William Kienzle - Masquerade

The fare was simple. A fruit salad in gelatin, beef broth, lamb, red potatoes, steamed vegetables. Simple but well prepared. Everyone partook of everything and all seemed to enjoy the food.

Conversion was not that enjoyable. Janet and Martha, mostly, attempted to introduce topics, but no verbal balloon stayed aloft. Awkward. It was awkward. But Koesler had expected little else.

Toward the end of the meal, Krieg spoke. “Praise God! You know,” he said jovially, “there’s one person here we’ve heard precious little from.” Pause. “Father Koesler. Here we were, runnin’ off at the mouth all afternoon, and there’s the good Father just sittin’ there takin’ it all in.”

If he had intended to embarrass Koesler by singling him out in this less-than-friendly atmosphere, Krieg was succeeding.

“After all,” Krieg continued, “you are a bona fide member of this panel. So, Praise God! Let’s hear it, Father. Your opinion of religion. Dull or not? I mean basically?” His very tone betrayed flippancy. It was as if the “father of the family” had taken the reins and the conversation was now well in hand.

Koesler, taken by surprise, swallowed injudiciously and started to cough. Winer and Benbow pounded his back. Benbow was about to apply the Heimlich Maneuver but Koesler waved him off. Things were getting under control.

Koesler’s complexion was florid. And he was embarrassed not only that he’d been singled out by Krieg like a child forced to recite, but also because he had almost choked to death.

“Sorry,” he said, as his system returned to normal. “Something got stuck. I’m all right now.”

“Well,” Krieg declared, “that’s a blessing. Praise God!”

“Yes. Well, to the point. When you introduced the supposition, the first thought I had was of all the dull homilies, sermons, religion classes I have been forced to sit through. And I was tempted to agree with your hypothesis. But I must confess, I didn’t stay with that thought very long. I can’t think of any book as worthy of study, reading, inspiration, or meditation as the Bible. To those of us for whom God is our beginning and our destiny, there isn’t anything more exciting than religion.

“So I guess it comes down to what you mean by religion. If you mean religion secondhand, as it’s communicated by very poor communicators, I suppose it can be-and is-pretty dreadful and painfully dull.

“Or think of it this way: There is no dull religion, just dull religious communicators.”

Koesler expected Krieg to be peeved or at least annoyed.But Krieg was beaming. “Couldn’t have said it better myself. Praise God!”

“But, this afternoon. .”Koesler began.

“This afternoon,” Krieg repeated, “this afternoon was salesmanship.”

“Salesmanship!” Winer exclaimed.

“Indeed, salesmanship. You must have sensed it. .” Krieg looked around the table at the others. “Each of us told the students, in the most gracious and benign manner, what we intended to cover during the coming week. We were so benevolent and ingratiating the audience was drifting off to sleep. They needed to be awakened, made eager to get into these workshops. That’s the function I served. Woke ’em up.”

“Then you didn’t really mean it? About religion being dull?” Koesler asked.

“’Course not.” Krieg smiled. “Just like our friend the rabbi here said this afternoon. ‘Greatest Story Ever Told!’”

Did the man ever say what was really on his mind, Koesler wondered. Yet Krieg had just provided an autobiographical footnote. He was in essence a salesman. Probably missed his calling. Should have been a salesman, not an evangelist. On the other hand, Krieg probably wouldn’t see a lot of difference between the two.

“Then,” Koesler said, “what about the topics of sex and violence and the like? Did you mean what you said about that?”

“Well, now that’s another question. Lemmee take your own words, Padre, spoken just a moment ago. As I ’member, you said somethin’ about, ‘There is no dull religion, just dull religious commentators.’ That about right?”

Koesler nodded. He was pretty sure where Krieg was headed.

“Well,” Krieg said, “some people were just born boring, poor souls. They’re gonna be boring all their blessed lives. Nothin’ for it. They’re gonna be boring bus drivers or boring sewer workers. They’re gonna be boring lovers, husbands, wives, parents. So we can forget them ever bein’ a big success at anything, including evangelism.

“But even people with a knack for communication aren’t successful just by rollin’ out of bed each morning. The salesperson has to have a pitch, a tool-a way of making his service or product attractive to the buyer. And the tool, if it’s gonna work, isn’t necessarily something the salesman prizes. It’s something the buyer finds appealing, attractive, compelling, irresistible!”

Krieg paused. His glance moved from one to another of those present as if expecting someone to complete his premise.

Koesler tried supplying a conclusion. “And you believe that what the audience, the viewer, the reader finds compelling and irresistible is violence and sex.”

“Graphic violence, explicit sex,” Winer added.

Smiling broadly, Krieg turned both palms upward, indicating a self-evident truth. “What sells? Ladies and gentlemen, what does the American public shell out its cash for?”

“Not always,” Marie protested, avoiding a direct answer to Krieg’s almost rhetorical question. “The public appreciates things done tastefully.”

“Such as. .?” Krieg challenged.

“In entertainment, information, education?” Winer said. “Lots of things. The classics. Music: Beethoven, Mozart, Brahms, Gershwin, Copland. They still fill concert halls and will till the end of time. The theater: Shakespeare, O’Neill, O’Casey, Miller. Literature: Chaucer, Cooper, Poe, Dickens, James, Wolfe. Television, for God’s sake: some of the fine series produced by the BBC. You know the names as well as I. Not all of them lost in the mists of history either. Contemporaries. Lots of them.”

It was doubtful that Winer had shaken Krieg. In any case, no one could tell from his continuing smile.

Nearly everyone had finished eating. Dishes were being cleared away. However, because he’d been talking steadily, Krieg was well behind the others. But when the waitress reached him, he indicated he was finished, and his dishes, still containing considerable food, were removed. Dessert and coffee were then served. All the women, none of the men, accepted the apple pie. Only Janet took cream with her coffee.

“You’re quite right, Rabbi. .” Krieg, stirring his coffee in an attempt to cool it, returned to the fray. “I do know the familiar names. But I’m not talking about literature or art that lasts forever. We are dealing with a pop culture.” His expression altered to one of sympathy. “Sad as it is to say, still, realistically, we cannot hope that all the books you have written are going to be on people’s shelves as long as, say, Shakespeare.” A small, consoling chuckle.

“We all know,” Krieg continued, “the Bible is the all-time best-seller in the history of the world. I dare say it would be difficult to find an American home-almost impossible to find a hotel room-without one.” One more chuckle for the Gideon Society. “And in all these homes and rooms, how many of these Bibles are read?” He left that truly rhetorical question hanging.

“Meanwhile,” he went on, “what sort of book does the great unwashed American public buy? Ever see people selecting a book in a supermarket, book chain, airport newsstand? Not War and Peace.

“Ever notice the general run of covers publishers put on paperbacks, the type of dustjacket on hardcovers?” Pause-a dramatic pause.