Page 249 - What They Did to the Kid

What They Did to the Kid 237

words of the consecration of bread and wine: Hoc est enim Corpus
Meum. This is My Body. Hocus Pocus. She asked too much, expected,
what? Something.
I felt she had a right to expect me to answer her dilemma as much
as I expected the priests to reveal to me the secrets of the answers I
needed for my sake as much as hers, but she was an occasion of sin,
her voice, her body, her snotty arrogant way intimating she came
from some place better, and deserved to be, needed to be, was really
asking to be fubbed, because her vocation was seducing innocent
priests like Charles Prosper who had been turning chivalrous and
dandy toward her, following after her with his eyes.
“Mr. O’Hara,” Rector Karg stood suddenly next to me and
squared off his place opposite Cyril Prosper and Lock Roehm. “May
I see you a moment? Excuse us, please, gentlemen.”
I followed Rector Karg into a cove of evergreen that sheltered a
small outdoor shrine to the Virgin Mary. He looked straight ahead
and made a big business with his Army Zippo of lighting a large
candle among the many small candles already burning. We were
alone. He had, he said, by chance happened to see me. How fortu-
nate, he said. He had, he said, wanted to remind me of my situation.
Finally, he turned and faced me.
“You came so perilously close, son. Your honesty, that’s what
saved you. Had you lied once, about the transistor radio or any-
thing, the smaller lie would have exposed larger lies, larger faults.
Small things fall into large patterns. Are you innocent? Have you
innocence?”
“Yes, Rector.”
“Forgetting nothing, I will forget everything so we can begin
anew next September. But one caution.” His face folded deeper
behind his jaw. “You must be prudent. Prudent enough not to tell
anyone what happened. Not your uncle. Not your parents. Lay peo-
ple can never understand what occurs in seminaries. Silencio. Do I
have your word?”
“Yes, Rector.”
“Promise me.”
“I promise you.”
“You will tell no one.”

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