floating in his mind, his memory slipping over her thick wavy hair and satin skin, he was finally blessed with sleep and, quite unexpectedly, slept soundly for five hours, feeling swindled when he woke up, because he couldn’t recall a single dream about the beautiful woman sheathed in lamé.
What the fuck am I doing here?. . . Conde stood in the church entrance and took in a far too pleasurable lungful of the damp draught blowing down the aisle of the modest slate and brick building he’d entered for the first time on the day he was baptised. Forty-seven years ago, according to his calculations – a number that never got smaller. Once again he saw in the distance the rather modest high altar and its peaceful image of the clean, pink-cheeked archangel Raphael, a heavenly being immune to the pull of world. The rows of dark pews, empty at that time in the morning, contrasted with the bustle the Count had left behind in the street, populated by its motley crew of churro and pastry sellers, passersby rushing or dawdling, grumpy morning drunkards propping up the bar on the corner and resigned pensioners waiting for the deferred opening of the cafeteria where they would comfort their groaning stomachs.
Over the last ten to twelve years, Conde had begun to visit the local church suspiciously frequently. Although he’d never been to another mass and never contemplated the possibility he might kneel by the confessional, the urge to sit for a few minutes in the deserted temple, freeing up the floodgates of his mind, repaid him with a feeling of calm he argued had nothing in common with mystical or extra-terrestrial spiritual longings apart from its basic function that the Count never used – he never prayed or asked for anything, because he’d forgotten all his prayers and didn’t have anyone to include in them – the church had begun to provide a kind of shelter where time and life lost the savage rhythms of the struggle for daily survival. Nonetheless, his conscience warned that, despite his lack of belief in life after death, a diffuse feeling did exist he’d yet to pin down, that wasn’t sapping his essential atheism but was beginning to entice him into that world and its persistent, magnetic appeal. Conde had come to suspect that the blend of aging and disillusion overwhelming his heart might finally cast him back, or just return him, to the fold of those who find consolation in faith. But the mere thought of that possibility irked him: the Count was a fundamentalist in his loyalties, and converts might be contemptible renegades and traitors, but re-conversion verged on the abominable.
That morning Conde felt full of expectation: he wasn’t entering church in search of passing solace, but to find an unlikely response, quite unrelated to mysteries of transcendence, but rather connected to those of his own past, in the most earthbound of all possible worlds. Consequently, rather than sitting anonymously on one of the pews, he crossed over the central aisle and headed for the sacristy, where he found, as he’d hoped he would, the ever-stalwart figure of octogenarian Padre Mendoza, Bible open at a page of the Apocalypse, searching no doubt for the text for his next sermon.
“Good morning, Padre,” he said, entering the precinct.
“Ready then?” asked the old man without looking up.
“Not yet.”
“Don’t leave it too long,” the priest warned.
“What did we agree? Is or isn’t the Lord’s time infinite?”
“The Lord’s is, your’s isn’t. Nor is mine,” he retorted smiling at the Count.
“Why are you so keen to convert me?” asked the Count.
“Because you’re crying out for it. You insist on not believing but you are somebody who can’t live without belief. All you need is to dare to take the final step.”
Conde had to smile. Could that be true or was the wily old priest merely exercising his sibylline logic?
“I’m not prepared to believe in certain words again.
What the fuck am I doing here?. . . Conde stood in the church entrance and took in a far too pleasurable lungful of the damp draught blowing down the aisle of the modest slate and brick building he’d entered for the first time on the day he was baptised. Forty-seven years ago, according to his calculations – a number that never got smaller. Once again he saw in the distance the rather modest high altar and its peaceful image of the clean, pink-cheeked archangel Raphael, a heavenly being immune to the pull of world. The rows of dark pews, empty at that time in the morning, contrasted with the bustle the Count had left behind in the street, populated by its motley crew of churro and pastry sellers, passersby rushing or dawdling, grumpy morning drunkards propping up the bar on the corner and resigned pensioners waiting for the deferred opening of the cafeteria where they would comfort their groaning stomachs.
Over the last ten to twelve years, Conde had begun to visit the local church suspiciously frequently. Although he’d never been to another mass and never contemplated the possibility he might kneel by the confessional, the urge to sit for a few minutes in the deserted temple, freeing up the floodgates of his mind, repaid him with a feeling of calm he argued had nothing in common with mystical or extra-terrestrial spiritual longings apart from its basic function that the Count never used – he never prayed or asked for anything, because he’d forgotten all his prayers and didn’t have anyone to include in them – the church had begun to provide a kind of shelter where time and life lost the savage rhythms of the struggle for daily survival. Nonetheless, his conscience warned that, despite his lack of belief in life after death, a diffuse feeling did exist he’d yet to pin down, that wasn’t sapping his essential atheism but was beginning to entice him into that world and its persistent, magnetic appeal. Conde had come to suspect that the blend of aging and disillusion overwhelming his heart might finally cast him back, or just return him, to the fold of those who find consolation in faith. But the mere thought of that possibility irked him: the Count was a fundamentalist in his loyalties, and converts might be contemptible renegades and traitors, but re-conversion verged on the abominable.
That morning Conde felt full of expectation: he wasn’t entering church in search of passing solace, but to find an unlikely response, quite unrelated to mysteries of transcendence, but rather connected to those of his own past, in the most earthbound of all possible worlds. Consequently, rather than sitting anonymously on one of the pews, he crossed over the central aisle and headed for the sacristy, where he found, as he’d hoped he would, the ever-stalwart figure of octogenarian Padre Mendoza, Bible open at a page of the Apocalypse, searching no doubt for the text for his next sermon.
“Good morning, Padre,” he said, entering the precinct.
“Ready then?” asked the old man without looking up.
“Not yet.”
“Don’t leave it too long,” the priest warned.
“What did we agree? Is or isn’t the Lord’s time infinite?”
“The Lord’s is, your’s isn’t. Nor is mine,” he retorted smiling at the Count.
“Why are you so keen to convert me?” asked the Count.
“Because you’re crying out for it. You insist on not believing but you are somebody who can’t live without belief. All you need is to dare to take the final step.”
Conde had to smile. Could that be true or was the wily old priest merely exercising his sibylline logic?
“I’m not prepared to believe in certain words again.
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