The Judgment (5 page)

We went to the back of the house. The large rear room had probably been a meeting room for the priests, a recreation room. But it had been converted to look like a kind of lodge, with the furniture looking like something taken from a north-woods cabin, comfortable but masculine. Guns and tackle lined the pine-paneled walls. There were several mounted deer heads with polished antlers. A large muskie and several bass had been preserved on the walls as trophies.

“This is my room,” he said. “Of course, it makes no difference. They’re all my rooms since I’m alone here. I have a housekeeper who comes in twice a week to
straighten up, but that’s it. This place used to have a pastor and four associate priests, plus a permanent housekeeper and cook. But no more. I’m the only one living in this mausoleum now. Would you like a drink?”

“No, thanks,” I responded. He had no way of knowing that I was a member of the club, and it didn’t seem to me that he needed to know. Besides, it’s one of the things we learn early on. You don’t have to blurt it out anytime anyone offers you a drink.

“Do you mind if I do?” he asked.

“Not at all,” I said, thinking back to when I was a kid and my friends who were altar boys would always make jokes about some of the priests who really got into knocking back the wine during Mass. I wondered if they, like me, had ended up in AA, too. Father Chuck, though, didn’t look like a boozer to me. He was so robust and appeared to be in terrific physical shape. He walked to a polished mahogany cabinet and opened it to reveal a number of decanters and ornate glasses. After filling his glass, he gestured for me to sit down and took a chair across from me. Again, the dazzling smile helped to light up the room, and I noticed that his brilliant green eyes were filled with a keen intelligence.

“I understand that my dear friend and colleague Bishop Solar has told you about my difficulty,” he said. Straightforward. To the point. No nonsense.

“He did, but I’d like to get your version.”

“Sure. There’s not a lot to tell. We don’t have a school anymore, so there isn’t much we can offer Catholic kids in the way of social life. I have a teen club that meets here once a month. It’s not just for Catholics. Everyone is welcome.”

He sipped the drink. “Anyway, Sam Evans came by and asked if he could attend. I said we’d be delighted to have him. It’s not much of a crowd, maybe eight to ten kids on a good night. Anyway, Sam showed up, stayed awhile, and then left.”

“Did he talk to anyone when he was here?”

“Not that I saw. He’s a strange kid, painfully shy, or so I thought.”

“Did you talk to him, or were you alone with him anytime during the night?”

“No. Oh, I said hello and introduced him to the others, but other than that, nothing.”

“Go on.”

“The next thing I know, I get a visit from a policewoman.”

“That would have been Sue Gillis.”

The smile broadened. “Yes. Quite a gal, frankly. We take a vow of chastity, but we still look, if you take my meaning.”

I did, and I didn’t like it.

“She told me that the Evans kid accused me of ‘fondling him,’ of grabbing his penis. Frankly, when I heard that, I was shocked. But all I could do was tell her essentially what I’m telling you. That nothing happened. I don’t know whether she believed me or not. Her professional manner is fairly inscrutable. But she continued her investigation, talked to Sam’s parents, his former teachers, and so forth. Then the kid admitted he had been lying.”

“I’d think you’d have been downgraded to a maker of illicit proposals.”

“Well, I didn’t do that, either,” Father Chuck said rather defensively. “As I told her, and have told you already, I wasn’t alone with him at all. So nothing could’ve been said without all the others hearing.”

“Cool your jets, Father. I’m here to help. I understand you’ve heard from the Evans family about this recently.”

“Yes.” He sounded quite glum. “Just last week Sam’s father telephoned me and said they were considering suing me for sexually abusing Sam. But he hinted that they might forget everything for the right sum.”

“And how did you respond?”

He chuckled. “If I weren’t a priest, I would have told him to go fuck himself.” He laughed like a bad little boy who had said something shocking. “Didn’t expect to hear
that from a priest, did you? Listen, we hear more salty language in the confessional than a drug dealer does out in the street. Sometimes I’m tempted to let loose with it, but don’t worry, I didn’t say anything like that to Evans. I just told him I’d have to contact my bishop, and that the bishop’s office would get in touch. I’ve heard nothing since, Mr. Sloan.”

