J. Powers - The Stories of J.F. Powers

That was how he acted one evening early in December when Monsignor Holstein — once rector of the Cathedral, Vicar-General of the diocese, and the Bishop’s right-hand man, now only pastor of St John Nepomuk’s, New Pilsen — said, “ Wie geht’s ? You’re sorely missed these days, John.”

The Bishop invited Monsignor Holstein to sit down, which he did, in his white socks, saying, “Like old times, John.”

Again the Bishop acted as if he hadn’t heard, for, while agreeing it was like old times — the two of them together again at the Webb at the corner table, where they’d so often gone into the problems of the diocese and planned the campaigns — he was also regretting his later treatment of Monsignor Holstein, who had taken it so well at the time and recently had contributed his full pastor’s share toward the farewell gift. Not vindictive, a good man in his way, Monsignor Holstein, but an idealist. Life had certainly been less difficult for the Bishop and others, including, unfortunately, the humanists at the normal school and the management of the Orpheum, after the man left town. Never content to leave well enough alone, always after the Bishop to do something — always something — Monsignor Holstein might have risen even higher, or stayed where he was, but for that weakness. And it came out again that evening at the Webb, with the cigars, when he spoke of this woman, a Mrs Nagel, in the country who thought she’d seen an apparition of Our Lady in a tree on several likely occasions. Always something, yes.

Oh, the Bishop agreed that it would take something sensational to get people thinking along more spiritual lines these days, and that this could be it, and, if so, that it would be a great thing for the diocese. But this woman’s pastor, a reliable man, and this woman’s husband, also reliable, a school-bus driver — they weren’t too sympathetic, the Bishop understood, and that, while not unheard of in such cases (“Those closest to the scene are often the last to believe, John”), settled it for the Bishop. “See the Auxiliary,” he said — he still thought of Bishop Gau as the Auxiliary — and let it stand.

“Saw him this afternoon, John.”

Yes, the Bishop from his window had watched Monsignor Holstein arrive at the Chancery that afternoon. “What’d he say?”

“Can’t give credence to this woman. Too many fakes.”

Yes, but if the Bishop were to visit this woman mightn’t he give credence to her? Monsignor Holstein seemed to think not. A slap in the face, wasn’t it? Yes, but wasn’t that what being retired was? So far, there had been — and, yes, there would be — fewer Christmas cards for him this year. It was the office that mattered, and nowhere more than in the Church — which otherwise would be just another institution and the gates of Hell would prevail against it. “The Auxiliary’s right.”

“ John, what if he’s wrong? ”

“ He’d still be right.” The Bishop knew what he meant. “ He’s the Bishop now.”

Monsignor Holstein said, “History hasn’t been kind to the hierarchy in these cases, John.”

Late that night, on his knees in his pajamas in the hallway, the Bishop pushed two envelopes under the door of the Chancery office, each envelope containing a Christmas card and a check, each check annotated some months earlier (in case he died unexpectedly): “Much obliged but can be put to better use, =J.D.” And then he went to bed again, and this time he slept.

Traveling north the next afternoon in the Mercedes, he had no trouble until, a mile past Fahrenheit, turning off U.S. 52, he was fiercely honked at by a truck. He activated his turn signal to make amends, and drove, flashing and drumming, down a crushed-rock road a half-mile or so, coming then to a white farmhouse with an orange school bus in the driveway and, parked behind the bus, a car, the color of which was reassuring. With his signal still flashing, right, he turned in, left, and came to rest behind the black car.

Monsignor Holstein materialized alongside the Mercedes — so it seemed to the Bishop, who’d been having trouble again with his seat belt. They went around to the back of the house, Monsignor Holstein saying the front door wasn’t used in cold weather, the Bishop assessing the Nagel property, noting the windbreak of blue spruce, the only sizable trees, though there were many seedlings.

Lest Mrs Nagel, perhaps put up to it by Monsignor Holstein, attempt to kiss the episcopal ring, which was a practice best confined to the clergy these days, the Bishop kept his gloves on — a needless precaution. Mrs Nagel was more concerned with Monsignor Holstein and his glasses, which had misted over in the warm kitchen, and which she polished with a linen towel while he stood blindly by, the Bishop enjoying the scene as one who, though older, wore glasses only for reading. In Mrs Nagel, who was blond, fairly young, fifty or so, he thought he saw the perky, useful, down-to-earth type of woman, a type he associated with hospital nuns and airline stewardesses, and liked, but he wondered that he didn’t see something else in her .

“Now, shoo!” she said when she’d finished with the glasses, and returned to the cake she was frosting.

So the Bishop and Monsignor Holstein, both smiling — both firm believers in the supremacy of women in certain areas — left the kitchen and passed through the dining room, where, as in the kitchen, there were numerous plants, and on into the living room, where there were many more. Yes, all kinds of green, growing things (some, in tubs, were immense), and so thick that the Bishop, settling down on the settee, and Monsignor Holstein, over by the TV, which was crawling with vines, had to look through a gap in order to see each other face to face.

“What’d I tell you, John?”

“What?”

“She’s a real homemaker.”

“Yes.” Yes, that was in Mrs Nagel’s favor, from the human standpoint. But when the Bishop thought of spiritual phenomena (of which he had no firsthand experience) he thought of way-out types. And that Mrs Nagel wasn’t one of them, that she wasn’t, according to Monsignor Holstein, unusually devout — only went to Mass on Sundays and holy days of obligation, to confession once a month — that she was to all appearances just a good, average Catholic, and not some kind of nut, was not in her favor, in the Bishop’s view. That, though, was what was so wonderful about this case, according to Monsignor Holstein, who, though — in interpreting it as he did, as a sign from Heaven that the traditional precepts and practices of the Church were still O.K. — might have a vested interest, the Bishop feared. Monsignor Holstein, like many pastors in re-cent years, had been under considerable pressure from curates, parishioners, and media, all crying change, change, change. The Bishop had been under similar pressure but could be more objective now, being retired, and the truth was he couldn’t see this woman, though he’d liked her in the kitchen, as one specially chosen by Heaven.

No, and when she came into the living room and sat where he could see her, beside him on the settee, he still couldn’t see her in that role. Nor could he while, over coffee and cake, they listened to her story, which was on tape because she’d had so many visitors and dreaded repeating it. (“The Little Flower felt the same way,” said Monsignor Holstein.) The Bishop resented that — the Little Flower, after all, was a canonized saint of many years’ standing — and after he’d heard the tape, which he also resented, believing an exception should have been made in his case, he was silent.

“Bishop, you’re free to ask questions,” said Monsignor Holstein, whom the Bishop, since moving over on the settee for Mrs Nagel, could no longer see.