Chapter twenty: Apocalypse
[From the Willow manuscript, Part 6.]
Argo’s rise to Cardinal while in his 30’s was surprising even to me. It was not that I thought he would be over his head in that position (I could not conceive of such a situation), but that I was certain he did not aspire to anything so grandiose. He dreaded the cross-Atlantic trips he was forced to endure several times a year, and now instead of fewer trips, he would have to subject himself to more of them. Of course, his own research had stopped altogether as soon as he left St. John’s, but he kept abreast of things at the university and likened himself an Oppenheimer to Einstein and Fermi on what he had dubbed the Wonderland Project. I must have been Alice.
Still, despite his exalted position, Argo had time for me. I was certain that he loved me as much as ever he could, but in truth the relationship began to tarnish. I grew weary of the secrecy of our relationship and of the traveling to Connecticut. Argo’s having no personal car he could use without a driver left me with the chore of having to make the long trip from central New Jersey to our rendezvous location a mile from the university grounds. It was impossible for him to be seen with me, of course, and that meant that we had to drive well away from the campus, either back to the City for a show or dinner. Most of the time I had to pick him up then drive back to my condo then drive him back to Connecticut, only to return back home to New Jersey. A few times he was able to use his car without raising suspicion, but those times were few, and they afforded us even less time together than we usually had.
Now I loved Argo, truly and deeply, and the times we shared were the best times of my life. Even if it were just a drive through the back roads watching the fall leaves turn color, I felt fortunate to be with him. In truth, the colors were brighter with him sitting in the seat next to me, his hand clasped in mine. We laughed a lot and even shared stories of our work, the people we ran into targeted for sarcasm and ridicule we were unable to express to anyone else. It became a can-you-top-this session to see whose world was more absurd. I usually won.
But one day as I was driving him back to campus and dreading the return trip home, I mentioned my frustration.
“Propinquous,” he said staring out the window.
“What?”
“It means placed nearby. The dean of my seminary asked me to define the word the first time we met.”
“I know what it means,” I said somewhat less than charmingly. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“I didn’t mean anything,” he answered. “The word just popped into my mind.”
“And why do you suppose it did?” I pursued.
“Because it is unpropinquant, our situation.”
“That’s a word?”
“Probably not, but it should be.”
“And us? Should it be?”
He was still looking ahead at the road. “Not unless we both want it.”
“Well, you don’t seem too ready to fight for it,” I remarked, my ire rising at his complacency.
“It’s much easier for me,” he answered looking over to me. “You’re the one who has it rough. You’re the one who has to drive, and it bothers me almost as much as it does you. I just don’t have a good solution.”
And he didn’t, and that was the problem. I was certain by then that he would never leave the priesthood for me, and it was not really possible for me to leave my father’s firm in New Jersey. My only option was to sell my condo and find one up north. At least my driving time would be reduced.
So that is what I did, though it took some explaining to my parents who knew that I had a good situation where I was. But that was only a partial solution. Aside from the building pressure of keeping our affair secret, and that was growing ever more tiresome, there was Argo’s trips to Rome. Normally separated as we were by distance, and constrained as we were by time, Argo spent weeks at a time in Rome on Legion business. Being a spokesman for the Pope required that he be with him or at least nearby, and our time together became more a premium.
That was where The Sanctum came in, or more precisely sailed in. Argo so named the sailboat, which he took out as often as he could. Either with one or two of his associates by preferably by himself, Argo seemed to find excuses to take the boat out if even just for an hour or two. He told me a number of times how the boat had lived up to its name and that when he came back to land he was better able to face the difficulties that beset his life.
The problem was that other boat owners in the marina knew Argo. They were a friendly lot who were always on their boats having small parties or just enjoying the ambiance, and they, of course, knew who he was. I could hardly have been seen alone on the boat with him, of course, though one Fourth of July he took my family and me out to watch the fireworks in New York Harbor.
For us to be on the boat alone together, he would motor to a commercial marina for diesel where I would come aboard with as little fanfare as I could manage. It was a bit risky, but Argo felt safe in believing that dock hands were unlikely to recognize him. We did that several times, and I found that I enjoyed sailing almost as much as he. The wind filling the huge white sails gleaming in the sun as we heeled silently across the water’s surface was exhilarating. We were alone in a natural world capturing the force of nature to move us along with no particular destination or concern for time. To know that an endless sea lay before us and that we could, if we wanted, sail to another continent provided a sense of freedom I had not known before. So when he asked if I could get away for a week’s sail during a late autumn vacation, I arranged it. But Argo seemed if not distant at least anxious on our sail to Cape May and the Delaware Gap, and to my dismay I was about to learn why.
l
We sailed through New York Harbor on a clear and crisp day on our way to spend our first night anchored in Sandy Hook Bay. The sun was bright and warm, and as soon as we passed under the mammoth Verrazano Bridge, I began to believe that the hurly burly of our lives had been left behind, and we were at the gateway to a quiet and natural world different from the one that slowly vanished in the distance behind us.
