Cradle and All Read online

  Chapter 46

  I WAS GETTING CLOSER to accepting the fact that Kathleen Beavier’s baby was special in some way, and that troubled me more than I could say. It definitely worried me that I was starting to believe that Kathleen could be telling the truth, that my objectivity might be fading. I had gone from “This is a fraud” to “There just might be some truth here.”

  For just about the first time since coming to Sun Cottage, I had a few hours to myself. Kathleen was catnapping in the sunroom. Mrs. Walsh was baking furiously in the kitchen when I went in to get a pot of tea. Carolyn and Charles Beavier had gone to town to shop. Justin was off somewhere taking a run.

  I’d looked forward to an investigation of the Beavier library. As big as the libraries in some small towns, it was a place where I could do serious research. There were history books, biographies, yards of reading materials on sailing, seashells, gardening, birds, and finance.

  And there was a section right by the fireplace that was full of books on religion. Many of these were so recently purchased at Barnes and Noble, and the Maryknoll Bookshop that there were still sales slips tucked between the pages.

  A fire crackled in the grate. I poured myself a cup of tea, then placed a stack of books about the Virgin Mary on a mahogany end table beside a cozy rose-colored wing chair. Since I’d already read just about everything available on Mary, this was a review for me. I ran my hands across the spines of Our Lady in the Gospels, Our Lady of Fatima, Woman’s Mysteries: Ancient and Modern, before cracking open a wonderful book written in the late seventies called Alone of All Her Sex. I couldn’t read this book without falling in love with Mary all over again.

  “The Virgin, sublime model of chastity,” the author wrote, “remained for me the most holy being I could ever contemplate, and so potent was her spell that for some years I could not enter a church without pain at all the safety and beauty of the salvation I had forsaken. I remember visiting Notre-Dame in Paris and standing in the nave, tears starting in my eyes.”

  I thought it was so true. This was the way faith worked, the way it had felt to me. It was the power of the Blessed Mother Mary that so many women understood. Further in her book, Marina Warner wrote that the Virgin “is one of the few female figures to have attained the stature of myth.” She quoted Henry Adams, who had written, “The study of Our Lady leads directly back to Eve, and lays bare the whole subject of sex.”

  Quite an interesting dichotomy, I thought. The Virgin — who many and increasing millions feel should be elevated to the level of her Son — and Eve, who was tempted by the serpent, ate the fruit of the forbidden tree, and was cast out of the Garden of Eden. Eve had accepted Satan. Our Lady would crush him.

  I forgot the time as I contemplated the literature, looking for clues to the situation in Newport. There was pitifully little in the Bible about Mary, only six slight references, and there wasn’t that much historical evidence about her either.

  Two major theories, based on what scholars loosely called Christian tradition, were usually accepted in theological circles. The first was that Mary herself was conceived immaculately, inside the womb of her mother — she had been born without original sin. The second accepted theory was that when Mary died, perhaps in the ancient city of Ephesus in western Asia Minor, her body and soul ascended directly into Heaven. This was called the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

  I was still, after all these years, amazed that Mary was the least known, by far the most mysterious, of all major biblical figures. And why?

  I didn’t have to phone any feminist for the answer. Mary was a woman, a mother. The Scripture writers were men.

  Some things had changed since the birth of Christ. This modern blessed event surrounding Kathleen Beavier, if it was that, would be the most completely documented birth in almost two thousand years. There would undoubtedly be books and films.

  And — I hoped it wasn’t too vain of me to hope — I would be standing at the foot of the birthing bed.

  Maybe then I would know the whole truth about the virgin Kathleen.

  Chapter 47

  I STILL HAD PLENTY of work to do and I finally had a little time to do it. I grabbed my ancient pea coat from the hall closet and walked quickly outside to my car. Within minutes I was sweeping past Newport’s famous Bellevue Avenue, heading west on Memorial Boulevard.

  I drove the mile-and-a-half length of Sachuest Point, where Kathleen had apparently parked with a boy nearly nine months before, in January. The mysterious and perhaps mystical evening of January 23.

