Agnes Among the Gargoyles (12 page)

   "I always shop here," says Mrs. Tisch. "No sales tax in New Jersey."

   "You're not the treasurer for nothing," says Agnes.

   Sarah climbs into the Mercedes. Mrs. Tisch's friend walks on ahead. Mrs. Tisch and Agnes quickly run out of conversation.

   "So I guess I'll see you at the next meeting," says Agnes.

   "I look forward to it," says Mrs. Tisch. "And by the way, Agnes, I can't believe you never told me."

   "Told you what?"

   "Let's not be coy," says Mrs. Tisch. She smiles knowingly. "Don't you think I recognize Miss Clavelle's tartan?"

Agnes drops off the kid and the car, and after discussing the damage done to the Mercedes with Mrs. Blair Stanhope (who doesn't seem to understand why Agnes would even mention such a thing; the garage people will see it and make the repairs, and that's the end of that) puts the Wegemans out of her mind. Greta Anselm, who wanted Agnes to teach her Tae Kwon Do, calls Agnes in near hysterics. Agnes thinks at first they must be bulldozing the Woolworth Building, but the problem turns out to be something considerably less dramatic: Jessica Sanborne has died in her sleep.

   Most of the Telamones Society attends the funeral. Agnes goes, too, but as a poor person among the wealthy, she can't help but feel a little foolish. Jessica Sanborne had a rich full life, a life heaped with marvelous experiences, and Agnes can't work up much grief for the old dear. The rich they stick together: Madelaine Wegeman sits in the fourth row of the church, even though Jessica often professed hatred of her husband. Madelaine and Jessica worked together for the library, or for Art Comes To The Schools, or something—Agnes would have to check with Barbara-and whatever relationship they had would surely have been tested had Jessica lived. St. Basil's church, site of Jessica's funeral, stands on a parcel of land owned by Ronald Wegeman. The church's lease is up, and the Great Man needs the land to proceed with the Times Square Redevelopment Project. He has stated his eagerness to demolish St. Basil's. Jessica Sanborne told reporters that would be a "tragedy."

   The funeral Mass is celebrated by Father Matthew Clarence.

   "Our Lord Jesus Christ understood the nobility of the brewer's and vintner's arts," he says during his sermon. His voice is just above a whisper. His hands rest on the heads of the serpents that wind, caduceus-like, around the pulpit. "We are not told, in John's account of the Cannan wedding feast, about the cutting of the cake or the snapping of the garter or the father-daughter dance. But we know about the wine. The festivities could not have continued without the wine."

   Father Clarence is an old-fashioned Notre Dame-style priest, built like a fullback, skilled in oratory, very much in the world. He has great power and presence. Agnes loves him. She feels a great nostalgia for the all-powerful Catholic church of her childhood, and watching Matt Clarence holding a congregation spellbound she can almost forget the degree to which Catholicism has become vestigial. The only people who go to church anymore are old ladies.

   "I don't like our society's confusion," says Father Clarence. "I don't like it that people don't go to church because it bores them, as though the Eucharistic sacrifice were supposed to be like a company picnic. I don't like it that newborn babies are stuffed into bus station lockers because the responsibilities of parenthood are just too great. I don't like it that the pleasures of sex are equated with oxygen and bread as necessities for life. And I don't like to hear Jessica Sanborne vilified for manufacturing Gotham Amber, Gotham Lager, and Gotham Premium Porter. Beer and wine and the other earthly pleasures are gifts from God to be used wisely, my friends. It is not the brewers who need our prayers but rather those of weak will and no faith who become enslaved to their products."

   Agnes listens with great pleasure to this apologia for the Sanborne family business. Father Clarence has spent his twenty-five years at St. Basil's cuddling up to the wealthy and powerful, and Agnes would bet that he's been known to put away a drink or two. Agnes derives a masochistic thrill from his tongue-lashing. There's nothing like an abusive, berating sermon from a self-righteous priest to get the heart pumping in the morning.

