“In this job, I end up underestimating it, I think. I’m certainly getting a bad impression of what its normal state is.”
“‘I come not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.’”
“He was God. He had a better grip on some things than I do.”
“True,” the Cardinal Archbishop said. He dragged himself away from the window and rubbed his temples. There was a small bottle of ibuprofen in the filing cabinet. He went there, got it out, and swallowed two caplets without water. The worst thing would be for him to go into the conference room in this mood, with his head pounding.
“Have you left him alone in there?” he asked Father Doheny.
Father Doheny shook his head. “Sister is in with him, pouring him coffee and murmuring at his every word. He’s one of those people. Give him a nun in a traditional habit, and he goes totally to pieces.”
“And Sister Harriet thinks we want her back in a habit because we want to—what’s the word?”
“Disempower. We want to disempower her,” Father Doheny said. “The word isn’t in Sister Marie Claire’s computer dictionary, so she’s decided it’s a mistake. Whenever Sister Harriet uses it in a letter, Sister Marie Claire circles it in red pen.”
“And lets Sister Harriet see it?”
“Not yet, but I’m waiting.”
The Cardinal Archbishop put the ibuprofen back into the filing cabinet. “I suppose we’d better go,” he said. “It seems to me to be a terrible way to spend the afternoon. Are we going to run through that press conference?”
“Probably. You know Andy.”
“I can’t tell if that’s a good thing or a bad thing.”
“I wish I could understand what it is that people like Andy want,” Father Doheny said.
The Cardinal Archbishop felt his mouth twisting into a grimace. “Self-respect,” he said shortly. Then he shook his head, to soften his tone, because it wasn’t Father Doheny he was disgusted with, but himself.
The conference room was on the other end of this floor, in the corner where an office would have stood, but larger than any office in the building. It had windows on two sides and a thick pile carpet on the floor. The furniture consisted of a teakwood table, matching chairs, and a long low sideboard meant to serve as a place to park coffee and refreshments during meetings of boards and committees. There was coffee there now, in a big electric samovar to keep it warm, as well as china cups and saucers from the best set in the storeroom, and two large crystal plates piled high with cookies. Sister Marie Claire had worked for a Cardinal before. She knew what was expected when significant donors came to call.
Andy O‘Reilly was standing next to the conference table, balancing a china coffee cup on a china saucer. Sister Marie Claire was standing, too, and Andy wouldn’t feel right about sitting as long as she was. He was a short, wiry, gnarled Irishman, the kind played in the movies by James Cagney and Michael J. Pollock. He had looked forty on the day he was born, and he would look forty forever afterward. He would also never stop moving. For the Cardinal Archbishop, watching Andy O’Reilly was physically painful. He jumped around constantly. When he was sitting down, all his muscles seemed to twitch at once.
Andy saw Father Doheny and the Cardinal Archbishop come in, and put his coffee cup down on the conference table. “Your Eminence! Father! I was just talking to the Sister here about the terrible state of the parochial schools!”
Andy O’Reilly was the only person the Cardinal Archbishop had ever met who spoke in exclamation points. Sister Marie Claire made ready to go.
“Mr. O’Reilly was expressing his great concern that our parochial schools give their students a solid grounding in religion,” she said. “I’ve told him I couldn’t agree more.”
“Quite,” the Cardinal Archbishop said.
Father Doheny went to the sideboard. “Why don’t you take some coffee and cookies with you, Sister? I know you’re not hungry now, but in another hour or two—”
“That’s very kind of you, Father, but I’m due at the refectory for a late lunch at any moment. If His Eminence doesn’t need anything—”
“I’m more than fine, Sister,” the Cardinal Archbishop said.
Sister Marie Claire bowed slightly, then floated out as they watched her.
“That’s the real thing,” Andy said, when the door clicked shut behind her. “Nuns in habits, looking like nuns. Not these women with blue suits on that look like lesbian social workers. Not that they really are lesbians. If you know what I mean, Your Eminence.”