Free Parishioner by Walter Mosley Page B

hefound it hard to maintain his balance on the chair. He leaned forward, putting his elbows upon his knees and his face in his palms. As the light grew so did his despair. This was one of those few emotional moments that surpassed the violence in his heart and mind. This anger, this hostility he knew was not an aspect of the war that surrounded his upbringing. His cousin had become a practical nurse and his brother, Warren, was an accountant in Montclair, New Jersey.
    “Ecks,” Frank said at last.
    Xavier raised his head and teetered in the chair.
    “Tell me what happened,” the minister said. “All of it.”

    By the time the declaration was over Xavier was sitting up again. He neither shivered nor cried. But he felt empty, directionless.
    “The sun is up” were the first words Frank uttered after Xavier’s story. “Let’s take a walk down to the beach.”
    The path from the church down to the seashore was a gentle sloping trail through succulent plants and hardy grasses. There were small blue and white flowers here and there and huge white boulders that made Xavier think of superior beings so advanced that they could afford to ignore us, finally outlasting the passage of man.
    “You brought your friend back to his home and told him to follow his own mind,” Frank said as they walked north on the hard-packed sand.
    “Yes.”
    “You only protected yourself from men who would have certainly murdered you and him.”
    “If you want to look at it that way.”
    “That’s the only way, Brother Rule. The only way. You’ve taken up this cause for a good reason. You weren’t looking for trouble, not really.”
    “Sedra is dead because I kicked the hornets’ nest.”
    “She’s dead because she lived a life dealing in slaves, suffering, and murder.”
    “But if I hadn’t gone there …”
    “Somebody else would have gone. Benol was dead set on this course.”
    “Do you believe Benol?”
    “I believe that she abducted three babies. I believe that she will lead you to those lives that were stolen.”
    “But is she an innocent or at least a penitent?”
    “I don’t know,” Father Frank admitted.
    “Then why send anyone to follow her lead?”
    “Have I ever told you what I think men are, Ecks?”
    A seagull cried, and Xavier’s heart quailed one of the few times when life was not on the line.
    “No, sir,” he said.
    “Earth,” the minister intoned, “is a multitiered plane of existence. For the animals and plants it is, for the most part, an Eden of extraordinary beauty and wonder. For these beings life is one continuous story with no beginning or end.
    “But for humanity this life is hell. We were once, I believe, angels existing in some higher dimension. We faltered in our duties or our faith and were thrown down here among others like us to experience the anarchy that a failure of duty causes. We don’t remember where we’re from or what we did to bring us here, but here we are—up to our necks in blood and shit, torture and death.
    “We cannot escape the reality foisted upon us by whatever powers there are … maybe something without sentience—like fate. Maybe our consciousness is just some ephemeral biotic that we must experience before returning to the unconscious unity that once embraced us—I don’t know. What I do know is that we must act. We have to work for what we think is good. We will stumble and fall and take many wrong turns on this journey. But we have to keep on getting back up and searching for our bearings. We must try to do right in a world where everything is wrong.”
    They walked for two hours after that. Xavier wanted to respond; he wanted to ask about the details of his minister’s complex faith. But the words remained unformed—inarticulate.
    When they finally climbed back up to the rectory the small table was set out with twobowls of steaming porridge and cups filled with hot coffee for Xavier and black tea for Frank.
    “So you’re telling me that anything a