Nothing. But this." His hand waved at the bottle. "It's a coward's way out, and no way out at all, but it slows my mind from eating at itself so I can pretend to function. Every time I say Mass, I hope I will receive the grace to face this, and every time, I gain only enough strength to keep up the mockery. Now I understand why even Our Lord asked His Father to take the cup of His coming sacrifice from His lips in the Garden of Gethsemane. If what is in these letters becomes public, I will be crucified."
Matt steeled himself to receive the envelope Father Hernandez passed over the desk. Gethsemane again, Where Christ went to contemplate his foreordained suffering and death. And yet the act was not foreordained, according to church teaching; Christ could have refused; that was what made the fruition so significant. Matt never thought for a moment that Father Hernandez was exaggerating his situation.
He drew the rustling bundles of paper from inside the envelope as if they were snakes. He opened one white, business- size envelope, unfolded a crisp piece of typing paper and read.
He read three before he looked up again. Sweat crystallized on Father Hernandez's anxious face. He watched Matt like a child gauging a parent's reaction to a bad report card, uneasy but defiant, afraid but proud.
"And there's nothing to this?" Matt asked.
"Nothing. I swear on the Cross."
"Nor the charges about your previous appointments?"
"Nothing, there or here, then or now. You know what will happen if this . . . garbage becomes public."
"A media circus maximus."
"Bring on the Christians," Father Hernandez intoned with bitter drama. "Bring on the priests."
"So it should be," Matt said, his tone stern as any archbishop's. "Child abuse of any kind is a heinous offense. The sexual abuse of children by the clergy is unspeakable. I confess that I can't imagine how any man of God can shut his eyes to such acts, yet several have been proven to have done just that."
"Not me." Father Hernandez's dark eyes glowed like embers as his fist pounded his chest, not in the humble throb of a mea culpa, but in the emphatic rhythm of a Spanish dancer. "And now it has become fashionable to allege such things. You know how disturbed minds leap in when such ethical chasms open up, swallowing even the innocent. I am innocent!"
Matt spread his hands. "If so, you would be cleared, ultimately."
"Perhaps. And I say only perhaps. But the stigma." Rafael Hernandez held up his pale, damp palms from the glass they curved around. "Stigma. We know where that word comes from, from the nails through the wrists and feet; the stigma is the Crucifixion.''
Matt nodded.
"You know the position the church faces on such matters nowadays."
Matt nodded again.
"What would you have me do?"
Matt said nothing.
"If I went, as I should, to the archbishop, he would be forced to take the most stringent of actions. There would be publicity. Now, the church is anxious to demonstrate its eagerness to root out what it once covered up, and rightfully so. Yet mistakes can be made when such zeal is employed, when an institution of any kind is fighting for its integrity, its reputation. There is a new Inquisition at work."
Matt could not deny that.
"You talk to people on that hotline; you must speak to many disturbed souls, some quite unappealing. What do you think of the writer?"
Matt moved the three envelopes through his hands as if weighing them. "The police could do a better psychological profile. Yes, I know why you feel they mustn't be involved.
I'm no expert on anonymous letters, but I'd say an organized person did this. They seem to be printed on a laser printer, which rules out the ancient clue of the uneven typewriter keys. I sense someone intelligent taking almost a vicious pleasure in the perversity of the charges. Does the writer never ask for anything?"
"Nothing!" Father Hernandez clutched his head instead of his glass, his face taking on a distracted look.
"Then it could be a crank, some disaffected parishioner, or even an anti-Catholic bigot."
"I know what it could be. I also know what will happen if the letters are made public: a full-scale investigation, no matter how unsubstantiated the charges. After that, neither I nor Our Lady of Guadalupe will be worth much. Matthias, I have been a decent priest, perhaps not the brightest or the best, or the humblest, but to the extent of my abilities, I have been faithful to my vows and have tried to be of service to my parishioners and my duties. I don't know what to do. Perhaps this . . . correspondent will tire of baiting me and stop."
"Perhaps he--or she--will go public when you least expect it."
'True."
"The police would be your better bet," Matt said.
"Go to Lieutenant Molina? Never."
"Pride goeth before a fall, to be sanctimonious. Besides, this isn't a case for a homicide lieutenant."
"She would learn of it."
"Probably, but forget your image in the eyes of a parishioner. Lieutenant Molina is also a professional, and professionals don't buy what every anonymous crank might charge. The police investigate this sort of thing all the time and are well acquainted with anonymous letter-writers. They might give you more benefit of the doubt, and they certainly would investigate quietly. If they leaped to conclusions and filed false charges, they can get sued."
"What you're saying is that the church, my church, to which I have devoted most of my life, is more likely to persecute me than to defend me."
"Now, given the political climate on this issue, it has to avoid any appearance of favoritism, of sheltering anyone."
"So they will crucify me, with a mockery of a trial, as was done to Christ. We priests claim we walk in Our Lord's footsteps, or try to, but confront something like this, Matthias, and say then that you are prepared to face the Crown of Thorns from the hands of your own bishop and the whips and the scourges of the press."
"I believe your innocence," Matt said. "I do believe you, Father Hernandez. And if I do, so will others. Yet I see your point. Why pull down disaster upon yourself? Still, the pressure will draw attention to you in any event."
"You mean this?" He lofted the two-thirds-empty bottle. "I try, but my thoughts run around and around like mice on a wheel. Who? Why? When will the attack escalate? How?"
"That's why the good news of Miss Tyler's bequest hardly seemed to matter to you."
"Money." He shook his silvered head. "It is the means to a good end, one hopes. It is essential to life and bureaucracy. I wish the cats had gotten it, do you understand? No one would accuse the cats of misconduct."
"Father, we both should know more than most that false accusations are a terrible cross to bear. You, too, should ask our Father to take this cup from your lips." Matt pointed to the bottle. "Whatever happens, that is the first bridge to cross."
Father Hernandez shrugged and ran his fingers through his elegant hair, turning it into a ruffled halo. "I'll try. Harder."
"And I'll think about this letter-writer. It could be the same person who called Sister Mary Monica, and who tried to crucify the cat. We could be dealing with a truly demented individual."
Father Hernandez looked up, and actually smiled. "Thank you for that 'we.' That is more than I was willing to grant you when we first met. Forgive me."
Father, forgive me, for I have not sinned. . . .
Matt ran that ironic phrase through his mind as he left the rectory. His watch read, by the candle still burning in the kitchen window, five-thirty in the morning.
Dawn was a vague, teasing lightening of the dark along the eastern horizon. He jammed his hands, cold hands from tension felt but not shown, into his pants pockets and began walking back to the Circle Ritz.
Daylight would begin to shadow him soon, and he was not afraid of the neighborhood. He was not afraid of anything he might encounter on Las Vegas's stirring streets. He had spent two hours staring at the face of true, spiritual fear, and ordinary fear would never look the same again.