It was an escape from the bombardment of the electronic world, and for that I would be grateful. On board we did not have TV or talk radio, there was no computer monitor flashing at me, and we vowed to keep our cell phones off. As soon as we left the busy New York waterway, Argo tuned the ship’s radio to receive only emergency WX weather alerts, and the only sounds were the wind in the sails and the whoosh of the sea along the hull. Removed from the jangle of the media, my senses grow more acute, or perhaps they returned to what they once had been. In Newark it was necessary to walk the streets with blinders lest the ugliness of the area intrude. The broken brick factories that had become condos; the broken glass lying in pools of urine left by the broken homeless; the stink of gasoline, garbage, and feces of one type or another; and the unrelenting cars, trucks, and busses forced me inward. Nothing natural and beautiful existed on those manmade streets: not even a tree, not a bird, not even dumb earth. Humans and their dogs passed by, did their damage, and moved on.
The Sanctum was a small cutter that sailed almost eight knots on a reach. Its hull was not the typical white or bright artificial color but a natural cream that along with its lavish teak appointments made it a natural fit for its home on the sea. Below, it had hand-rubbed teak paneling with intricately carved designs. The galley’s cabinets were highly polished and the countertops were Spanish granite. Fitted into the port wall was the electrical panel, trimmed in bronze. All the portholes and hatches were also bronze giving the boat an old world charm. Even the head was walled with Tuscan marble and had small, ornate bronze fixtures.
There was a bookshelf on the starboard with a few boating reference books but only two fiction titles: Paradise Lost and The Inferno. The latter was in Italian.
After supper, with pillows under our heads, we lay on deck and watched a red sun drop behind the Jersey coast. Argo was unusually quiet, but his hand felt good in mine, and all was right with the world.
We were finished with breakfast before sunrise the next morning and raised anchor at first light. Argo had allowed 18 hours to reach the piers of Cape May, but with the strong wind off the coast, it was certain that we would make port well before midnight. It was bright day, and the sun lit the caps of surf like colored jewels dancing in the breeze. It was chilly and I needed a hooded sweatshirt under my Rutgers windbreaker. Argo wore a navy blue pea coat, a Yankees baseball cap, and gloves to handle the cold steel of the wheel.
It was only my second day out on the water, and in the nippy autumn breeze I was more alive than ever. I sensed the shifting breezes, the heat of its currents, the sound it makes around the sails and through the lines. The colors of the sea in differing light created by thin clouds in the azure sky titillated and became somehow important. The fresh salt air and the scent of tropical wood below decks with their varied textures and colors become increasingly more pronounced. Even the natural color of the boat seemed in harmony with the ocean that carried it. Sadly, it is in the looking inward that one often finds dread.
Argo was not himself. I could always count on him to provide interesting observations, wisecracks of one sort or another, and conversation that provoked and challenged. But from the time we had boarded The Sanctum, I sensed a problem. While he responded quickly and completely to any questions or statements, he offered none of his own. He was attentive to my needs, as he always was, offering me hot coffee or looking to my comfort in the cool autumn air, but he was humorless. It had been a hallmark of our times together to laugh as we had when we were kids, and I had never realized until then how important that had been.
“Why so glum, chum?” I asked sitting with my legs stretched out on the cockpit pillow that ran the length of the locker. Argo was piloting from his favorite spot on the portside gunnel as the boat heeled gently heading due south.
“No reason,” he lied. “Want to take over for me? I have to use the head.” He hopped down, gave me his gloves, and went below. Argo had set the sails perfectly for the wind speed, and it really was unnecessary to steer; The Sanctum was sailing itself.
It was fitted with a navy blue dodger and Bimini. The dodger was basically an isinglass windshield that protected the passengers from wind and any spray that might be splashed up in bad weather. Attached to it across the top of the cockpit was the Bimini in matching canvas that acted as a roof. Inserted in the roof was square of isinglass that provided a view of the sails. It was important that the sails be shaped correctly given the wind and course the sailor wanted to follow. A series of lines, each with different names, attached to pulleys led to the cockpit, and from there the pilot could set the lines to maximize the boat’s speed. I had learned only about the lines that altered the shape of the front sail, called the jib, and Argo was to teach me more as we went along.
He came back with a hot chocolate for me, taking my spot on the cockpit pillow. “We’ll be there by midnight,” he said.
“He speaks,” I remarked. “That’s the first time that you offered any words. Are they expensive?”
“Not my words. I work gratis.”
“By your own choice, Father Malle,” I answered looking over at him. He stared at me, unsmiling and distracted.
“Right, I could be so wealthy if just weren’t a priest,” he said, piqued no doubt that I referred to him as Father. “How much do professors make?”
“They do all right,” I answered. “They might not be able to afford a boat like this.” I don’t know why I needled him, then, but the words just seemed to pop out.
“Some can.”
“So there you go. You can become a professor and buy your own boat.”
“I already am a professor.”
“Right,” I answered, “so you don’t need to make money, and you already own a yacht.”
“It’s not mine.”
“Oh, sorry. It’s Joe Machiarolla’s.”
“Correct, and that doesn’t seem to bother you enough to keep you off it.”
“There’s a lot that doesn’t seem to bother me.”
“But in actuality a lot does,” he pursued.
“That’s right, but there’s nothing that seems can done about it.”
“Then why bring it up?”
“I didn’t,” I protested.
“I guess not,” he said mockingly. “I misunderstood the undercurrent.”
“Maybe you did.”
“And maybe I play for the Jets.”
We sat in silence at least an hour after that bitterness, and I decided that if this vacation had any chance of being enjoyable, Argo would have to air whatever it was that was bothering him.
“So are you planning to tell me what’s eating at you?” I asked looking over at him. “Or are you going to give me the silent treatment.”