  Now that I was away from Sun Cottage, my latent feelings of doubt rose up again. I was actually more confused about Kathleen than ever. When it came right down to it, nothing made complete sense; everything required some faith on my part. Faith. It always came down to that.

  Cardinal Rooney seemed to accept the virgin facts, and I knew he wasn’t easily fooled. The cardinal was a sarcastically brilliant, cynical, and tough-minded priest of the old school. And Rooney believed in Kathleen Beavier. He seemed to believe a holy child was about to be born. Justin believed as well, and he was nobody’s fool.

  Why? What made them so sure about her? What did they know? What was I here in Newport to find out? What mystery still had to unravel?

  Next, there was Kathleen herself. She was a virgin, and she was pregnant. That much I knew for sure. Kathleen said that she’d seen the Blessed Virgin, and I — tough-minded and cynical myself — felt emotionally convinced that she was telling the truth, at least the truth as she knew it.

  No facts, just feelings, but I was swept up in them as I drove through Newport.

  Here was another fact: Kathleen had tried to kill herself and had failed. If she was pregnant with the Holy Child, why had she tried to take her life and that of the baby? Or should I be looking at the other side of that coin? How was it that help had showed up in an abortion clinic that was supposed to be closed for the night? Another patient arriving late. Help that had saved Kathleen’s life.

  No one had known Kathleen was going to be there on that day, not even her three best friends. They thought she was going the next day. That was the plan.

  Finally, there was an important historical perspective to consider. Christianity was based on a belief in miracles. Christians all over the world believed in the Virgin Birth, and that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, had become man. Was it truth or was it myth?

  I wanted a fact. I was starving for one measly, crummy fact to prove what I was starting to believe.

  As I continued down Memorial Boulevard, I saw a gold-and-blue sign pointing to the left, just past Spring Street: ROGERS HIGH SCHOOL.

  I hit the turn signal. There was someone at the school who might give me what I wanted: a little light on this fantastic puzzle. Kathleen’s date on the night of January 23.

  Jamie Jordan.

  He was a cold hard fact.

  Chapter 48

  I POINTED THE CAR down the tunnel of colorful maple trees called School Street and stepped down on the gas pedal.

  It was 2:57 by my watch. I was just in time for the end of the school day.

  An electric bell rang out and the clamor of boisterous youth filled the crisp fall air. A mob of students stampeded out of the school’s eight swinging glass front doors. Car horns blared, and a bloated, faded brown football wobbled out away from the sedate, Colonial-style school building.

  I stared into the swarm of shaggy-haired kids, trying to pick out one teenage boy from the many.

  I scanned the crowd several times. My eyes finally settled on a tall muscular boy with a bright shock of blond hair falling across his eyes.

  He was swaggering, shoving, engaged in physical repartee with a fellow male student who was no match for him.

  I knew it was him. I’d seen a picture in Kathleen’s room, and it couldn’t be anyone else. James Jordan was a big boy, more like a man. I figured he was probably six-two and close to two hundred pounds. He was good-looking to be sure, but somehow I couldn’t see
him with Kathleen.

  I had an inkling of fear, the thought that maybe it was nuts to force a confrontation, but I pressed on. It’s called counterphobia, I knew, and not generally advisable in my trade.

  “Hi, excuse me,” I said, interrupting his horseplay with his pals. “Are you James Jordan?”

  He stopped, turned, gave me a slow, cool, appraising smile.

  “I guess that means that you are,” I said. I forced a smile I didn’t feel as he tapped out a cigarette from a red-and-white pack.

  “My name is Anne Fitzgerald. I’m a friend of Kathleen’s.”

  Jordan lit up a cigarette, then shot a look at his buddies, who’d begun to clump around him. They were sniggering and giving me the once-over, trying to be as unsubtle as possible about it.

  “Yeah, I’m Jamie. And you’re a friend of Kathy’s? What kind of friend?”

  “I’d like to talk with you for just a few minutes.”

  I kept my eyes steadily on James Jordan. I didn’t move a muscle. I didn’t show any fear, or doubt that he would talk to me.

