The Greatest Evil (34 page)

Tony and Beth were seated at a table in the Lindell A.C., downtown Detroit’s quintessential jock beefeatery and watering hole—one of whose claims to fame was the now bronzed athletic supporter presented by Detroit Lions linebacker Wayne Walker upon his retirement from football.

Tonight there was another celebration. Tony Delvecchio’s jersey, “Old Number 28,” was going to be hung in the bar. Tony would never be elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Nor would his number be retired by either the Bears or the Lions. But, for a time at least, it would be on exhibit in the Lindell A.C.

This was Tony’s crowd. Probably there was little reason for anyone to patronize the Lindell A.C. if one were not wildly in love with sports. It served its clientele well.

It held little attraction for Beth. She was here solely for Tony’s sake and the honor being paid him.

The presentation had been made minutes ago. Things were returning to normal: arguments over statistics, bets on sports trivia, recollections of yesteryear’s heroics.

“Can’t we go yet?” Clearly, Beth was bored.

“In a little bit.” Tony’s brow knitted. “I’d think this place was beginning to reach you except that you’ve been like this for … what?—three, four weeks? What’s the problem?”

She picked up the sweating glass that held her gin and tonic and began making wet circles on the table. “You know the punchline, ‘It’s the whole damn thing’?”

“Yeah …?”

“Well, that’s what’s wrong: the whole damn thing.”

“That doesn’t give me much to go on.”

She put the glass down and caught his eyes in her gaze. “We’ve been together for twenty-six, years. Over a quarter of a century. And aside from setting some sort of record for living together without benefit of clergy, what have we got to show for it?”

“Lotsa good times. Lotsa good memories. And …” He shook his head. “… some that weren’t so good.”

“Couldn’t just about anybody say that?”

“So what’s so bad about it?”

“Tony, we should be grandparents by now. And we’ve never even had a kid. We could’ve had some really close friends. Where are they?”

“What do you call the people we chum around with? How ’bout”—his gaze swept around the room, then back to her—“the folks here tonight?”

“Jocks … and jocks’ wives. Look at the configuration: We’re the only couple sitting together. The men are hanging around the bar. The women are off by themselves. I know this happens at most gatherings, but at the parties we give—and go to—the separation of the sexes happens immediately—almost the minute they walk in. I know you know that there’s a world out there. But the rest of these guys—their world stops at the locker room door.”

“Honey,
I’m
a jock! It’s just natural that we hang together. But it doesn’t have to be like this. If you want to, we can pal around with some of the folks from your law firm … although,” he joked, “I got the impression you see enough of them during the week.” He realized she wasn’t sharing the joke. “Look, hon, at this stage in our lives, we can be with anyone we want. I’m just not at all sure a lot of the people in our tax bracket would be all that interesting.”

“That’s not it!” Her voice took on a tone of annoyance. “It’s …”

“I know: the whole damn thing. Well,” he said, after a moment, “there must be something we can do to get things off Square One.”

She toyed with her glass again. “Well, I have been thinking of something …”

“What?”
Tell-me-what-it-is-and-I’ll-get-it-for-you,
his tone said.

“Religion.”

He laughed so heartily that the level of conversational noise in the bar dropped abruptly. When the others noted that Beth was not laughing, but rather was flushed, they returned to their chatter. But not as loudly as before.

“What field did that come out of?”

“I’ve been thinking about your heritage. All your people are—were—Catholic. You attended parochial school. Your sister goes to Mass. My God, your brother’s just been made a bishop. But you haven’t gone to church since your mother’s funeral. Why?”

“Hypocrites.”

“Hypocrites? I beg your pardon?”

“The once-a-week churchgoers. They stab everyone in the back, pull the carpet out from under everyone. Lie, cheat, steal. Then they get pious on Sunday. They think that makes them holy … that it makes the lousy tricks they pulled between church visits okay. And Catholics are maybe the worst. I don’t know why … maybe ’cause they’ve got confession to really clean things up.”

“You’re talking ’they’ and ’them.’ You’re not a Catholic anymore?”

