Luís Rocha - The Holy Bullet

“No problem. I’m fine, and you?” If it weren’t for Cupid’s arrow, Simon would have noticed a certain impatience in the captain’s voice with talking for the sake of talking.

“Very well. I’m very well.” The same stupid smile spread over his mouth, a smile of happiness. “I’m going to transfer you, Senhor Raul. Have a good day.” If it hadn’t been for his lover on hold on the other line, Simon would have started a long conversation with Sarah’s father, whom he had not yet had a chance to meet. Better that he chose not to. Better for the two of them, of course.

He pressed the buttons to transfer the call to Sarah without telling her first, since his instructions were to send any family calls through directly.

“I’m back, my love,” he said with the same stupid grin and blush covering his face. “It was my boss’s father. Nothing important.”

Let us leave the love affair on that side and move on to Sarah’s office, where the telephone began to ring. It was not Simon; that would sound different-the marvels of technology-it was an outside call, and a glance at the screen identified the familiar number of the family home of her parents in Beja. She stopped the work she was doing and answered immediately.

“Hello?”

“Sarah?”

“Hi, Papa. Is everything all right?”

“Are you all right, Sarah?” One question followed another, as he completely ignored his daughter’s first concern.

“I’m fine.” Something’s wrong . Her father’s voice didn’t reflect his customary calm. The last time she’d heard this tone there was a man at the door of her old house in Belgrave Road preparing to kill her. And the only reason he didn’t was-

“Sarah, you need to pay attention to me,” her father ordered in a serious voice.

“What’s going on, Papa?” An anxiety returned that she hadn’t felt for a long time, a disagreeable sensation she hoped never to feel again.

“Listen, Sarah,” her father repeated. “Listen carefully. You have to leave London immediately-”

“Why?” she interrupted, her heart suddenly thumping with alarm. “Don’t treat me like a child. This time I want to know everything.”

Silence on the line, not total, punctuated by clicks and static electricity. Confusion and alarm spread through Sarah. The past was at the door like on that night. What the hell was going on?

“Papa?” She said his name to bring him back to earth.

“Sarah.” She heard a different voice that flooded her with panic and nervousness. Oh no. It can’t be him. Is it?

“JC?” she asked fearfully, hoping she was confused and had heard wrong. Please, no. Don’t let it be him .

“I’m honored you haven’t forgotten me.”

It was him. Her legs gave out; if it weren’t for the fact she was seated, she would have fallen on the floor.

“How are you since our last conversation in the Palatino?” he asked just to make small talk, something that was not part of his personality and awakened distrust in Sarah. She thought back on the conversation she’d had with JC in the Grand Hotel Palatino in Rome and the promise they would talk again. Almost a year later, this call kept that promise.

“What do you want? What are you doing in my parents’ house?” Sarah cut the formalities as she regained her reason. She couldn’t show her fear, no matter how much she felt it. This was the way to fight with people like this, without mincing words. JC was in Portugal, at her parents’ house, if the caller ID on the phone didn’t lie.

“Where are your manners, dear?” JC protested without hiding his sarcasm. “I’m having a pleasant conversation with your father, accompanied by a magnificent wine. We are at the most crucial point of our reunion, the reason he’s called you.”

“What do you want from us?” Her voice came out hard, as she wished, in spite of the inner turmoil that tormented her.

“I’m going to simplify things to make myself understood completely with no room for misunderstanding.”

“I’m all ears.”

A second of silence to get Sarah’s complete concentration. The old man knew how to get his listener’s attention. A gun to the head wasn’t always necessary.

“Leave London now. Bring what I left you in the Palatino and do not talk to anyone, warn anyone, or wait for anyone.”

“And if I don’t do what you ask me?” Sarah confronted him.

“In that case your father can prepare to ship your corpse back here because you’ll be eliminated today.”

Here we find the mortal remains of the patron of truck drivers, tunnel workers, hatmakers, pharmacists, haircutters, gentlemen and pilgrims, pilgrimages and roads, from Chile, Peru, Mexico, Colombia, Cuba, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Galicia, and Spain, and, to cut the long list short, the Spanish army. He is known by many names, Iacobus, Jacob, Jaco, James, Jacques, Jacome, Jaume, Jaime, but that which inspires most believers is Santiago. Santiago the Greater, apostle of Christ, killed by Herod’s sword, brother of the other apostle, Saint John the Evangelist, both sons of Salome and Zebediah.

The exact date is lost, thanks to the uncertainties of centuries when parchments were lost or consumed by the fire of despots or by the simple, implacable passage of time. In the year 813 or 814, Pelagius, a Christian hermit, told Teodomirus, the bishop of Iria Flavia, here in Galicia, about a star shining on a hill. There are also those who in this part of the legend, or truth, depending on how you see it, substitute strange lights or a sign from Heaven for the star. Whatever it was, it fell upon a specific place, an uninhabited hill, as if someone wanted to reveal something hidden. In this way Teodomirus found a tomb, and inside, a headless corpse with a head tucked under his arm, presumably his own. All the clues pointed to the corpse belonging to the apostle Santiago the Greater, forever immortalized as Santiago de Compostela, not to be confused with Santiago the Lesser, one of the other twelve followers of Christ. Legend or not, millions of people have visited this sacred place. For twelve centuries.

Here in the Praza do Obradoiro, Marius Ferris was moved by the silence of the place. He looked at the ornate facade of the cathedral, back to back with the Pazo Raxoi, occupied by today’s Xunta de Galicia, a neoclassical-style building, built by the Archbishop Raxoi, in the same century in which the building of the cathedral of Santiago was finished, the eighteenth, which one ought to represent with Roman numerals naturally. The other buildings were ancient, as well. Marius Ferris ignored them as he continued looking closely at the facade of the cathedral. The history did not matter to Marius Ferris, not even the paving stones trod by commoners and nobles. One who knew him, and there were not many who could presume so, would know he was remembering the more than twenty years since he last saw the cathedral, separated from this place that was his home. His thick white hair crowned an entire life, years of absence, spent in other places much more cosmopolitan. He had exchanged a small Galician city of eighty thousand people for another of eight million on the other side of the Atlantic. This was the cost of being a priest and following orders. A priest wasn’t asked to move to New York for twenty years. He was ordered. The life of a priest was determined by the bishop, the cardinal, and, of course, the pope. Never God. He was involved in the first calling; the organizational machinery of the religious authorities took care of the rest. And of course, since His Holiness was the emissary of God on earth, everything was connected.

That was what happened with Marius Ferris, exiled to Manhattan, a dream for many, but not for him. While he looked at the facade, he smiled. His exile was over. Not that he hadn’t liked the Big Apple. In some ways he’d loved it: the cultural, ethnic diversity, the museums, the theater, everything for every taste, as is often said. Yes, he was in a pleasing city and served the pope, the great John Paul II, with zeal and ability. Even now there was nothing negative his superiors could use against him. The opposite was not so true. After a year serving Benedict XVI, he’d decided to ask for a dispensation, for reasons that are not important here, but which led his life to an unstable, dangerous situation, in his own modest estimation. The truth was that he was almost killed by someone and that shook him.