“I haven’t decided,” he answered petulantly.
“Well I think you should. It’s no fun seeing you in such a funk.”
There was a long pause. “I know,” he admitted. “I’m sorry.”
“Why don’t you take the wheel,” I said, getting up from behind it, “and when I get back you can decide to tell me what’s on your mind or make an attempt at being at least half-way civil.” I went below to use the head and returned with sandwiches and coffee. Apparently he had decided not to tell me what was bothering him because he began the sailing lesson in earnest. I learned about shrouds and stays, clews and telltales, travelers and blocks, and sheets and halyards. Everything on a boat had a name different from what it was called on land. Blocks were really pulleys and shrouds were cables, but not all cables; some were stays.
“So you’re telling me that this rope is not a rope but a sheet?” I needled.
“When it’s used to move a sail.”
“But you just said that that rope was a halyard.”
“When it’s used to raise or lower a sail or ensign, it’s a halyard.”
“But they’re both ropes,” I insisted.
“No, they’re either sheets or halyards.”
“But a rope is a rope.”
“Then you’ll be particularly stressed to learn that what you pull the anchor with is a rode, spelled r-o-d-e,” he said with a tinge of sadism.
“Then it’s also not a rope.”
“No, that is considered a rope.”
“Why?”
“It’s a mystery,” he laughed sardonically.
But while the sailing nomenclature was puzzling at best, the functions of the pieces were as simple as they were ingenious. They were like keys on a piano; when used correctly they created a symphony of power and direction moving a ton of glass, steel, aluminum and wood effortlessly across the ocean.
It was midnight by the time we sailed into our slip at the dark Cape May marina. Argo hooked the shore power cable into the outlet stanchion at the dock while I sprayed fresh water on the hull to remove the sea salt. The cabin heated up quickly, and we were soon snuggled under the blankets, warm in each other’s arms. Argo wasn’t in the mood, and I attributed his lack of interest to the long day in the water. But I was wrong.
The long-range forecast before we left Long Island Sound had called for fair weather, but the next day broke overcast and there was now a threat of rain. Argo was preoccupied during breakfast and said little as the WX channel voice droned on about the bad weather that was in store.
“It’s no fun to sail in the rain,” he said finally, wiping his lips with his table napkin. “We can check out what Cape May has to offer.”
“That sounds good,” I said, collecting the dishes to be washed. “What about the Delaware Inlet?” I asked. We had planned to explore the bay that day.
“We could try it today, but it really sounds as if we’re going to get rain. Let’s wait until tomorrow.”
Argo took his umbrella, zipped up the Bimini, and we left The Sanctum, arm in arm, to explore the quaint town in southernmost New Jersey. I bought a tablecloth with embroidered anchors for the boat from one of the shops, and we made reservations for an early dinner at a downtown inn. We were back by two-thirty and sitting in the enclosed cockpit listening to the rain beat off the canvas. A bottle of Ruffino Chianti and a bowl of Yukon Gold potato chips sat between us on the cockpit table.
“Beats work,” I said to Argo who was trying but failing to hide his blue funk. It wasn’t until after my second glass of wine that I got up the nerve to ask him again what was eating him and devouring our time together.
“Why don’t we wait until we’re on our way back?”
“Why don’t we do it now?” I insisted.
“It’s a long story.”
“And we’ve got nothing to do till six.”
Argo inhaled deeply and began. “When you look at history, you see that great men have always broken the rules, often for the better.”
“Wait,” I said trying to suppress a grin, “do I have to take notes?”
“They won’t help; this is too difficult for you.”
“I just didn’t know this was going to be a history lesson.”
“Don’t worry. Just listen; maybe something will sink in.”
“Okay, but I think I’m going to need more wine,” I said, picking up my glass and taking a gulp. “Go ahead.”
“Thank you,” he said, his eyes down and nodding slightly in mock deference. “As I said before being rudely interrupted, great men in history have broken laws which at first seemed unforgivable but in the end were justified. Jesus, of course, is a prime example. He violated the Hebraic law and laid down his own rules. He did so with no concern for condemnation by other rabbis.” He took a sip of wine. “George Washington risked his life and his significant wealth to run the English army off the king’s own land. The law was certainly not on his side; subjects did not seize land from monarchies because they thought their policies were too stringent. And there was Lincoln, of course. He decided that sovereign states were really not sovereign and could not go their own way. He also unilaterally suspended habeas corpus. They were great men who broke the laws of other men because they were superior to them.”
“So you’re a proponent of Nietzsche’s superman theory.”
“Have you ever read Nietzsche?”
“No.”
“Just as well; he was insane, an atheistic sociopath who rejected the notion of good and evil. In fact, he even discounted the value of conscience. But he did recognize a different standard for truly great men, and so do I.”
He took a chip and crunched it loudly as if to punctuate his outlandish statement, and I waited for him to continue. “Hitler would have been a superman had he been successful against the Allies, but I would not think him a great man. History might say so, but I would not. There is a moral component to greatness that cannot be ignored. But the question remains about supermen. Does superiority give license to break the laws of man? Nietzsche says it does.”
“And you think so.”
“You’re the legal eagle; what do you think?” he asked taking another chip.
“I believe in the laws created by people to serve people. Anarchy results when certain people can break the law, based on their belief that they are superior.”
“And if the belief is founded?” he asked. “If a person is truly a superior being with a strong moral purpose?”
