Virgin (34 page)

The last two
sentences shook Kesev. He hadn't realized the end of the second millennium was
indeed upon the world. The epochal event of its departure dovetailed with his
apprehensions about the meaning of the apocalyptic events of the summer.

"Listen to
him!" the little sidekick said.
"Listen!"
But the
half-dozen people who had paused a moment to listen to the raggedy man had
heard it all before, so they moved on. And with no audience, the man called
Preacher and his lone disciple moved on as well.

Leaving Kesev
and a thin, sickly looking old man sharing the bench.

Good riddance,
Kesev thought.

Monsignor
Vincenzo Riccio shifted his weight on the bench. His wasted buttocks offered no
padding against the hard, rough planked surface. He wanted to get up and
continue his search for the vision, but he didn't know which way to go in the
fading light.

Fading like my
body, he thought. Like my life. Slowly, steadily, inexorably.

He was
beginning to think his chance to see the vision again would never come. He'd
been traveling down from the Vatican mission to the Lower East Side night after
night, hoping, praying, beseeching God and Jesus and Mary herself to honor him
with the vision once more, just once more before the cancer took him. It had
become a contest of sorts, a race between the tumor and his determination to
last until he saw her again.

He glanced at
the bearded man a few feet to his right.

"Do you
think he's right?" he said.

The bearded man
started, as if surprised that someone would speak to him. Most New Yorkers were
shocked initially when a stranger like Vincenzo opened a conversation with
them.

"Sorry. Do
I think who is right?"

A strange
accent. Middle Eastern, certainly, but where? The features framed by the beard
and dark hair were Semitic. A Palestinian?

"The
Preacher. Do you think we have only four years left until the Second
Coming?"

"You mean,
will the Second Coming of the Master coincide with the end of the second
millennium?"

"Yes. The
fin
de millenaire.
He's hardly the first to mention it, but it is an
interesting concept, is it not?"

The bearded man
nodded slowly. "But if that is true, if the Master is returning with the
end of the millennium, then we do not have four years."

Vincenzo
wondered at this fellow's use of the term "the Master." Surely he was
referring to Christ. Who else could be expected at the Second Coming. But it
was such an archaic reference, the way the early church referred to Jesus.

But Vincenzo
was even more intrigued by his last statement.

"It's 1996," he said. "Why do you say we
don't have four years?"

"Because
your calendar is wrong. The Master was not born in the year you have designated
one
a.d."

Vincenzo
realized with a shock that he was right. It was an accepted fact now that the
birth year of Christ had been miscalculated by a sixth century monk named
Dionysus Exiguus who had been charged by the Church with numbering the years of
the Christian era.

"Good
Lord, sir, that is true! Jesus Christ is believed to have been born somewhere
between four and seven
b.c!"

"Four."

"I beg
your pardon?"

"The
Master was born in what you now call four
b.c."

"I don't
think anyone really knows for sure."

"I
do."

The man's tone
was defiantly authoritative, leaving no room for argument. One would almost
think he'd been alive then.

"Yes . . .
well," Vincenzo said. "For the sake of discussion we shall accept the
year four
b.c.
That would mean
that" ... a chill rippled up Vincenzo's spine . . . "Heavens, man,
that would mean that this very year marks the two-thousandth year since His
birth!"

The bearded man
nodded slowly. "Yes. Unsettling, no? I just realized that fact myself a
moment ago." He shot to his feet. "Good-bye. I must be going."

"Yes,"
Vincenzo said. "Of course. It was most enlightening talking to you.
Perhaps we'll meet some other time."

"I do not
think so."

He walked off.

Vincenzo
wondered if he was another "Mary-hunter," as one of the local papers
had dubbed the hordes of faithful roaming the Lower East Side streets in search
of the Blessed Virgin.

Perhaps,
perhaps not, Vincenzo thought as he pushed himself to his feet. But certainly
something strange about that fellow. Not very friendly, which he supposed was
to be expected in New York, but this fellow was almost furtive.

Vincenzo wished
he'd had more time to talk to him, though. If he was right, then this year
indeed marked the true end of the second millennium. Vincenzo found that more
than a little disquieting.

As he crossed
Pearl Street a man ran out of an alley, frantically waving his arms in the
dusk.

"OhmyGod!
OhmyGod! I think I saw her! I think it's
her!"

Vincenzo's
heart leapt. "Where?"

As the fellow
pointed toward the black maw of the alley behind him, Vincenzo tried in vain to
make out his features in the dusky light.

"Back
there! She was just standing there, glowing."

"Show
me," Vincenzo said. "Please show me!"

"Sure,"
the fellow said, waving him to follow. "Come on!"

An alarm
clanged faintly in a corner of Vincenzo's brain, but his mind was too suffused
with glorious anticipation to pay it proper heed.

The darkness of
the alley swallowed him. He saw nothing.

"Where?"

