“What did they try on you?”
“With me it was sex.” Father da Costa smiled. “A path they frequently follow where Catholic priests are concerned, celibacy being a state they find quite unintelligible.”
“What did they do?”
“Half-starved me, left me on my own in a damp cell for three months, then put me to bed between two young women who were presumably willing to give their all for the cause, just like you.” He laughed. “It was rather childish really. The idea was, I suppose, that I should be racked with guilt be-cause I experienced an erection, whereas I took it to be a chemical reaction perfectly understandable in the circum-stances. It seemed to me that would be God’s view also.”
“So, no sin in you then. Driven snow. Is that it?”
“Not at all. I am a very violent man, Mr.. Fallon. There was a time in my life when I enjoyed killing. Perhaps if they’d ùworked on that they would have got somewhere. It was to escape that side of myself that I entered the Church. It was, still is, my greatest weakness, but at least I acknowledged its existence.” He paused and then said deliberately, “Do you?”
“Any man can know about things,” Fallon said. “It’s know-ing the significance of things that’s important.”
He paused and Father da Costa said, “Go on.”
“What do you want me to do, drain the cup?” Fallon de-manded. “The gospel according to Fallon? All right, if that’s what you want.”
He mounted the steps leading up to the pulpit and stood at the lectern. “I never realised you had such a good view. What do you want me to say?”
“Anything you like.”
“All right. We are fundamentally alone. Nothing lasts. There is no purpose to any of it.”
“You are wrong,” Father da Costa said. “You leave out God.”
“God?” Fallon cried. “What kind of a God allows a world where children can be happily singing one minute -” here, his voice faltered for a moment – “and blown into strips of bloody flesh the next. Can you honestly tell me you still believe in a God after what they did to you in Korea? Are you telling me you never faltered, not once?”
“Strength comes from adversity always/ Father da Costa told him. “I crouched in the darkness in my own filth for six months once, on the end of a chain. There was one day, one moment, when I might have done anything. And then the stone rolled aside and I smelled the grave, saw him walk out on his own two feet and I knew. Fallon! I knew!”
“Well, all I can say is, that if he exists, your God, I wish to hell you could get him to make up his mind. He’s big on how and when. Not so hot on why.”
“Have you learned nothing, then?” Father da Costa de-manded.
“Oh yes,” Fallon said. I’ve learned to kill with a smile, Father, that’s very important. But the biggest lesson of all, I learned too late.”
“And what might that be?”
“That nothing is worth dying for.”
It was suddenly very quiet, only the endless rain drifting against the windows. Fallon came down the steps of the pulpit buckling the belt of his trench coat. He paused beside Father da Costa.
“And the real trouble is, Father, that nothing’s worth living for either.”
He walked away down the aisle, his footsteps echoing. The door banged, the candles flickered. Father da Costa knelt down at the altar rail, folded his hands and prayed as he had seldom prayed before.
After a while, a door clicked open and a familiar voice said, “Uncle Michael? Are you there?”
He turned to find Anna standing outside the sacristy door. “Over here,” he called.
She moved towards him and he went to meet her, reaching for her outstretched hands. He took her across to the front pew and they sat down. And as usual she sensed his mood.
“What is it? she said, her face full of concern, “Where’s Mr.. Fallon?”
“Gone,” he said. “We had quite a chat. I think I understand more now.”
“He’s dead inside,” she said. “Everything frozen.”