sympathy. Can you tell me where he went?”
“No,” Father Vincent said. “Because I don’t know.”
“Would you tell me if you did know?”
“I would not.”
“To protect your brother?”
Father Vincent shook his head. “To protect you and your sons. To keep you from doing something that may damn you—”
“I’m already damned, Father,” Shaye said.
He turned and stalked up the middle aisle to the back door. He was stopped by the priest’s voice, echoing from the front of the church.
“‘Vengeance is mine sayeth the Lord,’ Daniel!”
Shaye turned and shouted back, “He’s going to have to fight me for it!”
36
Outside, in front of the church, Shaye found his sons standing apart, Thomas off to one side with his head bowed, James and Matthew together on another side, looking away from their brother. Like most young men—and possibly like most men—they had not learned how to deal with intense emotions yet. The emotions that Thomas was feeling at the moment embarrassed his brothers. Shaye walked over to his oldest son and put his hand on his shoulder.
“I’m sorry, Pa.”
“For what?” Shaye asked. “Speaking your mind? Don’t ever be sorry about that, Thomas.”
“Ma was a churchgoin’ woman,” Thomas said. “She’d’a tanned me good for talkin’ to a priest that way.”
“There’s absolutely nothing wrong with having your faith tested, Thomas.”
Thomas looked at his father. “Is your faith being tested, Pa?”
“Sorely tested, Thomas,” Shaye said truthfully. “In fact, my faith is shaken.”
“What do we do about it?”
“We can’t dwell on it now, son,” Shaye said. “It would keep us from doing what has to be done.”
“So what do we do?”
“We set the question aside for another time,” Shaye said. “Come on, let’s go talk to your brothers.”
James and Matthew had been having a conversation of their own about faith.
“’Course there’s a God, James,” Matthew said. “How could we be here if there wasn’t?”
“I don’t know, Matthew,” James said. “I just know that Ma didn’t deserve what happened to her. How could God do that?”
“God didn’t do it,” Matthew said, “the Langer gang did, and we’re gonna kill them for it. We can’t blame God, ’cause then we’d have to kill God for it, and we can’t kill God.” Matthew’s logic made perfect sense to him.
“We could stop believin’ in Him,” James said.
“James,” Matthew said, “if Ma ever heard you say that—”
Shaye and Thomas joined them then, and both James and Matthew looked embarrassed about their own conversation.
“You two okay?” Shaye asked.
“We’re fine, Pa,” James said. “Thomas?”
“I’m fine.”
“You’ve probably already figured this out,” Shaye said, “but I knew Vincent Shaye—Father Vincent—years ago, which means I also knew Ethan and Aaron.”
“During your outlaw days?” Matthew asked.
“Yes, Matthew,” Shaye said. “We crossed paths during my outlaw days.”
“So you knew why Langer was headin’ for Oklahoma City,” Thomas said.
“Not really, but I figured while he was here he might stop to see his brother.”
“What did the father mean about Langer seein’ Ma in his dreams, Pa?” Matthew asked.
“Your mother is haunting Ethan Langer, Matthew,” Shaye said. “He’s dreaming about her at night.”
“Good for Ma!” James said.
“Father Vincent seems to think this is the way Ethan is dealing with his guilt.”
“The important thing,” Thomas said, “is that we’re only a day behind the gang.”
“Yes, Thomas,” Shaye said, “that is important, but we also need rest, and so do the horses, so we’ll be staying overnight.”
“But we’ll lose some of the ground we’ve made up,” James said.
“We’re going to catch up to them, James,” Shaye said. “That’s a foregone conclusion. They can’t get away from us. A half a day this way or that isn’t going to make much difference.”
“So what do we do now?” Matthew asked.
“We go back to our hotel, we board the horses, and we get something to eat,” Shaye said.
“Good,” Matthew said, “because I’m starvin’.”
“You’re always starvin’,” James said as they mounted their horses. “If you ever weren’t starvin’, I’d think you weren’t my brother anymore.”
Inside the church, Father Vincent rose from the pew he was sitting in, went to the altar and knelt before it. He had to pray, but he wasn’t really sure who or what to pray for. His brothers were evil men. Should he pray for their souls? Daniel Shaye and his sons were after vengeance, but they weren’t bad men. Pray for them?
He made the sign of the cross and pressed his hands together. Maybe he’d just play it safe and pray for all of them—and while he was at it, toss in a prayer for himself as well.
37
They all had steak dinners that night, and there wasn’t much conversation during the meal. Shaye had the feeling they were all having thoughts about faith and religion. He was starting to wonder if accompanying him on his vendetta was going to adversely effect them as men. Or should he simply stop thinking about this as something he had to do and start thinking of it as something
During dessert, however, it was Matthew who finally brought the question of religion up.
“Pa?
“Yes, Matthew?”
“Do you not believe in God anymore?”
Thomas stole a quick look at his father and James looked away. He was hoping Matthew wouldn’t tell their father what he had said about that subject earlier in the day.
“Matthew,” Shaye said, “I don’t think we can give God much thought until we’ve accomplished what we’ve set out to do.”
“How can we do that?” Matthew asked.
“It won’t be easy, but we have to try,” Shaye said. “If any one of us can’t put aside the question of God while we’re doing this, he’s going to have to turn back.”
Matthew looked confused.
“Can you do that, Matthew?”
“I don’t know, Pa,” Matthew said, “but I know I don’t wanna turn back.”
“Just give it some thought tonight, then,” Shaye said. “God would not approve of what we’re doing, and your mother certainly would not approve. But we can’t dwell on that. We have to be committed to this, or even when we catch up to them and there’s the slightest doubt about what we’re doing, we could end up dead.”
“I’m committed, Pa,” Thomas said. “We have to do this, no matter what anyone thinks.”
