Clifford Simak - Project Pope

'Decker, said Tennyson, 'seems to think he may know where Heaven is. I talked with him the other day-

'How would he know? asked Ecuyer. 'How could he know?

'He didn't say and I didn't ask. He has a phobia about his privacy. You do not ask him questions. I think he might have expected me to, but I didn't. And having said what he said, he said no more.

'You should have asked him, said Jill. 'He may have wanted you to ask.

'I don't think I should have asked. I may be wrong, but I had the feeling he was setting up some sort of test. He gave me several openings to ask questions on other matters and I asked nothing. I was burning to, of course, but I managed to keep quiet. He's a strange man. Things were going well and I meant to keep them that way.

'I think, said Ecuyer, 'that all these years we have written Decker off as a sort of freak. A loner, which he certainly is. A man standing apart and wanting to stand apart. Jason is the first one to get anything like close to him. That could be valuable; we don't want to throw it away. I feel there may be far more to the man than any of us have guessed.

Hubert came in with a new-brewed pot of coffee and refilled their cups, then, saying nothing to them, went back to the kitchen.

'He's still huffy at me, said Ecuyer. 'I chewed him out the other day. He told Tennyson, 'You have to do it now and then. Keep him in line.

'One thing you have to say about him, said Tennyson. 'He makes a splendid cup of coffee.

'One thing I want to know, said Jill. 'Is Mary human? Is she still human? How many of the Listeners are human?

'Why, of course Mary's human, said Ecuyer. 'Why should you ask?

'The Listeners, said Jill, 'have had so many — what would you call them — other-worldly, perhaps — so many other-worldly experiences and not only that, but so often they have been or have seemed to be other-worldly creatures — I guess that I've been wondering how, in the face of all this, they have managed to retain their humanity.

'I've often wondered the same thing, said Ecuyer. 'But no matter how often I have wondered, I have never dared to talk with any of them about it, to ask them about it. With sensitives most times you have to walk on eggs. All of them are strong personalities. Maybe that's what saves them. Maybe a strong personality is a prerequisite for being a sensitive. But despite their strong personalities and deep strengths of character, many times they are haunted by their experiences. There are those who do refuse to go back to what they've found — willing to go on to something else, but not to what they've touched before. But there's never been a crack-up. No single sensitive has ever become unstuck.

Ecuyer finished off his coffee. 'I suppose, he said, 'I best had go and talk with Mary. Jason, do you want to come along?

'I think not, said Tennyson. 'I'm not her favorite person.

'Right now, neither am I.

'You've known her for a long time. That should help.

'Maybe it will, said Ecuyer. 'Well, I'll be seeing you. After he was gone, Jill and Tennyson sat for a time in silence, then Jill said, 'It seems to me, Jason, we may be coming on something. I have that feeling in my bones.

Tennyson nodded. 'If Mary goes back to Heaven and if she does find something, if she finds more than she found before…

'I don't think I rightly understand what's going on, said Jill.

'Vatican is divided in a funny sort of way. What's dividing it? Oh, I understand some of it, but not all. The worst is that I don't know what Vatican is. Is it a religion or a research think-tank? What does Vatican expect to find?

'I would doubt, said Tennyson, 'that Vatican itself knows what it expects to find.

'I've been thinking about the cardinal — I think it was Roberts, wasn't it? — who said we will not be allowed to leave.

'That's what he said, Tennyson told her. 'Saying it almost in passing. I don't know how hard the decision is.

'At the moment, said Jill, 'the decision, for me, is an academic one. I can't leave right now. I'm just beginning to dig out the history of Vatican. When I write my book-

'Your book? I thought it was Vatican's book.

'My book, she insisted. 'It will sell billions of copies. I'll wade in money up to my navel. I'll never have to work again. I can buy anything I want.

'If you can leave End of Nothing.

'Look, friend, Jill goes where she wants to go, when she wants to go. There never was a place she couldn't leave, never a spot so tight she couldn't wiggle out of it.

'Well, bully for you, said Tennyson. 'When you go, will you take me along?

'If you want to go, she said.

It was as it had been before — the broad and singing road of light that reached deep into the distance, arrowing straight into the burst of glory that lay far and far and far. She was well above the road in a void that ached with emptiness; she was moving through the void toward the singing road, but not fast enough. She strained every nerve and fiber to speed her to that road of glory.

This time, she told herself, I will look the better. I will impress upon myself certain landmarks and certain signs and I will know where I am so I can tell them where I was, so I can offer proof of Heaven. For they did not believe me — and this time they must all believe. There must be no doubt or quibble. Coordinates, Ecuyer said, and what are coordinates? How do I find the coordinates that will convince them? For there might be none except those of faith, and in these they must believe. This time I must bring to them the faith that will force unquestioning belief, so that they may know I am the one who found Heaven for them.

I know what they want, she told herself. They want me to bring back a roadmap so they can crank up their ridiculous machines and follow me to Heaven. The fools, she thought, at once enraged and sad at their foolishness — the fools believe they can go physically to Heaven, not knowing that for mortals Heaven is — what had that moron of a doctor called it? — a state of mind. And he was wrong, she thought, he with his professionally kind face, his mincing devotion to his science. For Heaven is not a state of mind; it is a state of grace. And I alone, of all of them, am the only one who has attained the state of grace required to seek out Heaven.

The state of grace so laboriously attained, and yet, perhaps, not laboriously, for there had been no labor in it, no labor, but a striving — a striving toward that deep sense of holiness, the selfless submission of one's self to a sweet authority. And at times, with all the striving, managing to touch the hem of holiness, but never grasping it; at times stripping away all thought of self, and then a stray, feebly wriggling, impossible-to-suppress thought of self creeping back again to cuddle against the emptiness to which it had been condemned. She never had attained her goal, she reminded herself — but enough, it seemed, to tread this road of glory that now lay just before her.

She came out of the void and her feet seemed to touch the road, although it did not feel like any road she had walked before. It was smooth and shining and it stretched straight before her, with the burst of glory far away. Perhaps, she thought, too far for her to walk. And what would she do, what could she do, if out of sheer exhaustion, out of lack of strength, she should collapse upon the road before she came in sight of the shining, lofty towers?

But there seemed to be no problem, for she did not have to walk. Somehow or other, she was being wafted down the road with never a step to take. The music and the singing welled all around her and she wondered for a moment if it was the singing, the strength of sonorous song, that carried her along.

She seemed to hang in a strange lassitude, with a mist closing all around her so that she saw only the road and the glory burst at the end of it, although the lassitude was tinged with a consuming joy and she moved along the road through no effort of her own, as if a gentle tide had caught her and was carrying her toward a far-off shore. The music became more glorious and the light seemed to grow the brighter: She closed her eyes against the brightness of the light and a holiness (a holiness?) caught her up and held her.