Kenneth Oppel - Such Wicked Intent

“Did they make the drawings in the caves?” I asked.

“Ah, Victor,” said my father, turning. “I’m glad you’re back. Professor Neumeyer has been kind enough to take a look at our recent discovery.”

“All too briefly,” he said, shaking my hand in a grip that was almost painful. “And, no, young sir, the Celts did not make those paintings. I believe they are altogether older.”

“How much older?” Elizabeth asked.

The professor shrugged his powerful shoulders. “I’ve never seen anything like them. They were made no doubt by an ancient hunting culture. Look here.” He pulled something from his pocket. “Their tools were primitive but ingenious as well. This stick of carved bone is stained with pigment at both ends-an early brush, I believe.”

“There were strange geometric symbols,” I said. “Did you see them?”

The professor’s bushy eyebrows lifted. “Indeed I did.”

“They had language,” I said.

“Ah, now there’s a question. Those markings seem purposeful, so I say yes. But it’s a codex I’ve never encountered. I made a transcription and mean to send it to a colleague of mine in France who discovered something similar in caves near Lascaux. I’m hopeful he’ll be able to translate them for me.” He looked at my father. “Alphonse, you’ve got a true treasure here. There are surely chambers and galleries yet to be discovered. I’d like to bring some artists to make a record of the paintings, and some colleagues to help make a thorough examination of the site.”

My father nodded. “I’d never hinder such an undertaking. The house is open to you.”

“I’d like to go to Mass,” Elizabeth said as we were finishing a late lunch after the professor had departed.

I knew that she only ever asked to go to Mass during a weekday when she was distraught. The last time was when Konrad was very ill and she’d wanted to light a candle for him. I had a fair idea what was bothering her, but it irritated me she was drawing attention to it. I looked over at Father, wondering if he suspected anything.

But all he said, somewhat distractedly, was, “Of course. Victor and Henry can take you.”

Before Konrad’s death it had always been his job to take Elizabeth to and from Mass in the nearby village of Bellerive, and he’d used this time alone with her, I later learned, to woo her. And she’d also used the time to slowly and secretly start converting him to the Church of Rome.

As I drove the horse and carriage down the lake road, I couldn’t resist asking her playfully, “So are we leaving you at the church permanently? Have you chosen your wimple yet?”

She tried to give me a withering look, but I could see the mirth behind her eyes.

Sitting between us, Henry turned to her in genuine alarm. “You’re not serious! That’s not happening today, is it?”

Elizabeth and I laughed together.

“No, Henry,” she said. “I won’t be joining the convent just yet.”

“Thank God,” murmured Henry.

“Any day now, though,” I said, and then a worrying thought halted my chuckling. I looked at Elizabeth sternly. “You don’t mean to confess anything, do you?”

“That’s really none of your business,” she said. “And even if I did, the priest is sworn to secrecy.”

“This is true,” Henry said.

“Still,” I said through gritted teeth, “it would be best if you didn’t go whispering our secrets to anyone else.”

“Well,” said Elizabeth, unable to restrain a smile, “why not come right into the church with me, to make sure I don’t go on a whispering spree.”

“I think I will,” I said as I guided the horses into the churchyard.

“Good. Henry, you’re most welcome to join us too.”

“I’ll wait outside, thank you,” said Henry, who worshipped at the Calvinist church.

“Better hurry, Victor,” she said tauntingly over her shoulder as she lifted her skirts and ran toward the entrance. “I’m feeling very contrite. Who knows what I might confess!”

I ran after her. During the service I waited at the back, watching Elizabeth like a hawk, to make sure she didn’t try to duck into a confessional booth. But she seemed intent only on her own prayers, and after a while I wandered into a side chapel where, above the altar, there was an oil painting of Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead.

The Bible was not a book I was terribly familiar with, but this story I did know.

In the picture Jesus radiated light, his hand outstretched toward Lazarus, whose body was still partially wound in burial linens. Yet his eyes were open, one arm flexed to help push himself upright. All around, people were staring in amazement. Some swooned; others wept in joy, or perhaps terror.

I stared so long that I didn’t notice that parishioners were leaving the church, and that Elizabeth was at my side.

“I might’ve slipped into confession without you knowing,” she said mischievously.

“Did you?” I asked sharply.

“No. It’s very moving, isn’t it?” She nodded at the painting.

“Do you really believe such a thing can be done?” I asked her.

“Of course. By God.”

“Then why not ask Him?”

She said nothing.

“Have you asked?” I persisted.

“Please don’t be disrespectful, here of all places.”

I wasn’t trying to be disrespectful. I was genuinely curious. “Surely you want Konrad back as much as the rest of us. More, maybe. So why wouldn’t you ask, if you believed in such astonishing power?”

“Miracles were rare even when Jesus walked the earth. Lazarus was a friend of His, and people needed to believe, to know He was the son of God.”

I stared back at the painting, at the power emanating from Jesus’s body like a corona.

“Is it because you don’t really believe it can be done?” I asked.

She sighed. “When Konrad died, I prayed for his soul to go straight to heaven. Death is part of life, Victor. I hate it, but I’ve accepted it.”

“When he died,” I told her, “I made myself a promise at the crypt. I promised myself I would bring him back.”

“That was not a good promise.”

I pointed at the painting. “What if I can achieve the same thing?”

She put her fingers to my lips to stop me.

I grabbed her hand. “Please come and help me.”

Slowly she shook her head.

“Henry and I will go alone, then,” I said with a sigh, releasing her hand. I looked down, forlorn, but watched her from the corner of my eye. “Konrad will miss you. When I think of him in there alone… Well, he’s got Analiese, of course. She must be a great comfort to him.”

“Can’t you see I’m at war with myself?” she whispered, her eyes wet. “I want him back! My memory of him is so intense, it mocks reality.”

“Then help me make a new reality.”

The church’s stained glass darkened briefly as a cloud passed over the sun.

“God is the sovereign master of life, Victor, not us.”

“Rules, and then more rules,” I muttered savagely. “They can all be broken. You love him too much to let this chance pass!”

Her breath slipped out of her, and I sensed her resolve falter.

“You don’t know what it cost me, going in just that once,” she said, and then with resignation added, “I may already have eternally damned myself.”

I grinned. “In that case what do you have to lose?”

A drop upon the tongue and we are here, all three.

I sit up on my bed and turn to Henry, seated in the chair at my desk, hands in his lap, eyes just opening. Here is my oldest friend, and yet it takes me a moment to recognize him. His frame seems more substantial, the lines of his once slender face wider, his wispy hair more abundant, the jaw harder.