Megan Abbott - Phoenix Noir

“Any relic larger than a toothpick is quite potent,” said O’Toole.

“And one as long as five or six inches...” Walberto whispered, like a child who knows a story by heart.

O’Toole completed the thought, “... would be a stunning find.”

Walberto remained entranced. He said, “Radegunda, Queen of the Franks, obtained from the Emperor Justin II, in 569, a remarkable relic of the True Cross.”

O’Toole was amazed. It was almost the exact wording of the Catholic Encyclopedia , a volume from which O’Toole could quote extensively, and had quoted to Walberto. The coyote, whose typical reading consisted of the ingredients lists from the backs of Campbell Soup cans, had remembered.

“Yes,” said O’Toole. “This was one of the relics catalogued in 1870 by the Parisian scholar Rohault de Fleury in his masterly M é moire sur les instruments de la Passion. ”

Walberto tapped impatiently on the pew in front of him, his massive signet ring making a sound like a door-rapper. “And how did it get here, all the way from France, after all that time?”

“The provenance shows that,” rejoined O’Toole. “Stolen in France, carried to the new world, treasured for centuries in a monastery high in the Sierra Obscura in northern Mexico, then spirited away fifty years ago to the mission in Magadalena, then...”

“... brought to Phoenix two weeks ago by Jorge Canto, a muralist in that mission...”

“... to pay his passage across the border.”

“Jorge Canto, who now lies dead of seven wounds in his chest and back on a bed in Room 23 of the Painted Robin Motel in Buckeye,” Walberto concluded with some relish. “A crucifix on his forehead.” O’Toole could hear him tapping his head, as if trying to spring loose a thought. “What’s that prov thing?”

“Provenance,” said O’Toole. “The papers you stole from Canto last week and gave to me. That’s why I told you to get the relic. They prove it’s authentic.”

“Oh, sure.”

O’Toole was put off. “You don’t believe it?”

“Faith is very hard, Father. You know that.”

“Yes.”

“A man is easily tempted. You’ve heard of the seven deadly sins?”

O’Toole felt a surge of annoyance. Was this Dallas Cowboys fan really trying to instruct him on matters of faith?

“Yes,” said O’Toole. “The seven deadly sins — lust, gluttony, greed, sloth, anger, envy, and pride.”

“Sure,” said Walberto. “ Luxuria, gula, avaritia, acedia, ira, invidia, and superbia . In Colombia, the priest taught us in Latin.”

Jesus, this was too much.

“I know Latin,” O’Toole said heavily.

“Of course. But do you know there is an eighth deadly sin?”

O’Toole sighed.

Walberto’s laugh crackled. “The eighth deadly sin is over-confidence. I don’t know how to say it in Latin.”

Touché. It occurred to O’Toole that “Walberto” was a name of Germanic origin, meaning “one who remains in power.” The coyote had the upper hand now, and O’Toole had to get it back. “I can market the relic,” O’Toole said. “I have a buyer. I told you that. In San Francisco. One hundred thousand dollars.”

He half-turned to see if Walberto was now holding a weapon, but the coyote’s hands were empty, and he waved O’Toole back to the front. “One hundred thousand dollars,” said Walberto. “No, I think it’s worth more now. Here, see what you think. Don’t turn around again, just put your right hand out to the side, palm up.”

O’Toole did so, and felt a hard scrap thrust into his grip. His pulse hammering, he brought it up before his eyes. A sliver of pine wood, seven inches long at least, calcified by age. He could see places where other slivers had been torn away, and he looked back through the centuries, thinking of the remnant being passed from hand to hand, hidden under cloaks, enclosed in velvet and leather cases, being spilled rudely on a carpet by burglars, slipped into pockets foul with tobacco, held reverently up to the light of forgotten dawns, always on the move, its destiny to wind up here, in his hand.

Walberto’s voice was urgent. “Put your finger in the blood.”

There was a crusty black splotch — not large — near one tip of the large splinter. O’Toole tried it with a thumb, and the surface broke and wept red. Hastily, he wiped his thumb on his robe, his heart beating faster.

“The blood of Jorge Canto,” intoned Walberto, “shed by us for the forgiveness of sins. And, I think, for two hundred thousand dollars minimum.”

O’Toole turned the remnant over to hide the red spot, and noted older, darker stains on the wood. He thought of Christ’s hands, torn by the nails, and the spear that had slashed into his side, bringing forth blood and water. Could the blood of Golgotha really have survived all these centuries, locked in the fibers of the wood? His faith urged him toward that conclusion, but Walberto had a different interpretation.

“You’re beginning to see it now, aren’t you, Father? Plenty of dudes like Jorge have died for that relic. That’s what makes it valuable. The price went way up the second I slipped that knife through his ribs.”

The coyote paused, and O’Toole could not bring himself to reply. He felt a crawling sensation between his shoulder blades, and envisioned Walberto’s knife blade, plunging again and again through skin, scraping bone, exploding blood vessels, releasing scarlet geysers of life-juice. Silence fell as they knelt there in the sweaty heat, with the shadows of the church smothering them. Then, somewhere outside the church, O’Toole heard a light scraping sound.

“Shit!” whispered Walberto. “There’s somebody out there. Let’s take this into the sin-box. We don’t want to be seen together.”

A happenstance visitor? O’Toole didn’t believe it. He hadn’t heard a vehicle engine since Walberto had pulled up, and even the sound of moving feet — some hiker extending his distance over desolate territory — would have reached them in the dead quiet within the church walls. Most likely it was a wild dog or an actual coyote, some beast that could have made the approach without attracting notice.

“All right,” O’Toole whispered back. He rose quickly, his big legs twitching, and started for the priest’s side of the confessional.

Walberto took his arm. “Let me go in that side,” the smuggler whispered, grinning. “I always wanted to try out that priest’s seat. Besides, maybe you have a sin to confess.”

O’Toole felt tightness in his throat. His mind blanked. Dumbly, he nodded, thinking desperately about favorable possibilities. The pistol might not be easy to see. Out of caution, he had tilted a missal up against it when he’d placed it on the small shelf next to the priest’s seat.

He made his way to the penitent’s door on the confessional and creaked it open. It stuck a bit. Things in the church had never worked exactly right for O’Toole. He wondered about that. On the other side, he could hear Walberto bumping around, then settling down. O’Toole knelt on the hard bench, his face inches from the mesh that covered the square hole between them.

The coyote’s breath rippled the cloth. “Aren’t you going to say it, Father?”

“Say what?”

“What you’re supposed to say — Bless me, Father, for I have sinned .”

Despite his nervousness, O’Toole felt anger rising in his throat. “You’re not a priest.”

The coyote was unfazed. “And are you a priest, Father? For sure? You sure do some slick things for a man of the cloth.”

“A man has to live,” O’Toole replied.

“Yes, that can be a problem.” Walberto seemed to be shifting around in the enclosed space. One of his elbows thumped the thin wall between them. “But once a priest, always a priest, even if you’re an asshole, right?”