“Call me Charley. Please. Everyone does.”

“Sure, Charley.”

“I’ll talk to the parents,” I said. “I doubt you’ll have any trouble from them.”

“A tough lawyer, are you?”

“No. But I think I can be persuasive.”

He laughed. “I’ll bet you can. Tell me, Charley, are you Catholic?”

“Lapsed,” I said.

He nodded. “So many are nowadays. Ever think about coming back?”

This time I laughed. “Not seriously, no.”

“Don’t be alarmed,” he said, grinning. “The subject is closed. If you ever change your mind, let me know.”

“I appreciate it,” I said. And I really did, because I thought he was a true believer and not a holier-than-thou type at all. Over time, a number of well-intentioned people have tried to lure me back into the fold, even one of my ex-wives, but I never thought of her as being exactly well intentioned. All she wanted was to be married at St. Lucy’s in a high-class, High Mass ceremony, replete with all the mumbo jumbo.

“Are you a hunter, or a fisherman?” asked Father Chuck, changing the subject and sensing accurately that I would be more comfortable if he did.

“Not recently, but I can see that you are,” I said, pointing to the antlers, the deer heads, the guns, and the tackle on the walls.

“I used to enjoy fishing and hunting a great deal as a hobby, but these days there isn’t much time for it. This is a needy parish, filled with needy people, and I try to give
them almost all of my time. It’s part of the job description, you know,” he said with a laugh. “Sometimes, not very often, I do a little skeet shooting out back, but I don’t think the Big Guy upstairs would like it too much if I paid less attention to my parishioners because I was skeet shooting or fishing.”

“I understand.” I nodded. “But aren’t you afraid of having these guns around when there are teenagers in the place?”

“Not at all, Charley. You have to understand that this is my haven, my
sanctum sanctorum
, if you will. And this room is always securely locked when I’m not here or if I’m expecting visitors. When you’re a priest, you learn how to be cautious. You have to be because you’ve been given the charge of taking care of people and looking after them.”

“What do your neighbors think about the skeet shooting?”

He laughed. “I have no neighbors, Charley. When you go back out through town, you’ll see the closest thing to me is a store, and that’s a block away. Nobody complains. They know it’s just my hobby. The parishioners use it, too. The men’s club has an annual trap shoot here to raise money. We all get along here, Charley. It’s a very amicable place.”

“How long have you been pastor here?”

“Not long. Maybe five years. Rural posts like this aren’t exactly sought after. I suppose that’s why they made me pastor. I like the solitude.” He sighed. “Actually, I have five other churches that I serve as priest. We call them missions now. Maybe that’s what I am, a missionary.”

“Tell me,” I said. “Have you ever had any other complaints like this one by Sam Evans? Things they could dig up from the past?”

He shook his head. “No, never. I’m a priest cut from the old cloth, Charley, or at least I like to think I am.” He grinned. “Look, I’m a normal man, not some pansy hiding behind a Roman collar. Does that answer the question?”

“Yeah, it’ll do.”

He drained the glass and put it on a table. “Besides, I don’t have much time for being wicked. This is a rural parish but we have all the problems of the big city. Drugs, crime, you name it; we have it. Maybe not in big-city numbers, but there is just as much evil here as anywhere on earth. I do what I can and it really keeps me hopping. I used to be able to get away for a little hunting and fishing, but I haven’t even managed that the last couple of years.”

He saw me looking at the empty glass. “Oh, I drink a little, Charley, but not to excess. I play a little poker, too, mostly with other priests or members of the parish men’s club.” He chuckled, “Most of the priests are card sharks. I make up my losses off the locals. Anything else you want to know?”

“I understand you’ve had some psychiatric treatment?”

There was no smile, only an expression of sadness. “That’s true. I was hospitalized twice for depression. After all the changes in the Church, a lot of men like myself began to doubt their purpose in life, perhaps even their faith. I did. Some fell into a bottle or took a walk. I just withdrew into myself. I feel fine now, by the way.”

He studied me for a moment. “You certainly do your homework.”

“I try. If I know what’s coming, I can usually get prepared.”

“That’s wise.”

“Thanks for your time. It was a pleasure.”