He slid down in his chair. “Once a Catholic, always a Catholic—that’s what the nuns and priests drummed into our little heads. And”—he pushed himself upright again—“I wouldn’t argue: I’m a Catholic, I guess. But I’d hardly say I was practicing it.”

“Would you object to my looking into it?”

“What? Catholicism? If it’ll make you happy—whatever you want, babe. How’re you gonna do this?”

“I thought I’d get in touch with our pastor.”

“‘Our’ pastor! We got a pastor?”

“I’ve done a little investigating.”

“Oh, so this bit about religion didn’t come right off the top of your pretty head!”

She ignored his gibe. “We live in St. Waldo of the Hills parish … that is, we live within its boundaries.”

“And our pastor?”

“You aren’t going to believe this …”

“I won’t believe it? Then I’d guess it would be my old buddy Father Koesler.”

“Close. But much closer than that.”

He looked at her expectantly.

“Our pastor is Bishop Delvecchio.” Disregarding his startled expression, she went on. “I think it says a lot about your interest in your faith that you don’t even know where your brother went after he became a bishop.”

“This is spooky.” Clearly, Tony was impressed.

“I thought so too. But spooky or not, what do you think?”

“There’s something about this that rings all the wrong bells.”

“I really feel strongly about it, Tony.”

She was drumming her fingers on the tabletop—always a sign that she was about to become emotional. Her emotional outbursts confused him. He had never learned how to deal with them.

“Well,” he said at length, “I guess it couldn’t hurt to look into it.”

She brightened. “Great! I really think this will do wonders for us. I feel I want to get involved in a church group. We need more meaning in our lives.”

“Yeah. Sure.”

It was ten days since Tony’s jersey had been hung in the Lindell A.C. Not another word about this religion business had been uttered.

Tony was quite satisfied with the status quo. He did not need another word. Beth had another word, but was waiting for the appropriate time.

Dinner tonight featured lamb chops, Tony’s favorite.

It was coffee and dessert time.

Now.

“Honey, I saw your brother, the bishop, the other day.” Actually, she had made an appointment and called on him the day after their talk at the A.C.

Tony’s brow knitted. “If you saw Vinnie, ‘the other day’ and you’ve waited this long to tell me about it, the news can’t be all that good.”

“It’s good news and bad news.”

“And you’re going to start with the good news, like you always do.”

She smiled. “I can respect the bishop. I think I can trust him too. And it looks like this religious experience is what I’ve been looking for.”

He toyed nervously with his spoon. His coffee sat half drunk, his dessert half eaten. “Seeing that all the good news happened to you, I’d guess the bad news is mine.”

She began drumming on the tabletop. “Well, what the bishop said about us seemed to make a lot of sense—”

“How come you keep addressing him as ‘bishop’?”

“That’s what I started out calling him, and he never suggested that I use any other title or name.”

“Okay, so what about us?”

“The bishop said that we couldn’t overlook the obvious: We’ve never been married.”

“I’m not Frank Gifford and you’re not Kathy Lee. Our private lives are private. Did you volunteer our marital status?”

“The bishop asked if we had been married in a civil or a religious ceremony. I told him neither.”

“Okay. So then?” Tony was picking up threatening vibes.

“The bishop said he didn’t think he was anticipating anything that wouldn’t be covered later in the instructions, but the fact that we never married in any legal manner meant we were living in sin.”

Tony’s furrows grew deeper.

“The bishop said it didn’t make any sense that I would be taking instructions—and thus agreeing that you and I are living in sin—without doing something about our situation.”

“Oh? What’s he want us to do: Get a divorce when we’ve never been married?”

“This is the tough part, Tony. Please … just remember how much I want to at least find out about this. And the bishop is trying to make this Church rule as easy on us as he can—”

“I can hardly wait to find out what comes next.”

Beth swallowed what seemed to be an indigestible plea. “The bishop wants us to promise not to have intercourse during the time I’m taking the instructions.” She figuratively ducked.

The fork Tony had been handling bent in half.

“Now, please, wait a minute, honey,” she pleaded. “They have a regular convert class that runs all through Lent and ends at Easter. The bishop offered to give me private instructions. He said he’ll do it himself because you’re special to him.”