“Still no. Perhaps in a lawless system with no other means of redress. But in a democracy we can change laws … make new ones. The system provides procedures for change … lawful change.”
“Jesus changed the Hebraic law without convincing the rabbinate that changes should be made. He didn’t work within the system; he saw what was needed and did it.”
“Well that’s a bit different, don’t you think?”
“Not really,” he answered. “Certainly Lincoln had a system of laws, but he didn’t think they were good enough. He did what had to be done to save the union, so he mobilized an army against the secessionists. How many thousands died because of his unilateral decision?”
“Okay, suppose for argument sake there are times in history that great men take extreme action, perhaps unlawful action. Are you arguing that the ends justify the means?”
“Yes, of course. They most often do, though not always. Ethics is a always a balancing act.”
“And who gets to judge? I’d say it is the people in a lawful society.”
“I’d say that is true most of the time; other times it is a superman who transcends the law when the society or organization cannot or will not act in its own best interest.” He took another sip of wine and with his finger snapped against the isinglass knocking the raindrops off.
“So this idea of a superman, is that what’s bothering you? Is this theory of a crackpot German, a sociopath, ruining our vacation?”
“It’s not the theory but the application,” he said, his face somber and his voice not much beyond a whisper.
“What do you mean?”
He waited a long moment and exhaled visibly.
“The Church is being threatened, not from without but from within, and what I am about to say affects not only the Church but us.” He looked directly into my eyes and then looked away as if charting the course of his next statemnts. “The situation is that as a leader of the Legion of Christ I am dedicated to protecting the Church at whatever cost. Everything I have worked for, all my effort and the efforts of hundreds like me, is toward that end. I can allow nothing, nothing at all to prevent that effort.”
“Meaning Condicio.”
“Meaning his second encyclical. Condicio, despite its damage, is tolerable, but if he goes forward with a second encyclical, the Church as we know it will collapse. There is no question; it simply cannot withstand what he has in store for it.”
I poured myself a third glass.
“The Curia is meeting continually and nothing is coming out of it. It’s as if they are on high alert for a coming disaster. Of course, they are helpless. Michael answers to no one.”
“It’s always been that way.”
“But in this case, the Pope is a clear danger to the Church. He is ill, psychologically. He’s become paranoid … I’ve talked with him; I know … and I know the damage that his paranoia will cause. Michael has the power to, and he will, publish a second encyclical, regardless of the objections of the Curia, and regardless of the catastrophic consequences.”
“What consequences? And how can you know what he will write?”
“After the first one, it’s obvious. He is going to call for direct action to be taken against the enemies of the Church. Condicio names them, and they are everyone not aligned with the Church.”
“What action?”
Argo leaned toward me a bit, his eyes steady and narrow. “He sees himself as Michael the Archangel. He’s a warrior. And what action do warriors take?” His eyes grew colder, focusing squarely into mine. “He has to be stopped.”
“And the Curia can do nothing at all? There’s no codicil, no estop mechanism?”
“If there were, it would have been used to prevent the first one,” he said with an unusual tension in his voice. “The Curia was uniformly opposed to it. No, there are no legal means of stopping a pope, deranged or not. How could there be, the pope is God’s choice.”
Even though I was already feeling the effects of the first two glasses, I took a long draught. My lightheadedness was no doubt due to the wine, but I suspect what I was hearing, and what I feared I was going to hear, added to the effect. “So I don’t understand. If Michael is God’s choice, obviously this is what God wants. That is canon law, correct?”
“Yes, and that’s the problem,” he answered. Looking vacantly past me he said more to himself than to me, “But Jesus amended the Hebraic law.”
“So the Curia will have to amend canon law.”
“But they can’t, not in time. They need quick and decisive action. To do so would require a great leader… someone who can rise above his time and place and do what must be done to save the Church from itself.”
“And you are that person? And does the burden fall on you?”
He sat motionless, and the silence was harrowing.
“But what can you do? You’re not the Curia.”
He sipped his wine before answering. “That remains to be seen.”
“And that’s why you’ve been so sullen since we left.”
“Only partially,” he answered ruefully, looking up at mast through the rain that beat ominously on the Bimini. “What I have to do will impact on us.”
“Yes, well it always has, hasn’t it,” I replied not hiding my disgust. I put my glass down and went below leaving him sitting under the canopy in the pouring rain. I threw myself face down on the bed and with a pillow over my head began to cry.
I had slept past dinner and awoke to Argo’s telling me that a tropical storm had developed and was headed our way. It would bring days of rain, but there was a window of opportunity to get back to Long Island Sound if we left immediately. So at eight o’clock that foggy night we headed out of the marina and into the black Atlantic.
The wind had shifted southeast and with it came the sad fear of an inevitable storm. As the boat swept over an ocean still warm with summer, the whisper of hollow loss grew stronger. The Sanctum’s sails were full and proud, alive against the cobalt sky, but they were loud in the night --- sirens sighing sadly of the change that was to come. Holding back the wind and whispering a woeful warning, the sails were for the first time not powerful servants of The Sanctum but white, wailing shrouds --- waiting.
I shuddered and went below to hide. As it always had, the fresh scent of unfinished teak greeted me before I could see it glowing orange in dim cabin lights. The sweet wood had become a sanctuary from all that was raw above, but that night its quiet warmth failed to work its charm. There would be no escape from the dread of the approaching storm, a storm not of the sea but of the man. And the man was standing dark and motionless at the helm.