He grinned and slapped me on the back like a politician running for office. “Hey, maybe next summer I can get away for a little fishing. You could come along. You look like you could use a little serious recreation. I keep a small boat on the river. I guarantee more walleyes than you’ve ever seen before.”

“Sounds good.”

He walked me to the front door. “Will you need me next week?” he asked.

“I doubt it.”

“Good. I’m going off tomorrow on a retreat. The Dominicans are going to sock it to a bunch of us mission priests, tell us how to do our jobs better.”

“If I need you, a week won’t make that much difference.”

We shook hands, and again I noticed how firm and sincere his handshake was.

“You’re a good guy, Charley,” he called after me as I headed toward my car. “I can’t begin to tell you how glad I am that you’re in my corner.”

I looked back at him as he stood in front of the rectory. He seemed both solid and at ease.

As I drove away, my mind was filled with memories of the priests I had known as a boy, those seemingly selfless men who embodied goodness and God. Father Charles Albertos was a lot like them—hearty, cheerful, and often intuitive. And, as I look back on it now, comforting. I admired them then and I suppose, to a certain extent, I still did. But I also had to acknowledge that their narrowness and their certain rigidity had gone a long way to help in driving me out of the Church. And as I grew older and began to seriously question the existence of God, I also began to question the validity of the priesthood.

Almost in spite of myself, I found I liked Father Chuck.

T
he sky remained ominous, but rather than hurry home, I decided to try to make the trip pay doubly. The Evans family lived only a mile or two out of Hub City.

It was rude not to call first, but sometimes rudeness can provide a tactical advantage. They wouldn’t be ready for me.

The Evans house wasn’t much, just a small frame bungalow with some deserted outbuildings. Someone had once raised chickens there but the effort had been long abandoned and the coops and wire fences were neglected and falling down.

I pulled in behind a pickup truck and parked.

I waited for a minute in case they had a dog, but there was no barking, so I walked up to the front door and knocked.

The house badly needed painting. From what I could see, everything in and around Hub City needed painting.

I glimpsed someone peering out from a front window, then the door opened and a woman’s face appeared. She reminded me of those Dust Bowl photos from the thirties.

“What do you want?” she asked, her tone half hostile, half fearful.

“My name is Sloan,” I said. “I’m a lawyer representing the local Catholic diocese and Father Charles Albertus. I’d like a moment of your time.”

The door closed and I could hear muted conversation
inside. Finally, it opened again, this time wider.

“Come on in,” the woman said.

Inside, the furniture looked as worn as the woman. An old television set flickered in one corner of the small living room. A bald-headed man lying on the sofa clad only in trousers and a ragged T-shirt glared up at me but made no effort to get up.

“Mr. Evans,” I said, “my name is Sloan—”

“I heard,” he snapped. “It’s about time someone showed up. I’m about to have my lawyers bring suit.”

“If you decide to do that, Mr. Evans, you’ll be arrested for extortion.”

“What are you talking about?”

“There’s no use in beating around the bush. Let me give you the facts hard and fast. You have no case and you know it. You were there when your son told the police he had lied. He has a history of doing exactly this kind of thing, as you know. You even whisper
lawsuit
and I’ll have your ass behind bars so fast your head will spin. Are you getting this?”

For a minute his mouth gaped open in shock. Finally he spoke, trying to summon up outrage. “You have no right to come into my house and—”

“I’m saving you a trip to jail, pal. You should thank me.”

“I told you we were going to get in trouble,” his wife whined.

“Goddamn Catholics got a shithouse full of money,” he snarled. “I don’t see why they can’t give us some.”

“That’s not the point, is it?” I said. “You’re causing trouble, Mr. Evans. And there are ways for taking care of people who do that. That’s what the law’s there for, to protect citizens against people like you.”

“Get out,” he said, but he didn’t sound nearly as sure of himself as before.

“I’m going,” I said, “but I hope you won’t think this an idle threat. I’ve talked to the police already. One word, one peep, and you’ve had it.”

He looked away. This time his voice was just above a
whisper. “All right,” he said, “just get out.”

I turned and walked to the door.

“I’m sorry,” the woman said quietly. “I told him we’d get in trouble.”