Tony snorted.

“The bishop promised he would hurry things along. Your agreement—consent—is all that stands between me and my finding out if this is what I’m looking for.”

Silence.

“How long for the instructions?” Tony asked finally.

“Three, four months at the most.”

“Brother and sister …” Tony almost laughed.

“What?”

“That’s at least what they used to call this crazy arrangement: brother-and-sister relationship. That’s what Aunt Martha and Uncle Frank had to promise while the Church fooled around with their lives.”

“Frank? Your uncle who committed suicide?”

Tony nodded:

She was silent for several moments. “Four months at the maximum,” she said finally. “… maybe it’ll be more like three.”

Tony moved his chair and leaned forward so his face was inches from hers. She had tears in her eyes that refused to run down her cheeks.

“Sweetheart, I don’t know what all professional jocks did about sex. But there was a lot of pressure … and a lot of opportunity. We were on the road so much! And there were groupies and desirable women in every city … at every stop. Having sex for a jock was the easiest thing in the world.

“But I can tell you straight to your face: I never fell. I never cheated on you. Part of that was because I respect you so much. And part was because you are always here for me. You seem to enjoy sex as much as I do.”

She nodded vigorously.

“And we’ve just never had a problem with that. For that, I’m grateful … and I guess you are too.

“But I’ve got to tell you at the outset that I don’t know if I can make it that long.”

She was certain this abstinence would hurt her as much as it would him. But it was she who had the motivation. The carrot at the end of the stick was for the lady.

“Honey …”—she laid her hand on his arm—“I’m sure the bishop meant that we should give this arrangement our best effort. I’m sure the Church allows for a slip …”

“And,” he replied, “I’m sure your friend the bishop doesn’t have room in his meticulous life for messups.”

Tony thought for a few moments. “Okay,” he said finally. “Okay, I’ll agree for one reason and one reason only: because you want so badly to give Catholicism a try. But I warn you: When I agree to a contract, I intend to keep it.”

Ignoring her grateful expression, he asked, “So, now what? Is there some sort of form I’ve got to sign?”

She smiled. “The bishop trusts me. He said if I showed up for instructions it would mean that you had agreed to those conditions.”

He smiled mirthlessly. “So, big brother trusts me. There’s a switch!”

“What is there between you two? Is it because you went into athletics and he went into religion? You yourself told me he was brilliant—I think you said he was a genius … is that it?”

“It’s the whole damn thing.”

They both smiled.

“There have been studies,” Tony said reflectively, “of siblings who don’t get along. That was Vinnie and me. He set the scene in school by achieving—setting standards I could only approach, but never equal—well, at least not often. We competed constantly—in school and out. The only thing I could beat him at consistently was sports.

“It didn’t help our relationship that
he
was the one who was fulfilling Mama’s dearest wish: that one of her sons would become a priest. I think, at the end, she knew he would be a bishop some day …

“And then, when she was dying …” He seemed to look into the distance, then shook himself, as if throwing off the past. “Just remember as we go through this, hon, I said old Vinnie was brilliant; I didn’t say he was human.”

Starting that evening, Tony slept in the guest room. He did not reflect that his uncle Frank had followed the same course many years before.

28

Murphy’s Law prevailed. If four months of abstinence was the worst possible scenario, that’s how it would play out: Three months segued into four as the instruction lessons dragged on.

Tony’s lifestyle for the past three months had been monastic. It had not been a rose garden. But at least the pro season hadn’t yet begun, so he didn’t have to accompany the teams on the circuit.

He had plenty of time—too much time—on his hands. Under normal circumstances he would have solved this problem by reading, or visiting with friends, or with exercise.

But he grew so fixated on his nonsexual state that it became impossible to concentrate on any book. He grew increasingly fidgety and quarrelsome in the company of friends. With no other outlet, more and more he fell back on exercise—lots of exercise. But there was a limit even to that. There he was, in the full vigor of healthy virility …

He was now close to peak condition physically—to the extent that he was nearly in shape to join the players. But he was not foolish enough to try.