan! I wish you would stop calling the cardinal that! The man is anointed of the Lord, a priest, according to the Order of Melchizedek. Come Judgment Day, you will be sorry,” the monk warned with a wagging finger.

“Well if
Cardinal Cock Robin
allows Jesus to be my judge, I’ll have nothing to worry about,” was Jan’s standard reply.

Jacques usually replied by putting his head in his hands and mumbling something about praying for Jan. In Jan’s estimation, a better person than Jacques had never lived.

The cardinal, on the other hand, was a high-handed, mean man. When Tim’s body arrived in Arles to rest in the tomb of the Lords of Guyencourt, the cardinal made a loud and public objection. “Homosexuals have no place among the nobles of France,” he opined.

The cardinal’s rant sparked a deep, abiding dislike of the prelate in Jan. Over the years, the two men quarreled
openly. Jan hated these episodes because they produced nothing but more ill will—something very much out of his character.

“Okay, okay, Jacques. I’ll be more respectful of the Lord’s anointed.” It was a promise Jan never kept.

Jan shook off the remembered conversations. Handing his briefcase to Kevin, he said, “Hold on to this and wait here. I may need you.”

Leaving Kevin in the car, Jan walked to where Jacques stood. The crowd got louder. Juliet Dufort, the village representative, moved off to confer with her fellow protesters.

Jan caught the abbot’s eye as he approached. “Jacques, how nice of you to invite me to the party!”

Jan looked around for his nemesis. “Where’s His Arrogance?” he asked acidly.

“My Lord Cardinal!” Between clenched teeth, the abbot said, “Jan, you promised to stop calling him that.” Then, sotto voce, “He is right behind you, Jan. Please, help us!”

Jan turned and beamed a smile any car salesman would envy, his hand extended in a friendship he didn’t feel. “Ah, Your Eminence!”

A gaunt man clothed in red silk moiré from nose to hose stood glaring at Jan. His billowing red cape and matching skullcap proclaimed Alphonse Paré de Breton as a Prince of the Church. If not for occasional movement and speech, he could have served as a cadaver for an anatomy class. Many said his emaciated look was due to his holy fasting. Jan’s take was that good food refused to digest in his sour stomach.

Ignoring Jan’s outstretched hand, the cardinal said, “Monsieur Phillips, the salutation for a cardinal changed some time ago. Please address me as, ‘My Lord Cardinal’.”

Jan made a deep bow.

“And since I am the lord of the Chateau Coeur d’Alène, you, My Lord Cardinal, may address me as le seigneur. You may as well, everyone else does.”

“I will do no such thing!” snapped the cardinal. “Have you come here to add your sarcasm to this chaos? I phoned the police and demanded they clear away this rabble. It would be wiser for you to leave now and avoid arrest.”

Looking around with the hauteur only one confidant God is on his side can muster, the prelate pointed toward the chapel.

“That,” he sneered, “and all the surrounding land is the
Church’s property. It belongs to the Diocese of Arles, not to these villagers, and certainly not to you! Holy Mother Church has decided to put it to better use—for the benefit of all, I mean.”

“I don’t suppose the cathedral’s loss in tourist Euros has anything to do with Holy Mother’s recent interest toward land reform,” Jan said.

“I warn you, monsieur, you place your immortal soul in peril by impugning the purity of our intentions.”

“Ha!” Jan scoffed. “I place my soul’s safety in
God’s
hands. Somehow, I feel it’s safer with Him. You understand. By the way, where is Monsieur le Maire and his cadre of gendarmes? I thought…. Oh! There they are.”

Jan waved mockingly at an unmarked van parked under a naked chestnut tree. The mayor slid low in the front seat, obviously wanting no part of this mêlée.

“They are keeping a safe distance at my request. Of course we hope force will not be needed,” the cardinal said.

“He’s more likely afraid of a bolt lightning,” Jan mumbled.

“What did you say, monsieur?”

“Nothing,” Jan lied. “Look, Eminence, why do you want…? Uh, no, let me rephrase, what plans has our Holy Mother for this property? It isn’t as if the cathedral hasn’t enough land already.”

The cardinal ignored the repeated slight, yet his face flushed with rising anger. “I do not need to justify Holy Mother’s decisions to you! However, because of your generosity to the Church in the past, I will tell you that we have a gentleman’s agreement of sale, on condition that we remove the chapel. It is that simple. We need the money, and the community will benefit from the income derived from the sale, as will the Church.”

Jan eyed the old man with a knowing look and shook his head at what he knew was a lie.

“Lose again at
chemin de fer
in Monte Carlo? Hmm…?” Jan mocked.

“Monsieur! If that was an attempt at humor, it failed.”

Ignoring the cardinal’s fury, Jan said, “Well, if your prospective buyer is a devout Catholic, as so many of the French are, I can see why he would be reluctant to pull down God’s house by himself. It seems appropriate that he should turn to your Eminence to get the job done.”

Jan thought the skinny old man was going to have a conniption. The cardinal’s face turned as scarlet as his hat.

Before the cleric could regain his composure, Jan added, “I have a proposal that may suit us all.”

