TWENTY-ONE
The old man stands at the back of the auditorium. It is a large, rectangular room, decorated with bright streamers and multicolored bunting, with folding chairs aligned row by row, eighty in all. There is a small stage with risers at the front. The event is a chorale of first-and second-grade children singing songs that welcome spring, which is just a month or so away.
In the audience are scores of proud parents and grandparents, flip cameras in hand. Onstage thirty or so children are singing: ‘If You’re Happy and You Know It.’
She watches the man from the other side of the room – his eyes, his hands, the cant of his shoulders. He has the countenance of a kindly uncle, but she knows better. She knows what he is.
At the end of the song she walks across the room, sidles up next to him. He does not notice her.
‘Hi,’ she says.
The man turns to her, a bit startled. He quickly looks her up and down, tiny predator’s eyes assessing threat. He finds none. He fashions a smile. ‘Hello.’
She gestures toward the stage. ‘They are so precious when they are this age, aren’t they?’
The old man smiles again. ‘That they are.’ He looks more closely at her, this time with a flicker of remembrance. ‘Have we met before?’
They always ask. She shakes her head. ‘Where you’ve been I cannot go.’
The man looks at her quizzically. Before he can respond, she continues.
‘Is one of them your grandchild?’
The hesitation says so much. It says the truth.
‘No. I just come here to watch them. It makes me feel young again.’
‘You do more than watch though, don’t you?’
The man slowly closes his eyes. A moment later, when he opens them, he looks at her, and knows.
They are silent for a long time, the joyous singing of the children a backdrop to their transaction, one this man has awaited with dread for years.
‘I knew this day would come,’ the man says. ‘He is real after all.’
‘Oh, he is real,’ she echoes. ‘Did you doubt him?’
‘One lives in hope. Ever since I was a child, not much older than these children, I have believed in him, have known he walks with me.’
She points out the window, to the old church across the street. ‘He is waiting for you.’
‘In the church?’
‘Yes. And now is the time.’
The man glances back at the stage, knowing that this will be the last time. ‘I’m not ready.’
‘There will be no more negotiations.’
He turns to face her fully. ‘Is this the only way?’
The pedophile knows the answer to this. There is no need to respond. She does not.
A few minutes later they leave the auditorium. They cross the street, walk down the alley next to the church. The door is already open for them. They enter, descend the stairs into the basement.
‘I feel him,’ the man says.
She gestures to a small room, directly beneath the sacristy. ‘Remove your clothing.’
The man looks up, his eyes no longer those of the predator, but rather that of cornered prey. ‘This is something I must do?’
‘Is it not how you came into the world?’
Slowly, piece by piece, he removes his clothes. He folds them neatly, lays them on the floor, next to the pile of white stones.
She gestures for the man to sit. Naked, he eases himself to the frigid stone floor. He makes the sign of the cross. Soon, a single tear runs down his cheek. ‘I grew up in a very religious house,’ he says. ‘If we didn’t say our prayers we would be beaten.’
She says nothing. This is all known to her. They all have a devout background. It is why they know, in the end, there is only one penance.
‘May I make an Act of Contrition?’ he asks.
‘Yes.’
The old man clasps his hands. ‘O my God, I am heartily sorry …’
She waits for him to finish. When he does she asks the question. ‘Do you remember what you said?’
‘Yes.’
‘I want you to tell me. Word for word.’
The man closes his eyes for a moment, perhaps remembering, perhaps taking a moment for a second silent Act of Contrition. ‘I said, “If you keep me out of prison, I will do anything. I will even make a pact with the devil.”’
‘The devil.’
‘Yes.’
‘When you made this deal, did you think it would never come due?’
The man remains silent. For him, and all his sins of the flesh, the story is told.
A moment later, without another word, he opens his mouth and swallows the first stone.