[From the Willow manuscript, Part 6.]
Argo’s rise to Cardinal while in his 30’s was surprising even to me. It was not that I thought he would be over his head in that position (I could not conceive of such a situation), but that I was certain he did not aspire to anything so grandiose. He dreaded the cross-Atlantic trips he was forced to endure several times a year, and now instead of fewer trips, he would have to subject himself to more of them. Of course, his own research had stopped altogether as soon as he left St. John’s, but he kept abreast of things at the university and likened himself an Oppenheimer to Einstein and Fermi on what he had dubbed the Wonderland Project. I must have been Alice.
Still, despite his exalted position, Argo had time for me. I was certain that he loved me as much as ever he could, but in truth the relationship began to tarnish. I grew weary of the secrecy of our relationship and of the traveling to Connecticut. Argo’s having no personal car he could use without a driver left me with the chore of having to make the long trip from central New Jersey to our rendezvous location a mile from the university grounds. It was impossible for him to be seen with me, of course, and that meant that we had to drive well away from the campus, either back to the City for a show or dinner. Most of the time I had to pick him up then drive back to my condo then drive him back to Connecticut, only to return back home to New Jersey. A few times he was able to use his car without raising suspicion, but those times were few, and they afforded us even less time together than we usually had.
Now I loved Argo, truly and deeply, and the times we shared were the best times of my life. Even if it were just a drive through the back roads watching the fall leaves turn color, I felt fortunate to be with him. In truth, the colors were brighter with him sitting in the seat next to me, his hand clasped in mine. We laughed a lot and even shared stories of our work, the people we ran into targeted for sarcasm and ridicule we were unable to express to anyone else. It became a can-you-top-this session to see whose world was more absurd. I usually won.
But one day as I was driving him back to campus and dreading the return trip home, I mentioned my frustration.
“Propinquous,” he said staring out the window.
“What?”
“It means placed nearby. The dean of my seminary asked me to define the word the first time we met.”
“I know what it means,” I said somewhat less than charmingly. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“I didn’t mean anything,” he answered. “The word just popped into my mind.”
“And why do you suppose it did?” I pursued.
“Because it is unpropinquant, our situation.”
“That’s a word?”
“Probably not, but it should be.”
“And us? Should it be?”
He was still looking ahead at the road. “Not unless we both want it.”
“Well, you don’t seem too ready to fight for it,” I remarked, my ire rising at his complacency.
“It’s much easier for me,” he answered looking over to me. “You’re the one who has it rough. You’re the one who has to drive, and it bothers me almost as much as it does you. I just don’t have a good solution.”
And he didn’t, and that was the problem. I was certain by then that he would never leave the priesthood for me, and it was not really possible for me to leave my father’s firm in New Jersey. My only option was to sell my condo and find one up north. At least my driving time would be reduced.
So that is what I did, though it took some explaining to my parents who knew that I had a good situation where I was. But that was only a partial solution. Aside from the building pressure of keeping our affair secret, and that was growing ever more tiresome, there was Argo’s trips to Rome. Normally separated as we were by distance, and constrained as we were by time, Argo spent weeks at a time in Rome on Legion business. Being a spokesman for the Pope required that he be with him or at least nearby, and our time together became more a premium.
That was where The Sanctum came in, or more precisely sailed in. Argo so named the sailboat, which he took out as often as he could. Either with one or two of his associates by preferably by himself, Argo seemed to find excuses to take the boat out if even just for an hour or two. He told me a number of times how the boat had lived up to its name and that when he came back to land he was better able to face the difficulties that beset his life.
The problem was that other boat owners in the marina knew Argo. They were a friendly lot who were always on their boats having small parties or just enjoying the ambiance, and they, of course, knew who he was. I could hardly have been seen alone on the boat with him, of course, though one Fourth of July he took my family and me out to watch the fireworks in New York Harbor.
For us to be on the boat alone together, he would motor to a commercial marina for diesel where I would come aboard with as little fanfare as I could manage. It was a bit risky, but Argo felt safe in believing that dock hands were unlikely to recognize him. We did that several times, and I found that I enjoyed sailing almost as much as he. The wind filling the huge white sails gleaming in the sun as we heeled silently across the water’s surface was exhilarating. We were alone in a natural world capturing the force of nature to move us along with no particular destination or concern for time. To know that an endless sea lay before us and that we could, if we wanted, sail to another continent provided a sense of freedom I had not known before. So when he asked if I could get away for a week’s sail during a late autumn vacation, I arranged it. But Argo seemed if not distant at least anxious on our sail to Cape May and the Delaware Gap, and to my dismay I was about to learn why.
l
We sailed through New York Harbor on a clear and crisp day on our way to spend our first night anchored in Sandy Hook Bay. The sun was bright and warm, and as soon as we passed under the mammoth Verrazano Bridge, I began to believe that the hurly burly of our lives had been left behind, and we were at the gateway to a quiet and natural world different from the one that slowly vanished in the distance behind us.
