The General Zapped an Angel: New Stories of Fantasy and Science Fiction by Howard Fast

good here.”
    â€œVibes?”
    â€œVibrations.”
    â€œOh.”
    â€œIt’s a question of belief. This place is filled with belief. That’s why I picked it. I need belief.”
    â€œFor what?” Father O’Conner asked curiously.
    â€œSo I can believe.”
    â€œWhat do you want to believe?”
    â€œThat God is sane.”
    â€œI assure you—He is,” Father O’Conner said with conviction.
    â€œHow the hell do you know?”
    â€œIt’s a matter of my own belief.”
    â€œNot if you were a Mohawk Indian.”
    â€œI don’t know. I have never been a Mohawk Indian.”
    â€œI have.”
    Father O’Conner thought about it for a moment or two, and in all fairness he could not deny that a Mohawk Indian might have quite a different point of view.
    â€œHis Eminence, the Cardinal, is provoked at me,” he said finally. “He wants me to persuade you to leave.”
    â€œSo you’re bringing back the fuzz.”
    â€œNo, peacefully.”
    â€œBefore you were with me on this being God’s pad. Has His Eminence talked you out of that?”
    â€œHe pointed out that the Almighty has equal claim to the Soviet Union. I suppose wherever it is, the tenants make the rules.”
    â€œAll right. Spell it out.”
    â€œI hate to be a top sergeant about it,” Father O’Conner said. “How long were you planning to stay?”
    â€œUntil God answers me.”
    â€œThat can be a long time,” Father O’Conner said unhappily.
    â€œOr an instant. I am meditating on time.”
    â€œTime?”
    â€œI always think of time when I think of God,” the Indian said. “He has His time. We have ours. I want Him to open His time to me. What in hell am I doing here on Fifth Avenue? I’m a Mohawk Indian. Right?”
    Father O’Conner nodded.
    â€œI don’t know,” the Indian said. “We’ll give it the old school try, and then you can call the fuzz. How about it? Until morning?”
    â€œUntil morning,” Father O’Conner said.
    â€œI’ll do as much for you sometime,” the Indian said, and those were the last words he was heard to say. The newspaper reporters came down and the television crowd made a second visit, but the Indian was through talking.
    The Indian was meditating. He allowed thought to leave his mind and he watched his breath go in and out and he became a sort of a universe unto himself. He considered God’s time and he considered man’s time—but without thought. There are no thoughts known to man that are capable of dealing even with man’s time, much less God’s time; but the Indian was not so far from his ancestors as to be trapped in thought. His ancestors had known the secret of the great time, which all white men have forgotten.
    The Indian was photographed and televised until even the networks had enough of him, and Father O’Conner remained there to see that the Indian’s meditation was not interrupted. The priest felt a great kinship with the Indian, but being a priest, he also knew how many had asked and how few had been answered.
    By midnight the press had gone and even the few passers-by ignored the Indian. Father O’Conner was amazed at how long he had remained there, motionless, in what is called the lotus position, but he had always heard that Indians were stoical and enduring of pain and desire and he supposed that this Indian was no different. The priest was gratified that the June night was so warm and pleasant; at least the Indian would not suffer from cold.
    Before the priest fell asleep that night, he prayed that some sort of grace might be bestowed upon the Indian. What kind of grace he wasn’t at all sure, nor was he ready to plead that the Indian should have a taste of God’s time. The notion of God’s time was just a bit terrifying to Father O’Conner.
    He slept well but not for long,