He looked at the cardinal for a sign of compromise. “Shall I proceed, or do you prefer to prolong this charade?”

By now, the mayor, a balding, rotund man of fifty or so years, had extracted himself from the police van and joined them. He nodded to Jan but did not offer his hand. He seemed unsure whether, under these circumstances, Jan was friend or foe.

Jan motioned to Kevin to join them and whispered in his ear, “Bring me my briefcase, please. I’ll need you to stand by too.”

Taking the cardinal and the mayor by the elbow, Jan led them to a nest of unoccupied picnic tables and chairs. Safely out of the mob’s earshot, Jan asked, “Has the prospective buyer signed anything in the way of a contract for this land?”

“How do you know about this?” the mayor snapped.

“I told him,” said the cardinal.

The mayor immediately backed down like a dog with the spirit whipped out of him.

“As of now, there is no contract,” replied the cardinal. “The buyer refuses to sign anything as long as the chapel remains.”

“I see,” Jan said. “Well, Eminence, how much is he willing to pay for the land once the church is gone?”

“That is between the Church and the buyer! It is no concern of yours,” the cardinal said imperiously. A hint of color returned to his cheeks.

Jan turned toward the mayor and narrowed his eyes. “How much?”

Prelate and mayor shifted uncomfortably. The cardinal gave the mayor a warning look.

“How much!” demanded Jan, raising his voice.

The mayor owed his position as much to Jan as to the cardinal. Frightened, he looked to the clergyman and then to Jan, unsure which was master of the situation. Finally, he murmured, “A half million Euros.”

Jan whistled his surprise.

“A tidy sum, and how much do you, Monsieur le Mayor, get for supporting this bit of larceny?” Jan said.

The mayor leapt from his chair in righteous indignation.

“Larceny! That is a legal term! A criminal term!”

Jan offered a sardonic smile. “Yes, Monsieur, I am, after all, a lawyer. I also know the duke ceded this ground to the town of Christ a Amélioré in 1750.”

“The City of Arles annexed this land forty years ago. The village has no claim to it!” shouted the mayor defensively.

Ignoring the man’s outburst, Jan said in a calm even tone, “What I propose, gentlemen, if I may use the term, is this: I will buy the land and the chapel as it stands today, for the sum of seven hundred thousand Euros.”

The cardinal and the mayor exchanged glances. Jan could almost hear the sound of cash registers ringing in their greedy heads.

“Well?” Jan said. “Do you accept my offer?”

The cardinal spun the amethyst ring he wore on his right hand. He looked out over the river and said, “I will consult with the parish council, but I’m sure there will be no obstacle.”

The three men stood in a close knot. The cardinal nodded and offered his hand, as did the mayor, sealing the bargain. Jan wondered if there was enough holy water in the chapel font to wash his hands. It would take the sanctified liquid to remove the unclean feeling he now felt.

Jan motioned for Kevin to bring the briefcase and join them.

“Let’s just write a little contract now, and our attorneys can pretty it up later,” Jan said.

Kevin handed Jan a blank sheet of paper, and he quickly jotted down the terms of their agreement. The cardinal signed below Jan’s name. Kevin and the mayor signed as the witnesses.

The cardinal walked a short distance and lifted his arms, quieting the angry mob.

“You may all return home now,” he told the villagers. “It is concluded. God’s light has shown us what to do here. There will be no destruction of the chapel.”

A shout went up from the villagers as they congratulated themselves for preventing a disaster.

“What about my crew?” the demolition foreman shouted. “Is the Church going to pay for our time?”

The cardinal looked at Jan.

Jan nodded.

The priest drew his scarlet cape around himself. Mustering feigned humility, he made a slight bow toward Jan and spoke to the workmen. “Le seigneur is responsible for your fee. Apply to him for payment.”

The mayor, wishing to make a quick exit away from the situation, had already left the churchyard. The cardinal, his cape billowing like a red sail, was right on the mayor’s heels.

Jacques Malreve hurried to Jan’s side.

“Jan? What does this mean?”

“It means, Jacques, my old friend, that the church will stand, and I’m even more land poor than I was this morning.”

“You purchased the chapel?”

“It would appear so.” Jan sighed. “I’ve no idea what I’m going to do with it!”

“My son, God will reward you in more than this!” the old man said, wringing Jan’s hand.

“Mon père, it is nothing. I must go now. We will meet again before I leave.”

“Leave? You are going away so soon? You only just arrived!”

“Yes, I’m going to Paris for a few days on business, then on to the states. Michael is in China. He’ll return home to Philadelphia soon, and I want to be there. We’ve been apart too long,” Jan said.

“As always, Saint Sebastian’s will miss you. May I light a candle for you, my son?”

“Make it two, okay? One for me, and one for Michael.”

“You know, Jan, Saint Michael’s obedience to God made him the first saint in heaven. You love this man?”

Jan smiled. “He’s my very heartbeat.”

“Then I’ll light two candles,” Jacques said, smiling. “Oh, Jan, umm, before you leave, please come to the monastery… at six o’clock tomorrow morning? I have something important to discuss with you.”