Jim Flaherty was alone in his Spartan bedroom. He sat at his desk, intending to put the finishing touches on his yearly Christmas sermon and then – on this blessedly unbooked Thursday evening – he was going to get to sleep before midnight.
But first he'd tune into the ten o'clock news, where he was heartened by the analysis of the events of the trial. Wes Farrell's parade of defense witnesses had demolished any lingering doubt about its outcome. Mark wasn't going to get convicted – the prosecution's case was in rags.
Flaherty told himself that he'd never really entertained the notion that Mark had killed Sheila, but the blood had come close to shaking his faith. Now, though, it looked as though Farrell had put his finger into that potential hole in the dike, and what Mark had contended all along was true. The blood could have come from anywhere and the missing blood from his own doctor's office had been a terrible coincidence.
It was critical that Flaherty be clear on this score. Farrell had asked him to be ready to testify about Mark's character beginning as early as tomorrow.
He opened his desk drawer and pulled out the sheaf of looseleaf papers.
And there was a knock on his door.
He loathed interruptions in his bedroom – it was the only truly private place he had, the only personal time he ever got. But everyone on the staff here at the rectory knew that and protected his privacy, so this must be important.
Father Herman, his major domo, stood in the hallway in the at-ease position, and behind him, hands clasped in front of him, was Eugene Gorman, pastor of St Emydius. Seeing him, Flaherty's stomach tightened, and he put his hand over it.
Herman was trying to explain that he had asked Father Gorman to wait downstairs and he'd send the Archbishop down to see him in the study, but…
'That's all right, Father. This is an old friend. You want to come in here, Gene? I don't have anything but hard chairs to sit on.'
When the door closed behind them, Flaherty walked across the room and sat on his desk. Gorman stood awkwardly and finally, looking behind him, sat down on the Archbishop's bed. 'I'm sorry to bother you. I wouldn't have if this weren't an emergency.'
'It's all right,' Flaherty began, 'we're-'
But Gorman cut him off. 'I have been examining my conscience now for months, and I don't know what else to do. I need for you to hear my Confession.'
Flaherty cocked his head at the man across from him. He seemed to have aged five years since they'd last spoken in May or June.
The light was dim. A crucifix, the only ornament in the room, hung over Flaherty's bed.
Gorman's eyes were tortured, pleading.
The Archbishop nodded once, boosted himself off the desk, and crossed to the bed. He put his hand behind Gorman's head and stood like that for a moment.
Then he went over to his dresser and picked up his stole – the sacramental cloth. Draping it over his shoulders, he returned to the bed, and sat down next to Gorman, making the sign of the cross.
Gorman began. 'Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. I am living in a state of mortal sin, in despair.'
'God will give you grace, Gene. He won't abandon you.'
But Gorman didn't seem to hear. He continued. 'I am tormented by guilty knowledge and bound by the seal of the confessional. It's destroying me, Jim… I can't function.'
Flaherty began to offer his counsel to Gorman. This was one of the heaviest burdens of the priesthood – penitents had terrible secrets they needed to confess…
Gorman couldn't hold it in any longer. 'This was murder, Jim. Literal murder.'
Entering his apartment after another night on the town, Wes Farrell was confronting another of the deadly sins, pride. The headiness of his success had not obliterated his doubts about his friend nor any moral qualms concerning his strategies at the trial, but he would be damned if he would let any of that nonsense stand in his way now.
Winning was what mattered. Winners had to learn to ignore those small voices of discontent, the traces of timidity, that hampered lesser souls – that were, indeed, the hallmark of lesser souls.
Wasn't it De Gaulle who had said that to govern was to choose? Well, Wes thought that the sentiment translated well into his own situation. He would no longer consider other paths he might have taken, could have taken, that were perhaps more righteous and less ambiguous. No, he had chosen to believe Mark Dooher, chosen to defend him. And those decisions had elevated him in his community. And that was what mattered.
After a certain point, you just didn't have to think about certain things anymore.
He had been reading about his exploits every day, hearing himself described in the various media as brilliant, dogged, ruthless, even charismatic. He wasn't about to give any of this up by worrying too much about the vehicle that had propelled him to here. It was Faustian, perhaps, but he'd often said he'd sell his soul for this chance.
It might have disappointed him when he'd been younger and more idealistic, but right now all he could think was: I'll take it, I'll take it, I'll take it – and while we're at it, give me more.
The time was 11:15. He was entering his apartment, filled with these thoughts. A dinner at John's Grill had turned into a testimonial from some of the other diners who had recognized him. He was resolving to change his residence in the next couple of months, get himself another house and a house cleaner to go with it, a new car, fix up the office as befitted his station.
The telephone was ringing and he crossed the room, petting an ecstatic Bart, and picked it up.
'Wes. This is Jim Flaherty.'
The usually husky, confident tone was missing. 'Your Excellency, how are you?'
'Well, I'm not too good, to tell you the truth.' A long breath. 'I might as well come right out with it, Wes. I'm afraid I've decided I'm not going to be able to testify for you, for Mark, about his character.'
Farrell pulled out a kitchen chair and sat heavily upon it. He had been expecting to call the Archbishop tomorrow and wrap up his defense.
'But just two nights ago…'
'I realize that. I know. But something has come up…'
'What?'
Another pause. 'I'm not at liberty to say.'
'Archbishop, Father, wait a minute. You can't just-'
'Excuse me, Wes. This is a very difficult decision, one of the hardest of my life, but I've made it, and that's all there is to say about it. I'm sorry.'
The line went dead. Farrell lifted the receiver away from his ear and looked at it as though it were alive. 'You're sorry?'
He put the phone down and stared at his wavy image, reflected in the kitchen window.
Flaherty sat, alone again, on the side of his hard bed. He'd wrestled with it for an hour or more, trying to find some other interpretation for Father Gorman's words. He grudgingly admired Gorman's decision the way he'd come to him for Confession. The strategy was, Flaherty thought, positively Jesuitical. Gorman never said Dooher's name, never even implied whether it was a male or a female who had committed the murder or, for that matter, whether it was one of his parishioners. He didn't, technically, break the seal of the Confession.
But there was small doubt about what he was saying, and none at all about whether it was true.
CHAPTER FOURTY TWO
A war had broken out in Thomasino's chambers.
The lead attorneys, the Judge, and Glitsky had originally gathered to discuss logistics. Farrell had decided that, after all, he wasn't going to call character witnesses – he didn't need them. The defense was going to rest.
And then Jenkins had dropped her bomb, saying she would like to call a rebuttal witness then, someone who wasn't on her original witness list, a man who had been at the driving range during the time Dooher claimed he was, and who hadn't seen him.