He was shoved
roughly from behind and fell to his knees on the garbage-strewn pavement.
Fear pounded
through Vincenzo as he realized he was being mugged. He'd heard about the
predators who'd begun stalking the defenseless Mary-hunters. The papers had
dubbed them
"Holy-rollers." He began shouting for help until
a heavy boot slammed into his ribs and drove the wind out of him.

"Shuddup,
asshole, an' gimme yer wallet!"

Vincenzo
shouted again and was kicked again. The mugger grabbed his wrist and pulled off
his watch.

"Where's
yer wallet. Gimme yer fuckin' wallet or I cut ya!"

Vincenzo was
reaching for his back pocket when he heard a groan above him. He heard
scuffling feet, and then a heavy weight slammed onto the pavement next to him.

"Did he
stab you? Do you need a hospital?"

Vincenzo
recognized the accent--the little bearded fellow who'd been sitting on the bench
with him moments ago.

"No. I'm
only bruised. Could you help me up, perhaps?"

He raised his
hand and felt another grasp it and pull him to his feet.

Immediately the
man began to move off.

"Wait. I
haven't thanked you. There must be something--"

"You can
say nothing of this," the fellow said, stopping and turning. "That
will be thanks enough."

"But
people should know! You're a hero!"

"That man
behind you will be dead before help arrives. I am a stranger in this country. I
do not wish to be arrested."

"What did
you do to him?"

"My knife
did to him what his knife was going to do to you."

"But
why?"

"I needed
to."

Weak and
trembling, Vincenzo leaned against a wall and silently watched the stranger
hurry off. The parting words turned over in his mind. /
needed to.
Something
about the way he'd said that . . .

Needed to what?
Help somebody . . . or stab somebody?

He turned for
one final look into the alley that might have been his grave and saw her.

She was only a
few feet away, moving closer . . .
flowing
toward him . . . her faint
glow a beacon in the black hole of the alley. Her robes were the same as in
Cork, only now he was close enough to make out some of her features. The tears
in his eyes blurred them but he thought he detected a hint of a smile as she
looked at him.

"It's
you!" he sobbed, overcome by an unplumbed longing within. "I've been
searching for you. I knew I'd find you again!"

She flowed
closer without slowing . . . closer . . .

Vincenzo backed
up a step but she never slowed her approach. It was as if she didn't see him.
When she
was within inches he cried, "Stop!" but she continued her
irresistible course, pressing against him--but he felt nothing. She had no
substance. And then his vision was filled with light that blotted out the alley
and the street and the city, light all around, light within him . . .

Within him . .
.

The apparition
had merged with him. Was he within her or was she within him?

He froze, he
sizzled, dazzling spots flashed and swelled and danced before his eyes, he
floated, he plummeted . . .

And then the
light faded and the city night filled his eyes again. He whirled and saw the
apparition directly behind him, flowing away.

She walked
. . .
right . . . through . . . me!

And then she
began to fade. Within seconds Vincenzo was alone again. And then the wonder
that filled him also began to fade as the pain began, searing bolts of agony
lancing through his chest and abdomen, doubling him over, driving him to his
knees.

IN THE PACIFIC

7deg N, 150deg W

The
clouds and wind have organized into a pocket of turbulence with sharply
demarcated

borders. The pocket begins to drift eastward, drawing warm moist air up
from the ocean

surface into its high, cool center where the moisture condenses into
droplets. Thunder

rumbles and lightning flashes as rain and wind whip the churning ocean
surface to a froth.

The
storm swells as it accelerates its eastward course.

19

Manhattan

"Okay,
Monsignor. Another deep breath, and hold this one."

Vincenzo Riccio
filled his lungs while Dr. Karras's fingers probed his abdomen under the lower
right edge of his rib cage. The young oncologist's normally tanned-looking skin
was relatively pale today. The overhead fluorescents of the examining room
reflected off the fine sheen of perspiration on his forehead.

"Damn!" he muttered as his fingers probed more
deeply under Vincenzo's ribs.

"Something
wrong?" Vincenzo said, exhaling at last.

"No. I
mean, yes. I mean . . ."

Vincenzo sat up
and pulled down his undershirt.

"I don't
understand."

"Neither do I," Karras said, running a hand
through his short black hair.

"Perhaps
you'd better tell me the problem, Doctor. I think I deserve to know."

The examination
had started out routinely enough, with Vincenzo arriving at the outpatient
cancer clinic, reading in the waiting room until his name was called, and then
being examined by Dr. Karras. But after examining him just as he had now,
Karras had stepped over to the chart and pulled out yesterday's blood test
results. After checking those for what seemed like an unduly long time and
shuffling through the sheaf of previous reports, he examined Vincenzo's abdomen

again, then sent him for a CT scan of the liver, with comparison
to the previous study.

"Stat,"
he'd said into the phone.
"Double
stat." So Vincenzo had
allowed himself to be swallowed by the metal gullet of the
scanner where his liver could be
radiographically sliced and diced, and now he was back again on the examining
table. He had an inkling as to the nature of Dr. Karras's discomfiture, but he
dared not voice it . . . dared not even
think
it. 'The problem is--"