It was an escape from the bombardment of the electronic world, and for that I would be grateful. On board we did not have TV or talk radio, there was no computer monitor flashing at me, and we vowed to keep our cell phones off. As soon as we left the busy New York waterway, Argo tuned the ship’s radio to receive only emergency WX weather alerts, and the only sounds were the wind in the sails and the whoosh of the sea along the hull. Removed from the jangle of the media, my senses grow more acute, or perhaps they returned to what they once had been. In Newark it was necessary to walk the streets with blinders lest the ugliness of the area intrude. The broken brick factories that had become condos; the broken glass lying in pools of urine left by the broken homeless; the stink of gasoline, garbage, and feces of one type or another; and the unrelenting cars, trucks, and busses forced me inward. Nothing natural and beautiful existed on those manmade streets: not even a tree, not a bird, not even dumb earth. Humans and their dogs passed by, did their damage, and moved on.
The Sanctum was a small cutter that sailed almost eight knots on a reach. Its hull was not the typical white or bright artificial color but a natural cream that along with its lavish teak appointments made it a natural fit for its home on the sea. Below, it had hand-rubbed teak paneling with intricately carved designs. The galley’s cabinets were highly polished and the countertops were Spanish granite. Fitted into the port wall was the electrical panel, trimmed in bronze. All the portholes and hatches were also bronze giving the boat an old world charm. Even the head was walled with Tuscan marble and had small, ornate bronze fixtures.
There was a bookshelf on the starboard with a few boating reference books but only two fiction titles: Paradise Lost and The Inferno. The latter was in Italian.
After supper, with pillows under our heads, we lay on deck and watched a red sun drop behind the Jersey coast. Argo was unusually quiet, but his hand felt good in mine, and all was right with the world.
We were finished with breakfast before sunrise the next morning and raised anchor at first light. Argo had allowed 18 hours to reach the piers of Cape May, but with the strong wind off the coast, it was certain that we would make port well before midnight. It was bright day, and the sun lit the caps of surf like colored jewels dancing in the breeze. It was chilly and I needed a hooded sweatshirt under my Rutgers windbreaker. Argo wore a navy blue pea coat, a Yankees baseball cap, and gloves to handle the cold steel of the wheel.
It was only my second day out on the water, and in the nippy autumn breeze I was more alive than ever. I sensed the shifting breezes, the heat of its currents, the sound it makes around the sails and through the lines. The colors of the sea in differing light created by thin clouds in the azure sky titillated and became somehow important. The fresh salt air and the scent of tropical wood below decks with their varied textures and colors become increasingly more pronounced. Even the natural color of the boat seemed in harmony with the ocean that carried it. Sadly, it is in the looking inward that one often finds dread.
Argo was not himself. I could always count on him to provide interesting observations, wisecracks of one sort or another, and conversation that provoked and challenged. But from the time we had boarded The Sanctum, I sensed a problem. While he responded quickly and completely to any questions or statements, he offered none of his own. He was attentive to my needs, as he always was, offering me hot coffee or looking to my comfort in the cool autumn air, but he was humorless. It had been a hallmark of our times together to laugh as we had when we were kids, and I had never realized until then how important that had been.
“Why so glum, chum?” I asked sitting with my legs stretched out on the cockpit pillow that ran the length of the locker. Argo was piloting from his favorite spot on the portside gunnel as the boat heeled gently heading due south.
“No reason,” he lied. “Want to take over for me? I have to use the head.” He hopped down, gave me his gloves, and went below. Argo had set the sails perfectly for the wind speed, and it really was unnecessary to steer; The Sanctum was sailing itself.
It was fitted with a navy blue dodger and Bimini. The dodger was basically an isinglass windshield that protected the passengers from wind and any spray that might be splashed up in bad weather. Attached to it across the top of the cockpit was the Bimini in matching canvas that acted as a roof. Inserted in the roof was square of isinglass that provided a view of the sails. It was important that the sails be shaped correctly given the wind and course the sailor wanted to follow. A series of lines, each with different names, attached to pulleys led to the cockpit, and from there the pilot could set the lines to maximize the boat’s speed. I had learned only about the lines that altered the shape of the front sail, called the jib, and Argo was to teach me more as we went along.
He came back with a hot chocolate for me, taking my spot on the cockpit pillow. “We’ll be there by midnight,” he said.
“He speaks,” I remarked. “That’s the first time that you offered any words. Are they expensive?”
“Not my words. I work gratis.”
“By your own choice, Father Malle,” I answered looking over at him. He stared at me, unsmiling and distracted.
“Right, I could be so wealthy if just weren’t a priest,” he said, piqued no doubt that I referred to him as Father. “How much do professors make?”
“They do all right,” I answered. “They might not be able to afford a boat like this.” I don’t know why I needled him, then, but the words just seemed to pop out.
“Some can.”
“So there you go. You can become a professor and buy your own boat.”
“I already am a professor.”
“Right,” I answered, “so you don’t need to make money, and you already own a yacht.”
“It’s not mine.”
“Oh, sorry. It’s Joe Machiarolla’s.”
“Correct, and that doesn’t seem to bother you enough to keep you off it.”
“There’s a lot that doesn’t seem to bother me.”
“But in actuality a lot does,” he pursued.
“That’s right, but there’s nothing that seems can done about it.”
“Then why bring it up?”
“I didn’t,” I protested.
“I guess not,” he said mockingly. “I misunderstood the undercurrent.”
“Maybe you did.”
“And maybe I play for the Jets.”
We sat in silence at least an hour after that bitterness, and I decided that if this vacation had any chance of being enjoyable, Argo would have to air whatever it was that was bothering him.
“So are you planning to tell me what’s eating at you?” I asked looking over at him. “Or are you going to give me the silent treatment.”
“I haven’t decided,” he answered petulantly.