   Today's clerics are such poor sticks, she thinks. They're far too concerned with their own piety. Father Clarence recognizes his mandate as a spiritual
leader;
he knows how to work a congregation. As he gets deeper into the sermon Agnes halfexpects him to loosen his collar, like Jerry Lewis at the end of the telethon.

   Father Clarence's association with St. Basil's is appropriate, for St. Basil's has always been the church of the theater and underworld. Disgraced politicians, bagmen and whores, the notorious Indian gangster V.D. Garg—all, at one time or another, have been publicly embraced by St. Basil's, and St. Basil's has profited from this generosity of spirit. There has never been a shortage of money. The church building is in tip-top shape; the sanctuary is heavy with paintings and statuary.

   The Great Man and Father Clarence have scheduled a meeting with the Cardinal and the mayor to iron out their real estate differences, but the battle has already begin in the pages of the tabloids.

   FR. MATT: RON A "MONEYLENDER IN THE TEMPLE" "And remember what happened to them," priest warns

   WEEGE: WHAT'S ALL THIS FUSS ABOUT A CHURCH THAT'S ALWAYS EMPTY ANYHOW?

   Blasts Clarence for "criminally boring" sermons

   Promises to lease space to St. Basil's in new hotel/office/residence monsterplex slated for church's site

   "A meeting room is all you'll need," says billionaire

   THE CLERIC AND THE CONDOS:

   FR. MATT CLARENCE SAYS THAT ANY MAN WHO WOULD TEAR DOWN A CHURCH WOULD WISH ILL ON HIS OWN MOTHER

   RON CALLS SHOCKER PRESS CONFERENCE AT NURSING HOME

   Mother endorses St. Basil Plan

   Fanny Wegeman, 92, on respirator

   Great Man jokes about building 30 story abortion clinic on St. Basil's site "Just to get Clarence's goat."

   At the conclusion of the service, Father Clarence returns to the pulpit. "Jessica told me once that there was one sound she loved more than any other. She told me that nothing brought more peace to her soul than the sound of a carillon on Sunday morning. Our carillon has been silent for many years, but I can think of no more fitting occasion for it to sound again."

   The priest gives a little nod, and the church is filled with a thundering, crashing, deafening pealing of bells. Father Clarence seems entranced by the pomp and power of the display. Agnes just finds it uncomfortably loud. The church seems to buzz and shake. Is it Agnes's imagination? Apparently not. She watches a crack forming in the wall, right next to one of the confessionals. Father Clarence waves his arms to stop the carillon.

   "They warned me about that," he says.

   A crowd gathers around the priest as he probes the crack. Large chunks of plaster fall away, exposing the brickwork beneath.

   "It's a miracle," says Agnes.

   She threads her way to where the priest is standing.

   "Look at how the bricks are laid out, Father," she says, pointing. "Flemish bond. Look how the headers and stretchers alternate."

   Upset by the damage, the priest just shakes his head.

   "Headers are bricks with the end facing out. Stretchers have the side facing out," Agnes explains. "Header, stretcher, header, stretcher. That's Flemish bond."

   Now Malthus Grosvenor is right there with her, and several other key players in the Telamones Society. Grosvenor says, "Flemish bond is a characteristic of Federal architecture. From Greek Revival on, the bricks are set in running bond, which has only stretchers. After 1800, only one architect that we know of insisted on Flemish bond for his brick surfaces."

   "Conforte," says Agnes. "He had a fetish for it."

   The priest brushes the plaster dust from his hands. "This church was designed by William Waldrych."

   "That's what they
say,"
sniffs Agnes.

   "I'm not the only one who sees Conforte's hand all over the place," says Grosvenor. "Do you know what this means?"

   "New evidence for the landmarks commission," says Agnes. She finds herself saying this directly to Madelaine, who has joined the crowd of the curious at the wall. Her daughter is right beside her. Sarah wears a long shapeless dress and wool tights and a burgundy beret.

   "Has St. Basil's been saved?" says Malthus Grosvenor rhetorically.

   "This is a beautiful church," says Madelaine. She is hesitant, not on her turf, but happy for a chance to come out on the side of the angels. "If you can show that St. Basil's should be landmarked, then no way is Ron going to tear it down. It just won't happen."

