JOE: O.K., Arch. What about others in the same boat?
ARCH: What others?
JOE: Smiley and Cooney.
ARCH: Smiley? Is he still in the Church? Puts ice cubes in his beer.
JOE: I know. But he’s got the same system I have, and likewise Cooney.
ARCH: Joe, we can’t let everybody off.
JOE: Not exactly fair, is it, Arch?
ARCH: Not exactly, but that’s life in the Archdiocese, Joe.
JOE: I’m not trying to tell you how to run the Archdiocese, Arch.
ARCH: Might not be a bad idea if you did, Joe. I don’t say that to everybody in lower middle management.
JOE: I know. Thanks.
ARCH: Say, how’s about us breakin’ bread sometime?
JOE: Where?
ARCH: I’d say here. Only you know how it is here. Always a crowd.
JOE: Catfish, you mean?
ARCH: Ho, ho. Joe, there’s something I’ve been wanting to ask you.
JOE: Shoot.
ARCH: Why do you call Kissass Catfish?
JOE: Because of his fat face, and big mouth, his little eyes. Started when we were kids. You know how cruel kids can be.
ARCH: “Shorty,” you mean?
JOE: “Half-Pint” and so on. However, where Cat-fish is concerned, there may be more to it than meets the eye.
ARCH: How so?
JOE: Catfish feeds on the dreck in organized religion — mummery, mobbery, robbery, finkery, fear. He’s a bottom feeder, Arch.
ARCH: Wham!
JOE: Often wonder what you see in the guy, Arch.
ARCH: He has his uses, Joe.
JOE: Like the pilot fish.
ARCH: Don’t get you.
JOE: Photo-essay in the paper today on pilot fish. Didn’t you, see it?
ARCH: Haven’t seen the paper, Joe. Always let the housekeeper have it first.
JOE: Well, these pilot fish, they hang around big, person-eating sharks — great whites, hammerheads, and so on. Do odd jobs for ’em, point out prey, clean up the mess, and can’t type.
ARCH: Joe, if he’s a pilot fish, what does that make me? A hammerhead?
JOE: Don’t push it too far, Arch.
ARCH: Joe, what’s the trouble between you two?
JOE: It goes way back. His father worked for mine.
ARCH: “Hockitt’s Cull Iss Hut Stoof.”
JOE: Right. In grade school we were rivals — at least in his view — but the good nuns thought more of me. Understandably, what with free coal, capons at Christmas, and all those dimes and quarters for the Missions that came so easily to and from me. Not to mention my sunny disposition, my natural good looks (as a boy), and my athletic prowess. Can’t blame ’em, the nuns. They’re women, after all. Catfish couldn’t keep up. He’s had it in for me ever since. Oh, I know it’s his job to be as excrementitious as possible within reason — probably I’d be the same, to some extent — but he goes too far. Why, when I call the Chancery and he answers, I want to hang up. And I’m not alone.
ARCH: Tsk, tsk.
JOE: He runs a lousy office, Arch.
ARCH: Joe, and I speak not so much as your pal as your Ordinary, if there’s anything irregular about his conduct in future — anything at all — I want to know. Let me give you my unlisted number.
JOE: Let me give you an example, Arch. I thought, since you liked the new rectory so much, you might be interested in blessing it.
ARCH: Why not?
JOE: So I called the Chancery and got Catfish. “We bless one, we have to bless ’em all,” he says. “Wait a minute,” I said. “How many new rectories are there nowadays?” “You could start a trend. Bless it yourself,” he says and hangs up. How ’bout that?
ARCH: Tsk, tsk.
JOE: Don’t suppose he mentioned it.
ARCH: No, but I’m glad you did, Joe. Methinks Kissass needs a change.
JOE: What I was thinking, Arch.
ARCH: Up and out.
JOE: Hate to see him a bishop, Arch.
ARCH: In some respects, this is still an imperfect world, Joe. Ever think of going into administration yourself?
JOE: Who hasn’t, Arch, in this diocese? But I’d like to see a new church out here before I move on, or kick off, which may come first.
ARCH: How is your health these days, Joe?
JOE: Not bad, everything considered — like ARF.
ARCH: ARF? Oh, you mean Arf. That’s what we call it here at headquarters, Joe — after my dog.
JOE: “Arf” goes Sandy?
ARCH: Exactly. But you just forget the whole thing, Joe.
JOE: Thanks a mil, Arch. Fifty thou, I mean.
ARCH: My pleasure, Joe. Say, how’s about us breakin’ bread sometime.
JOE: Where?
ARCH: I’d say here. Only you know how it is here. Always a crowd.
JOE: Catfish, you mean?
ARCH: Ho, ho.
Joe woke up in the dark and was annoyed that Bill hadn’t thought, or bothered, to look in on him. Or had he? Joe hoped not.
The next morning, after making a list, the first item on which required that he find out what others in his narrow category were thinking, Joe called Silverstream, learned that Smiley was attending a workshop in Chicago, and so spoke to the curate (Miller), which was better as things were in that parish since what the curate might say, if anything (that was the difficulty with the curate), would come from the horse’s mouth, as would not have been the case with the pastor, far from it.
“Arf,” Miller said. “It’s a real problem for us, Father, and would be even if we didn’t have the setup we have over here.”
“We have the same system over here, Father. That’s why I called.”
“It’s not working over here, Father.”
“It’s working over here, Father.”
“The pastor’s thinking of dropping it, I understand. At least for the time being.”
“What d’ya mean, ‘for the time being’? You either have it or you don’t. You can’t have it both ways, Father.”
“Then we just might be able to handle our assessment”—Miller, ignoring Joe’s objections, was used to dealing with Smiley—“like other parishes, Father.”
“And bring in the mercenaries?”
“Who?”
“The fund-raisers.”
“It’s my impression the pastor’s thinking along such lines, Father.”
“What about your good, loyal, paid-up people, Father?”
“They’d understand, I’m sure, once the urgency of the matter is explained to them. In any case, the decision rests with the pastor.”
Joe had to respect the curate for playing the game. “So the pastor’s taking a dive?”
“That’s all I can say, Father, at this juncture.”
“Nice talking to you, Father, at this juncture,” Joe said, and hung up.
He called Cooney and told him that Smiley was taking a dive.
“I’m not surprised,” Cooney said.
“I’m not surprised,” Joe said. “Smiley’s a reed.”
“A what?”
“Shaken in the wind.”
“Oh yeah.”
They discussed ARF, saying that it wasn’t the same for them as for others, that they might have been shown some consideration, that they might have been consulted before-hand, that they should not have been sent a frickin’ form letter. They criticized its style (“Manifest!”—“Manifold!”) and its content, saying that if there was such a money crisis in the diocese then things like the Institute should be closed down and not, for God’s sake, expanded, that if there was such a priestpower shortage in the diocese, then men off getting degrees and men off serving in the armed forces and men off goofing off (on so-called leaves of absence, which usually ended badly) should come home and go to work. Cooney proposed a halt in all new construction, but Cooney already had a new church, and Joe, rather than spoil what until then had been a perfect meeting of minds, was silent — they’d got pretty far afield.