  His curiosity about me won out over the don’t-give-a-shit posturing. I knew it would. It’s what I do for a living.

  Chapter 49

  HIS FRIENDS WERE SHIFTING their feet like a herd of prickly young bulls. They were standing too close to me, violating the invisible margin of space I try to keep with strangers. They knew it, too.

  “Who are you? You from Hard Copy or something?” one of them asked.

  “No,” I said coolly. “Not a tabloid reporter, just a friend.”

  “Okay,” Jamie said after a few long seconds. “Let’s walk and talk, friend. You’ve got five minutes to get my full attention.”

  “Oh, thank you, thank you,” I said, then finally smiled.

  And so did Jordan. I could tell that he liked me, and also that he considered himself good with women, even an older one like me.

  There was a side street at the end of the block and on it were pretty little houses with Jeeps and the like parked in the driveways, bikes and skateboards on the walks. Jordan was a head taller than me and as thick-chested as a lumberjack. Nothing had ever unsettled this boy, or at least that’s what he wanted me to believe.

  “Okay,” he said as we rounded the corner. “You have my attention anyway. Who the hell are you? Really? And what do you want? You aren’t Kathy’s friend. That much I know.”

  “Jamie, you don’t know shit,” I said. “And that’s a fact.”

  I told him who I was but very little about my actual assignment. I also gave off an indisputable don’t-mess-with-me attitude. Machismo could cut both ways.

  “This past January,” I continued, “you went out with Kathleen Beavier. That’s an established fact too. The two of you dated at least once.”

  He shook his head. “I knew this shit was coming. You guys are so predictable. You’re another one writing a book, right? So write this! I went out with Kathy Beavier once. One date. Plus a few trips to get a Big Mac or something after school.”

  “How come there was only one date?”

  “How come only one date? Well, we can’t spread the boy around too thin, can we?” Jordan said.

  He was too smug to be real. I couldn’t help thinking that this kid was a heartpounder of the Brad Pitt school. He and Kathy would have made quite a striking couple, but still, I couldn’t see her with him. She might have had a slight infatuation, but she didn’t like cocky people.

  “Could you be straight with me for one minute? Back on January twenty-third, you took Kathy to a formal dance at her school. Then something happened. Kathy told me that much. What happened?”

  A look of anger flashed across his face. I saw what he would look like as a grown man, and I didn’t like it. “Listen, goddammit, isn’t it obvious as the nose on your pretty face? She won’t tell because we made it after the dance. Everybody knows that Kathy was like a dead fish in the sack, I’ll admit, but that doesn’t make her the blessed virgin!”

  His scowl was intimidating. I wanted to throw up my hands and say, “Thanks. See ya.” But I couldn’t walk away. Not yet.

  “A medical expert from New York came here the night before last, a doctor with no reason to lie. Jamie, I was standing right there when he examined her. Kathleen is still a virgin. She never made it with anyone! Not you, not anybody else.”

  “Hey, bullshit!” he screamed at me. “I had her!” He grabbed himself between his long legs. “With this.”

  I must have telegraphed my disbelief, because he scowled again. Then, before I could move away, he shoved me hard.

  I went down on the ground. I clapped my hand to my chest. I was more embarrassed than scared. The kid had decked me! My side where I’d landed hurt.

  But I got right up. I shoved the bully. Then I shoved him again.

  “You’re a real tough guy, right? How tough are you?” I yelled at him. I kept coming at him. “Answer my questions! What happened that night at Sachuest Point? Something happened. I can see it in your lying, coward’s eyes. I can see right through you.”

  Suddenly, he whirled and hurried away. I wanted to chase after him, but I knew it wouldn’t do any good.

  He was lying to me — I was sure of it.

  But if that was true, then Kathleen was not.

  Chapter 50

  ALL I WANTED was the simple, unvarnished truth, but isn’t that what we all are searching for? That night I sat in an old painted pine rocker beside Kathleen’s pretty canopied bed. The moon had just floated up over the ocean like a big yellow balloon, but tonight it failed to move me with its beauty or serenity.