   The Telamones Society murmurs its appreciation.

   "My husband is interested in progress, not destruction," says Madelaine.

   Father Clarence is joined by his ascetic-looking assistant. Father Clarence gives him the names of people who must be called: architects and a structural engineer and, in Wisconsin, the manufacturers of the carillon.

   Sarah whispers in Agnes's ear. "They forget who they're dealing with. You know what my father will say, don't you?"

   "What?"

   "He'll say that it ain't fuckin' landmarked yet," she says, in gravelly imitation of the Great Man, "and then he'll send out a crew in the middle of the night to tear the place down."

   She knows her father very well, yet is still under his spell. She is proud of his cunning ways. This shouldn't surprise Agnes, who has known many women with a weakness for delinquents.

   "People don't like it when he does things like that," says Agnes.

   "Daddy's not afraid," she says. She points to Madelaine. "She's petrified, but not him."

   The priest resumes his position with the altar boys about midway down the church's nave.

   "We're sorry for the delay, Jessica," he says. "But I think you can see it was worth it."

   Father Clarence leads the casket out the front door of the church. On the steps of the church, Agnes discusses the remarkable turn of events with other Telamones members, then joins Sarah and Madelaine, who are arguing.

   "I don't agree with everything he said," says Madelaine, "but he has a lovely presence."

   "He's a fascist," says Sarah. "Remember what he said about the poor?"

   "All he said was that we'd always have poor people with us. I believe he was quoting."

   "Father Clarence said the world needs poor people," says Sarah insistently. "He said we need laborers and farmhands and factory workers. He basically endorsed sweatshops. He said the poor should stop seeing themselves as poor and instead as necessary cogs in God's machine."

   "So?"

   "It's all right for him, isn't it? His role in the machine is a comfy one."

   "Well, whatever he said, you could hear a pin drop in that church. Agnes, Sarah and I can't figure out how we're going to break the news about St. Basil's to Weege."

   Sarah and her mother leave for the cemetery. Agnes sits down on the steps of St. Basil's. The weather is cold and brilliantly sunny. The world seems in particularly sharp focus. A faint aroma of incense hangs in the air. Agnes seldom goes to church, but when she does, she typically emerges in a thoughtful mood. The world seems a varied and fascinating place. The cockroaches and pigeons and bums and receptionists and secretaries and word processors and writers and editors and brokers and architects and billionaires seem to make up a great urban chain of being. Agnes can almost imagine a divine intelligence watching over it all.

Bezel awakens to a vision of a damsel with a violoncello. She is gorgeous. Her face is like the face on a coin. She is sheathed in black.

   "110th Street, Cathedral Parkway. 125th next."

   Slowly he becomes aware of his situation. He is on the subway, stretched out on the corner seats. The car is crowded, but not where he is. He feels violently ill. He shakes even when the train is motionless. He has been drunk for—how long? Weeks? Months?

   Thank God it's over.

   What became of the Frenchman? The last thing Bezel remembers is watching him rifle a poor box in a church. Heretic. Bezel wheeled over a candle stand for illumination.

   Two heretics.

   The train climbs to the top of Manhattan. Bezel opens and closes his eyes. He makes a fist. He wiggles one foot, then the other. He clears his throat.

   The effort exhausts him.

   He watches the sublime cellist. She must be with the Philharmonic. She won't look at him. Finally, she and her instrument and a lesser woman carrying a flute get off the train.

   A man enters Bezel's car. He has wild eyes and bare, gnarled feet that look like mandrake roots. A beggar. His hands and face are scaly. He stands next to Bezel and addresses the other passengers.

   "Ladies and gentlemen, please excuse this interruption."

   Bezel groans. He's going to ask for money. There should be a law banning these awful beggars.

   "I am not a beggar," the man announces. "I am not crazy. I do not use drugs. I do not smoke or drink. I am of the opinion that crack is a menace to the little ones of our city."

   None of the passengers pay much attention to him.

   "What I am is a victim of the city. I cannot get a job. My clothes are too shabby for an interview. I cannot afford to have resumes printed."

   The train lurches. Bezel almost rolls onto the floor.