thing that slid out of the glove, however, wasn’t a human hand. It was a
hand in the process of becoming something else, still exhibiting
evidence of humanity in the tone and the texture of the skin, and in the
placement of the digits, but the fingers were more like finger-size
talons, yet not talons precisely, because each appeared to be splitor at
least to have begun to split into appendages resembling the serrated
pincers of baby lobster claws.
“I can only trust in Jesus, ” the priest said.
His face streamed with tears no doubt as bitter as the vinegar in the
sponge that had been offered to his suffering savior.
“I believe. I believe in the mercy of Christ. Yes, I believe.
I believe in the mercy of Christ.” Yellow light flared in his eyes.
Flared.
Father Tom came at me first, perhaps because I was between him and the
doorway, perhaps because my mother was Wisteria Jane Snow. After all,
though she gave us such miracles as Orson and Mungojerrie, her life’s
work also made possible the twitching thing at the end of the priest’s
left arm. Though the human side of him surely did believe in the
immortal soul and the sweet mercy of Christ, it was understandable if
some other, darker part of him placed its faith in bloody vengeance.
No matter what else he was, Father Tom was still a priest, and my folks
had not raised me to take punches at priests, or at people insane with
despair, for that matter. Respect and pity and twenty-eight years of
parental instruction overcame my survival instinct which made me a
disappointment to Darwinand instead of aggressively countering Father
Tom’s assault, I crossed my arms over my face and tried to turn away
from him.
He was not an experienced fighter. Like a grade-school boy in a
playground brawl, he threw himself wildly against me, using his entire
body as a weapon, ramming into me with a lot more force than you would
expect from an ordinary priest, even more than you’d expect from a
Jesuit.
Driven backward, I slammed hard into a tall armoire. One of the door
handles gouged into my back, just below my left shoulder blade.
Father Tom was hammering at me with his right fist, but I was more
worried about that weird left appendage. I didn’t know how sharp the
serrated edges on those little pincers might be, but more to the point,
I didn’t want to be touched by that thing, which looked unclean.
No. unclean in a sanitary sense. Unclean in the sense that the cloven
hoof or the hairless pink corkscrew tail of a demon might look unclean.
E As he pounded on me, Father Tom urgently repeated his statement of F
religious commitment, “I believe in the mercy of Christ, the mercy of
Christ, the mercy, I believe in the mercy of Christ! ” His spittle
sprayed my face, and his breath was disconcertingly sweet with the
fragrance of peppermint.
This ceaseless chanting wasn’t meant to persuade me or anyone else not
even God of the priest’s unshaken faith. Rather, he was trying to
convince himself of his belief, to remind himself that he had hope, and
to use that hope to seize control of himself once more. In spite of the
malevolent sulfurous light in his eyes, in spite of the urge to kill
that pumped uncanny strength into his undisciplined body, I could see
the earnest and venerable man of God who struggled to suppress the
raging savage within and to find his way back toward grace.
Shouting, cursing, Bobby and Roosevelt clutched at the priest, trying to
tear him off me. Even as he clung fast to me, Father Tom kicked at them,
drove his elbows backward into their stomachs and ribs.
He hadn’t been a skilled fighter when he launched himself at me, seconds
ago, but he seemed to be learning fast. Or perhaps he was losing the
struggle to subdue his new becoming self, the savage within, which knew
all about fighting and killing.
I felt something pulling at my sweater and was sure that it was the
hateful claw. The pincer serrations were snagged in the cotton fabric.