He ran all the way to Sacred Heart, fighting a stitch in his side, ignoring the sweat that was dampening his fresh shirt. Each time he faltered, gasping for breath, he saw Rabbi Hirsch in his mind’s eye, and rage urged him on. Outside the church, the sidewalk was packed with people in flowered hats and new suits and newsboys selling The Tablet. It was as if the whole neighborhood were converging on the 10 A.M. solemn high mass that was to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus. Michael pushed through them, thinking, Move, goddamn it, move, and took the steps two at a time into the church.
The nine o’clock mass was over, but the pews were almost full of those who wanted to hear the solemn high mass at ten, sung by three priests. Michael glanced up and saw that the choirboys were already assembled in the loft. An usher tried to stop him, but he pushed the man aside and hurried down the aisle and into the sacristy. He was relieved to find Father Heaney sitting on a chair, smoking a cigarette, finished with his own duties. The three other priests were helping each other don the gorgeous gold-embroidered white vestments used at Easter.
“Father Heaney!” Michael hissed. “Listen, there’s — I gotta — you have to—”
“Take a deep breath, kid,” the priest mumbled, “then tell me what you’re trying to say.”
Father Heaney listened as Michael told him the story, his voice hushed, to avoid distracting the other priests, who were busy dressing, talking among themselves. Father Heaney’s face shifted. A deep vertical crease carved itself into his brow.
“I’ll call the cops,” he said, standing suddenly and going to the sink to quench his cigarette.
“No, you can’t do that, Father. The cops don’t care, we don’t ever call the cops, they—we’ve got to help him.”
“Why?”
Four alter boys suddenly entered the sacristy. Michael nodded hello. The altar boys went to the door leading to the altar and waited. Out in the sanctuary, the choir began to sing. One of the priests glanced at the wall clock, said, Let’s go, and altar boys and priests went out to begin mass as music surged around them. Father Heaney stood looking at Michael. His eyes were more focused now, as if a film of indifference or boredom were being peeled away.
“We’re not cops,” Father Heaney said, when he and Michael were alone. Outside, the music soared. “Why should we get involved, kid?”
“Because Rabbi Hirsch is a good guy!”
“How do you know?” Father Heaney said, in the tone of someone who had seen too much evil.
Michael exploded. “How do I know? I’m the Shabbos goy at the synagogue! I help him turn on the lights every Saturday morning. I’m teaching him English. He’s teaching me Yiddish. And his wife is dead and he’s alone and he doesn’t need some goddamned Nazi painting his synagogue!” The words clogged, as Michael realized he’d used the word goddamned to a priest, and then rushed forth again. “My father died fighting the Nazis. You saw all kinds of guys die in the war, you—”
Father Heaney’s slits of eyes opened wider and he stepped back a foot, as if the words had pierced a part of him that had been numb for a long time. He raised a hand, palm out, stopping the flow of Michael’s words. He reached for his coat.
“Come on,” he said.
He walked out into the church, pointed at a few men and gestured for them to follow him. He grabbed one of the altar boys from the previous mass, a tall Italian kid named Albert. Some parishioners looked up from their prayer books at Father Heaney as if wondering why he was disrupting the mass. The choir reached a pitch and then stopped. Mr. Gallagher, the owner of the hardware store across the street, arrived late and was searching for a seat when Father Heaney took him by the elbow and guided him back outside.
At the foot of the church steps, Father Heaney started giving orders like the military man he’d once been. He slipped two dollars to Albert, the altar boy, and sent him to buy some coffee and buns at the bakery. He convinced Mr. Gallagher to open the hardware store and hand out rags and scrubbers and solvents. On the corner near the schoolyard, he saw Charlie Senator, who had left his leg at Anzio, limping toward the church. He whispered a few words to him, and Senator gave him a small salute and fell in line.
Then all of them were marching down the avenue, carrying mops and rags, pails and solvents. People in Easter finery looked at them in surprise. A few more men joined the line of march, with Father Heaney and Michael out front, as the platoon crossed the great square at the entrance to the park and turned into Kelly Street.
Father Heaney’s face was now clenched in righteous anger, his mouth etched tight, the muscles moving in his jaws. He didn’t say a word. Michael wondered if he’d gone too far, mentioning his father. His mother never did that, not to the landlord, not to Michael, not ever, and he’d never done it before either. But it just came out, and it was true. Private Tommy Devlin had died fighting these momsers. These lousy pricks. And he suddenly pictured his father marching with them down Kelly Street, going again to fight the Nazis. Then he realized he was the only boy among almost a dozen men. And saw himself with his father’s platoon. Helmeted. Carrying a machine gun. Going to get these bastards who killed babies and old ladies and turned men into living skeletons. Heading for Belgium.
When they reached the synagogue, Rabbi Hirsch was still poking with his mop at the first swastika.
“Rabbi, I’m Joe Heaney,” the priest said. “I was a chaplain in the 103rd Airborne. Most of these men fought their way into Germany two years ago, and one of them lost a leg in Italy. They are not going to let this bullshit happen in their parish.”
“Please,” Rabbi Hirsch said, “I can do it myself.”
“No, you can’t,” Father Heaney said.
And so they went to work. Mr. Ponte, the stonemason, fingered the texture of the bricks, while Mr. Gallagher examined the paint. “Sapolin number 3,” Mr. Gallagher said. “Every moron in the parish paints his chairs with it and then sits down before they’re dry.” Together, he and Mr. Ponte mixed the solvents in a steel pail. Others peeled off their Easter jackets, removed their ties, rolled up their sleeves, and grabbed rags and mops. Father Heaney stripped to his T-shirt. Albert, the altar boy, arrived with buns and coffee, then grabbed a cloth. A police car came along and one of the cops wanted to make a report, but Father Heaney said that he and Rabbi Hirsch would take care of the matter in their own way.
“We both believe in an Old Testament God,” Father Heaney said. “He punishes all morons.”
The cops shrugged and drove away. Michael hung his jacket and tie on the picket fence, on top of Charlie Senator’s coat, and joined in the scrubbing. The men said little as they scrubbed and grunted. Their eyes seemed cloudy with memory, as if the things they had seen a few years earlier were driving them to finish. Michael was soon exhausted but pushed himself harder, thinking of the grainy black-and-white images from the Venus newsreels, the skeletal men, the hollow-eyed women, the mounds of corpses. Thinking of soldiers dead in the snow. He kept glancing at Rabbi Hirsch, but the man had retreated into himself, his lips moving inaudibly as he attacked the hated red paint. The word JEW vanished. Then the word GO. And another swastika.
He must be thinking of her, Michael thought.
His wife.
Leah.
At one point, Frankie McCarthy and four of the Falcons strolled up from Ellison Avenue and stood on the far corner beside the armory. For them, Michael thought, the hour was early. Usually, you didn’t see them until noon. They passed around a quart of Rheingold beer and wore sneers on their faces and one of them said something that made them all laugh. But they knew better than to look for trouble from this group of men. Michael thought: Come on, Frankie, shout something about the Kikes, come on. These guys kicked the shit out of the Wehrmacht, Frankie, these guys beat Tojo. Come on, prick.