  My head was still ringing from my brief, disturbing interview with Jamie Jordan. I was mistrustful of just about everything. I needed to know what terrible thing had happened between Jordan and Kathleen at Sachuest Point.

  Kathleen was weak and exhausted. I could see it on her face. The darkened bedroom was lit only by a small lamp on the nightstand. I turned on the radio/CD player on the white lacquered bookshelf. Music enveloped us and I recognized Jewel. A popular love ballad Kathleen liked.

  “You don’t go for that sentimental stuff, do you?” Kathleen asked.

  “The idea is for you to go to sleep,” I told her. I went back to my chair and rocked quietly. As bad as my talk had gone with Jamie Jordan, it would have been worth it if I’d learned something useful. Why wouldn’t either of them talk about that night?

  “Kathy, I have to ask you a question,” I finally said.

  She was staring off into space, seemingly oblivious to what I’d said.

  “That day on the beach when I started bleeding,” she finally said, “I was terrified. I’ve never been so scared in my life. I love this baby,” she admitted to me for the first time. “I can’t lose it now.”

  And that admission moved me. I rocked silently for long minutes, just trying to get a grip on my emotions.

  “Do you trust me, Kathy?”

  Kathleen smiled her incredibly innocent smile, an absolutely charismatic look that she has.

  “I trust you. Of course I do. You’re very honest, open.”

  I took a deep breath. Kathleen could knock the wind out of me just about anytime she wanted to with a few little words. How was it that she could affect me like this? Was it why I was starting to believe in her?

  “Kathy, please tell me about Jamie Jordan. I went to see him today at Rogers High School. I spoke with Jamie. He said that —”

  “He said we did it. He tells that to people because he thinks that’s what they expect to hear from him. Honestly, I feel so sorry for Jamie. His whole macho fantasy is so sad.”

  I could tell that Kathleen was trying to mask her hurt. She clutched an ancient rag doll to her breasts, looking even younger than sixteen years.

  “We didn’t have sex, Anne. Jamie took me to go parking out on Sachuest Point, but I wouldn’t do anything with him. He was like an ugly animal forcing himself on me. I wouldn’t do it. I didn’t do anything with Jamie. That’s everythin
g there is to tell right now,” she said.

  I’m sure I had a blank expression on my face, but my brain was whirring.

  “Don’t you believe me?” Kathleen asked. “Please believe me, Anne. If no one believes — what will happen to me? What will happen to my baby?”

  I shushed her, then got up and smoothed her hair, tucked her covers up under her chin. She’d said she was innocent, repeatedly, but it nagged at me that she always added, “That’s all I can say right now.”

  I wanted to believe that Kathleen was being honest because I cared about her so much. But . . . I couldn’t. Something important had happened to Kathleen that night at Sachuest Point. I had been sent to Newport to find out what it was.

  So far, I hadn’t succeeded.

  Chapter 51

  Upstate New York.

  ST. JOHN OF THE CROSS was nestled deep within forested hills, ninety miles north of New York City, along the Hudson River. As his car bumped up the rutted drive, Nicholas Rosetti had never been more afraid for his life, or his soul. The compound, made up of a castlelike estate building and a dozen sandstone cottages, was a rest home for alcoholic, deranged, and melancholy priests from the Archdiocese of New York.

  But there was someone here who offered some hope to Father Rosetti. If there was any help in this world, it would come from Monsignor Bernard Stingley. This was Rosetti’s final stop before he traveled to Newport to see the second virgin.

  Inside the almost medieval estate, Rosetti was met by a slender, crew-cut monk who led the visiting priest down stone-block corridors. Their footsteps and voices echoed like pistol shots in an underground tunnel.

  At the end of a third or fourth hallway the monk knocked, then swung open a dark oaken door. A robed priest was standing at the window. Rosetti felt his heart expand when he saw him.

  Then he heard the Voice — laughing, cackling obscenely. You stupid, stupid fool. This vain old man can’t help you. No one can help you.

  Monsignor Bernard Stingley was his former mentor and confessor at the Lateran in Rome. Silenced for the past half-dozen years, the elderly priest was a great biblical scholar, and he was renowned for his writings on the Apocalypse.