“Well I think you should. It’s no fun seeing you in such a funk.”
There was a long pause. “I know,” he admitted. “I’m sorry.”
“Why don’t you take the wheel,” I said, getting up from behind it, “and when I get back you can decide to tell me what’s on your mind or make an attempt at being at least half-way civil.” I went below to use the head and returned with sandwiches and coffee. Apparently he had decided not to tell me what was bothering him because he began the sailing lesson in earnest. I learned about shrouds and stays, clews and telltales, travelers and blocks, and sheets and halyards. Everything on a boat had a name different from what it was called on land. Blocks were really pulleys and shrouds were cables, but not all cables; some were stays.
“So you’re telling me that this rope is not a rope but a sheet?” I needled.
“When it’s used to move a sail.”
“But you just said that that rope was a halyard.”
“When it’s used to raise or lower a sail or ensign, it’s a halyard.”
“But they’re both ropes,” I insisted.
“No, they’re either sheets or halyards.”
“But a rope is a rope.”
“Then you’ll be particularly stressed to learn that what you pull the anchor with is a rode, spelled r-o-d-e,” he said with a tinge of sadism.
“Then it’s also not a rope.”
“No, that is considered a rope.”
“Why?”
“It’s a mystery,” he laughed sardonically.
But while the sailing nomenclature was puzzling at best, the functions of the pieces were as simple as they were ingenious. They were like keys on a piano; when used correctly they created a symphony of power and direction moving a ton of glass, steel, aluminum and wood effortlessly across the ocean.
It was midnight by the time we sailed into our slip at the dark Cape May marina. Argo hooked the shore power cable into the outlet stanchion at the dock while I sprayed fresh water on the hull to remove the sea salt. The cabin heated up quickly, and we were soon snuggled under the blankets, warm in each other’s arms. Argo wasn’t in the mood, and I attributed his lack of interest to the long day in the water. But I was wrong.
The long-range forecast before we left Long Island Sound had called for fair weather, but the next day broke overcast and there was now a threat of rain. Argo was preoccupied during breakfast and said little as the WX channel voice droned on about the bad weather that was in store.
“It’s no fun to sail in the rain,” he said finally, wiping his lips with his table napkin. “We can check out what Cape May has to offer.”
“That sounds good,” I said, collecting the dishes to be washed. “What about the Delaware Inlet?” I asked. We had planned to explore the bay that day.
“We could try it today, but it really sounds as if we’re going to get rain. Let’s wait until tomorrow.”
Argo took his umbrella, zipped up the Bimini, and we left The Sanctum, arm in arm, to explore the quaint town in southernmost New Jersey. I bought a tablecloth with embroidered anchors for the boat from one of the shops, and we made reservations for an early dinner at a downtown inn. We were back by two-thirty and sitting in the enclosed cockpit listening to the rain beat off the canvas. A bottle of Ruffino Chianti and a bowl of Yukon Gold potato chips sat between us on the cockpit table.
“Beats work,” I said to Argo who was trying but failing to hide his blue funk. It wasn’t until after my second glass of wine that I got up the nerve to ask him again what was eating him and devouring our time together.
“Why don’t we wait until we’re on our way back?”
“Why don’t we do it now?” I insisted.
“It’s a long story.”
“And we’ve got nothing to do till six.”
Argo inhaled deeply and began. “When you look at history, you see that great men have always broken the rules, often for the better.”
“Wait,” I said trying to suppress a grin, “do I have to take notes?”
“They won’t help; this is too difficult for you.”
“I just didn’t know this was going to be a history lesson.”
“Don’t worry. Just listen; maybe something will sink in.”
“Okay, but I think I’m going to need more wine,” I said, picking up my glass and taking a gulp. “Go ahead.”
“Thank you,” he said, his eyes down and nodding slightly in mock deference. “As I said before being rudely interrupted, great men in history have broken laws which at first seemed unforgivable but in the end were justified. Jesus, of course, is a prime example. He violated the Hebraic law and laid down his own rules. He did so with no concern for condemnation by other rabbis.” He took a sip of wine. “George Washington risked his life and his significant wealth to run the English army off the king’s own land. The law was certainly not on his side; subjects did not seize land from monarchies because they thought their policies were too stringent. And there was Lincoln, of course. He decided that sovereign states were really not sovereign and could not go their own way. He also unilaterally suspended habeas corpus. They were great men who broke the laws of other men because they were superior to them.”
“So you’re a proponent of Nietzsche’s superman theory.”
“Have you ever read Nietzsche?”
“No.”
“Just as well; he was insane, an atheistic sociopath who rejected the notion of good and evil. In fact, he even discounted the value of conscience. But he did recognize a different standard for truly great men, and so do I.”
He took a chip and crunched it loudly as if to punctuate his outlandish statement, and I waited for him to continue. “Hitler would have been a superman had he been successful against the Allies, but I would not think him a great man. History might say so, but I would not. There is a moral component to greatness that cannot be ignored. But the question remains about supermen. Does superiority give license to break the laws of man? Nietzsche says it does.”
“And you think so.”
“You’re the legal eagle; what do you think?” he asked taking another chip.
“I believe in the laws created by people to serve people. Anarchy results when certain people can break the law, based on their belief that they are superior.”
“And if the belief is founded?” he asked. “If a person is truly a superior being with a strong moral purpose?”
