"And are you glad your wife and her lover are dead?"
In his heart, Monette instantly said yes. Aloud he said, "I'm relieved. I'm sorry to say that, Father, but considering the mess she made-and how it's apt to work out, with no trial and quiet restitution made out of the insurance money-I am relieved. Is that a sin?"
"Yes, my son. Sorry to break the news, but it is."
"Can you give me absolution?"
"Ten Our Fathers and ten Hail Marys," the priest said briskly. "The Our Fathers are for lack of charity-a serious sin but not mortal."
"And the Hail Marys?"
"Foul language in the confessional. At some point the adultery issue-yours, not hers-needs to be addressed, but now-"
"You have a lunch date. I understand."
"In truth, I've lost my appetite for lunch, although I should certainly greet my company. The main thing is, I think I'm a little too...too overwhelmed to go into your so-called road comfort just now."
"I understand."
"Good. Now son?"
"Yes?"
"Not to belabor the point, but are you sure you didn't give this man permission? Or encourage him in any way? Because then I think we'd be talking mortal sin instead of venial. I'd have to check with my own spiritual advisor to make sure, but-"
"No, Father. But do you think...is it possible that God put that guy in my car?"
In his heart, the priest instantly said yes. Aloud he said, "That's blasphemy, good for ten more Our Fathers. I don't know how long you've been outside the doors, but even you should know better. Now do you want to say something else and try for more Hail Marys, or are we done here?"
"We're done, Father."
"Then you're shriven, as we say in the trade. Go your way and sin no more. And take care of your daughter, son. Children only have one mother, no matter how she may have behaved."
"Yes, Father."
Behind the screen, the form shifted. "Can I ask you one more question?"
Monette settled back, reluctantly. He wanted to be gone. "Yes."
"You say the police think they will catch this man."
"They tell me it's only a matter of time."
"My question is, do you want the police to catch this man?"
And because what he really wanted was to be gone and say his atonement in the even more private confessional of his car, Monette said, "Of course I do."
On his way back home, he added two extra Hail Marys and two extra Our Fathers.
Ayana
I didn't think I would ever tell this story. My wife told me not to; she said no one would believe it and I'd only embarrass myself. What she meant, of course, was that it would embarrass her. "What about Ralph and Trudy?" I asked her. "They were there. They saw it, too."
"Trudy will tell him to keep his mouth shut," Ruth said, "and your brother won't need much persuading."
This was probably true. Ralph was at that time superintendent of New Hampshire School Administrative Unit 43, and the last thing a Department of Education bureaucrat from a small state wants is to wind up on one of the cable news outlets, in the end-of-the-hour slot reserved for UFOs over Phoenix and coyotes that can count to ten. Besides, a miracle story isn't much good without a miracle worker, and Ayana was gone.
But now my wife is dead-she had a heart attack while flying to Colorado to help out with our first grandchild and died almost instantly. (Or so the airline people said, but you can't even trust them with your luggage these days.) My brother Ralph is also dead-a stroke while playing in a golden-ager golf tournament-and Trudy is gaga. My father is long gone; if he were still alive, he'd be a centenarian. I'm the last one standing, so I'll tell the story. It is unbelievable, Ruth was right about that, and it means nothing in any case-miracles never do, except to those lucky lunatics who see them everywhere. But it's interesting. And it is true. We all saw it.
My father was dying of pancreatic cancer. I think you can tell a lot about people by listening to how they speak about that sort of situa tion (and the fact that I describe cancer as "that sort of situation" probably tells you something about your narrator, who spent his life teaching English to boys and girls whose most serious health problems were acne and sports injuries).
Ralph said, "He's nearly finished his journey."
My sister-in-law Trudy said, "He's rife with it." At first I thought she said "He's ripe with it," which struck me as jarringly poetic. I knew it couldn't be right, not from her, but I wanted it to be right.
Ruth said, "He's down for the count."