clerical garb. The black suit seemed to streamline his tightly muscled body. The immaculate roman collar was a narrow, neat band made whiter by being sandwiched between the black suit and his dark chocolate complexion. Close-cropped salt-and-pepper hair crowned his chiseled features.
Having made his prayer, Toussaint sat back in the pew next to Koesler. The priest introduced him to Wanda Koznicki. With Koesler and the Inspector between them, there was no point in attempting anything as physical as a handshake, so Wanda and Toussaint merely smiled and nodded at each other.
After a few moments, Koznicki leaned across Koesler and asked, “Were you able to get it? The list?”
Toussaint shook his head slowly. “No. It is a matter of timing. My sources assure me they will have it before we leave Rome tomorrow. Apparently, the Rastafarians involved in this plot have only one item that is their equivalent of our ‘Top Secret,’ and that is this list of
Koznicki sat back with a worried look. A criminal investigation, he had often thought, was somewhat comparable to a football game played in inclement weather. Coaches seemed to agree that competing on a wet or slippery field favored the offensive team over the defensive unit. Particularly on pass plays, the receivers knew which receiving routes they would run. The defenders, on the other hand, were forced to react to the receivers’ moves. The unsure footing enhanced the odds the receiver would be able to outmaneuver the defender.
In the realm of crime, particularly in a premeditated attempt at homicide, the assailant knew well in advance of the event who the target would be. The law enforcement officer usually could only react to the assailant’s action. In such a situation, ordinarily there could be comparatively little crime prevention. Only a great deal of post-factum crime investigation.
It was one thing to suspect that Cardinal Boyle was the target of a murder plot, quite another to be certain of it. The measure of security that it would be possible to impose on a strong-willed Cardinal and possible to elicit from a limited number of
Koznicki wished he knew.
Koesler was about to divert Toussaint with an account of the previous false alarm that had triggered the nonprocession of dignitaries when, once again, the soft music tapered off and all the stops were opened.
Once again, the congregation stood and swiveled toward the rear of the church. There were indications this was no dry run.
Proof positive was the presence of television. Two camera crews were grinding away on the steps outside the church’s front door.
This phenomenon quite naturally caused its concomitant phenomenon: the gathering of a crowd.
Drawn solely by the magnetic power of television, people began first to cluster on the street outside the church. If TV cameras were present, this must be an Event. Thus, as the cameras retreated into the church, covering the entering procession, so then did the crowds enter.
TV had a little crowd/Its mind was blank as snow/And everywhere that TV went/The crowd was sure to go.
There they were, the invited Detroit delegation, in full strength, such as it was. Yet it fell woefully short of filling the church.
Koesler was put in mind of the parable Jesus told of the large dinner feast that fell far short of standing room only. In that case, the master of the house sent his servant on a mission, bidding him, “Go out into the highways and along the hedgerows and force them to come in. I want my house to be full.”
If Jesus were on earth today, Koesler thought, he would not use a servant in his story. He would more probably say, “Call a press conference, make sure the local TV channels show up. Then my house will be full.”
As the bystanders filed in in a seemingly endless line, they all appeared to have the same expression: I don’t know what’s going on in here, but it must be important.
With the Rastafarian threat uppermost in their minds, Koesler, Koznicki, and Toussaint were alert to the presence of blacks in the crowd. There were, they were somewhat uneasy to note, quite a few black men in the congregation. Some were well-dressed. Some wore menial garb. Some, evidently African seminarians studying for the priesthood in Rome, wore cassocks in a variety of colors. None seemed overtly dangerous. But who could tell?
In any case, thanks to the miracle of television, a literally SRO crowd now filled all the pews, as well as the area along the back and side walls.
What was that? Koesler wondered. Certainly not English. Nor was it Latin.
It was Italian.
Funny how insular one could become. Automatically, Koesler had equated English with the vernacular. But of course when in Rome, the vernacular was Italian. In addition, he now recalled that Boyle was fluent in Italian.
Other than enjoying the sheer beauty of the Italian language when spoken gracefully, Koesler concluded he would not derive anything significant from this liturgy. The Cardinal did in Italian speak, thought Koesler, paraphrasing Shakespeare, and those who did understand did nod their heads. But as for me, it was Italian to me.
He began to mull over the relatively brief history of the contemporary vernacular liturgy. The first document to be approved by the Second Vatican Council reinstated the use of one’s native tongue to the liturgy. It had been such a guarded step. Only a certain few parts of the Mass were to be celebrated in the vernacular. And those only after a nation’s hierarchy had officially requested such a change. And with the approval of the hierarchies of every other nation that shared that language. And finally, only after Rome had approved the request.
At the time, at least as far as the impatient liberal liturgists were concerned, implementing the decree seemed a tortuous series of red tape-bound steps. And all just so people could understand in their own language what was happening liturgically.
Little did they know the far-reaching ramifications of that simple change.
Few could have guessed at that time that this at first insignificant step into a vernacular liturgy would eventually lead to the discarding and virtual desuetude of Gregorian Chant, as well as to the disappearance of Palestrina and most of the other religious classical music that had evolved so beautifully and lovingly down through the centuries.
Koesler smiled regretfully as he considered some of the lesser and more prosaic consequences of the seemingly innocent exchange of languages.
From the time of his ordination in 1954 until the mid-sixties, he had used as a language of worship a tongue that few, if any, of his parishioners knew. Which meant that when he spoke during services, almost no one understood him.
On the one hand, that had led to a nearly universal sloppiness on the part of a great number of priests. When dispensing sacraments or sacramentals to large numbers of people, slipshod elisions became common. And few, if any, were the wiser. On the other hand, constant repetition of a formula in a foreign language frequently engendered thoughtless, absentminded mistakes. Neither of these occurrences could one get away with when speaking a language the listeners understood.
Koesler’s mind turned to Ash Wednesday. For some reason he had never fathomed, on Ash Wednesday a priest would find attending services people he would see again only on Easter, Palm Sunday, and Christmas. Easter and Christmas attendance was easy enough to understand. Perhaps the popularity of Palm Sunday and Ash Wednesday was explicable since these were the two feasts when the Church gave something away . . . even if it was only a palm frond and a thumbful of ashes.
In days gone by, the manner of distributing ashes was that a priest would dip his thumb into a container of ashes (the residue of burning old unused palms from Palm Sunday of the previous year) and trace a sign of a cross on the recipient’s forehead while saying,
Confronted by a line of people that often extended clear out of the church, many a priest found a way to zip through that formula in record-breaking time. And no one was the wiser.
Such sloppiness could not work in the vernacular, Koesler thought sheepishly; he recalled any number of times he had caught himself tracing the forehead cross while saying distractedly, “Remember dust that thou art