“Still no. Perhaps in a lawless system with no other means of redress. But in a democracy we can change laws … make new ones. The system provides procedures for change … lawful change.”
“Jesus changed the Hebraic law without convincing the rabbinate that changes should be made. He didn’t work within the system; he saw what was needed and did it.”
“Well that’s a bit different, don’t you think?”
“Not really,” he answered. “Certainly Lincoln had a system of laws, but he didn’t think they were good enough. He did what had to be done to save the union, so he mobilized an army against the secessionists. How many thousands died because of his unilateral decision?”
“Okay, suppose for argument sake there are times in history that great men take extreme action, perhaps unlawful action. Are you arguing that the ends justify the means?”
“Yes, of course. They most often do, though not always. Ethics is a always a balancing act.”
“And who gets to judge? I’d say it is the people in a lawful society.”
“I’d say that is true most of the time; other times it is a superman who transcends the law when the society or organization cannot or will not act in its own best interest.” He took another sip of wine and with his finger snapped against the isinglass knocking the raindrops off.
“So this idea of a superman, is that what’s bothering you? Is this theory of a crackpot German, a sociopath, ruining our vacation?”
“It’s not the theory but the application,” he said, his face somber and his voice not much beyond a whisper.
“What do you mean?”
He waited a long moment and exhaled visibly.
“The Church is being threatened, not from without but from within, and what I am about to say affects not only the Church but us.” He looked directly into my eyes and then looked away as if charting the course of his next statemnts. “The situation is that as a leader of the Legion of Christ I am dedicated to protecting the Church at whatever cost. Everything I have worked for, all my effort and the efforts of hundreds like me, is toward that end. I can allow nothing, nothing at all to prevent that effort.”
“Meaning Condicio.”
“Meaning his second encyclical. Condicio, despite its damage, is tolerable, but if he goes forward with a second encyclical, the Church as we know it will collapse. There is no question; it simply cannot withstand what he has in store for it.”
I poured myself a third glass.
“The Curia is meeting continually and nothing is coming out of it. It’s as if they are on high alert for a coming disaster. Of course, they are helpless. Michael answers to no one.”
“It’s always been that way.”
“But in this case, the Pope is a clear danger to the Church. He is ill, psychologically. He’s become paranoid … I’ve talked with him; I know … and I know the damage that his paranoia will cause. Michael has the power to, and he will, publish a second encyclical, regardless of the objections of the Curia, and regardless of the catastrophic consequences.”
“What consequences? And how can you know what he will write?”
“After the first one, it’s obvious. He is going to call for direct action to be taken against the enemies of the Church. Condicio names them, and they are everyone not aligned with the Church.”
“What action?”
Argo leaned toward me a bit, his eyes steady and narrow. “He sees himself as Michael the Archangel. He’s a warrior. And what action do warriors take?” His eyes grew colder, focusing squarely into mine. “He has to be stopped.”
“And the Curia can do nothing at all? There’s no codicil, no estop mechanism?”
“If there were, it would have been used to prevent the first one,” he said with an unusual tension in his voice. “The Curia was uniformly opposed to it. No, there are no legal means of stopping a pope, deranged or not. How could there be, the pope is God’s choice.”
Even though I was already feeling the effects of the first two glasses, I took a long draught. My lightheadedness was no doubt due to the wine, but I suspect what I was hearing, and what I feared I was going to hear, added to the effect. “So I don’t understand. If Michael is God’s choice, obviously this is what God wants. That is canon law, correct?”
“Yes, and that’s the problem,” he answered. Looking vacantly past me he said more to himself than to me, “But Jesus amended the Hebraic law.”
“So the Curia will have to amend canon law.”
“But they can’t, not in time. They need quick and decisive action. To do so would require a great leader… someone who can rise above his time and place and do what must be done to save the Church from itself.”
“And you are that person? And does the burden fall on you?”
He sat motionless, and the silence was harrowing.
“But what can you do? You’re not the Curia.”
He sipped his wine before answering. “That remains to be seen.”
“And that’s why you’ve been so sullen since we left.”
“Only partially,” he answered ruefully, looking up at mast through the rain that beat ominously on the Bimini. “What I have to do will impact on us.”
“Yes, well it always has, hasn’t it,” I replied not hiding my disgust. I put my glass down and went below leaving him sitting under the canopy in the pouring rain. I threw myself face down on the bed and with a pillow over my head began to cry.
I had slept past dinner and awoke to Argo’s telling me that a tropical storm had developed and was headed our way. It would bring days of rain, but there was a window of opportunity to get back to Long Island Sound if we left immediately. So at eight o’clock that foggy night we headed out of the marina and into the black Atlantic.
The wind had shifted southeast and with it came the sad fear of an inevitable storm. As the boat swept over an ocean still warm with summer, the whisper of hollow loss grew stronger. The Sanctum’s sails were full and proud, alive against the cobalt sky, but they were loud in the night --- sirens sighing sadly of the change that was to come. Holding back the wind and whispering a woeful warning, the sails were for the first time not powerful servants of The Sanctum but white, wailing shrouds --- waiting.
I shuddered and went below to hide. As it always had, the fresh scent of unfinished teak greeted me before I could see it glowing orange in dim cabin lights. The sweet wood had become a sanctuary from all that was raw above, but that night its quiet warmth failed to work its charm. There would be no escape from the dread of the approaching storm, a storm not of the sea but of the man. And the man was standing dark and motionless at the helm.
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