The Heretics of St. Possenti Read online

  “On the other hand, if a gal marries the first guy she sleeps with—no, that sounds wrong. If she waits until she’s married to sleep with a guy, he’s the best she’s ever had, so the comparison doesn’t exist. Divorce stats for a gal that marries her second or third partner go up hugely because she’s working on a very limited sample size and gets easily discouraged with what she’s got, wishes she’d gotten more, and thinks it’s likely.”

  “Has anyone ever told you that you have a strange way of looking at the world, Mickey?”

  “All the time. That’s because I’m more results oriented than theory oriented. If theory and reality don’t mesh, then it is not reality which is wrong. And I read a lot.”

  “So you’re trying to sell the idea that chastity is about being a babe-magnet and is good for a marriage?” Bill asked.

  Mickey shrugged. “Some people say ‘any port in a storm,’ but heading in to shore is where you wreck on the rocks. It’s often safer to stay out at sea in the deep water. A safe ship in deep water is a safe ship.”

  “I think you should steal that one, Tom,” agreed Bill. “Metaphorically speaking, of course.”

  “Hey, it’s not like I’m the only one that thinks about these things. A lot of good stuff has been written about it, and not just by the ‘Doctors of the Church.’ Modern research documents work pretty well, too. It’s amazing how often traditional ways are well supported by science. Almost like it was experimented with and understood for, oh, I don’t know, thousands of years….”

  Permits

  If, perchance, any difficult or impossible tasks be enjoined on a brother, let him nevertheless receive the order of him who commands with all meekness and obedience.

  The Holy Rule of Saint Benedict, Ch. LXVIII (When a Brother is asked to do impossible things)

  Monday started as ordinary as any day had so far, with some of the brothers up early to get breakfast ready, go for an early morning jog, meditate, or study the Bible. Investigating the structures and getting the upgrades underway were the highest priority, so several three-man teams were attacking that problem.

  Until just after breakfast.

  A pickup with a building inspector logo on the side pulled up outside the ranch house, and a middle-aged guy in jeans and a Carhartt jacket stepped out, putting a hardhat on his head as he did so. It looked like it spent a lot of time there.

  “Howdy,” he said in a quiet voice to the brother closest to him, who happened to be Mickey. “May I speak with whoever is in charge here?”

  “Sure thing,” said Brother Finnegan. “Can I tell the abbot what it’s about?”

  “The abbot?” The man sounded uncertain. “Yes, perhaps that’s right. I’m Cade Wilson. I do contract work for the county on building inspections. It’s about the number of people you have here and the septic system limits.”

  “Oh. Okay, hang on. I’ll see if I can find him.” Mickey headed inside the ranch house while the other monks went quietly about the many assigned tasks and Cade watched in somewhat amused wonder at the number of them. It was less than a minute when Abbot Thomas came out to the veranda to greet their unexpected, and not particularly welcome, visitor. But Thomas knew better than to show anything negative.

  “Welcome! I’m Abbot Thomas Cranberry. Welcome to the future site of the first monastery of St. Possenti.” He held out his newly calloused hand and shook firmly.

  “Cade Wilson,” said the newcomer almost apologetically. “County health, safety, and building code inspector. Well, just about anything in these parts that needs inspecting anyway. I got a call that… well, short version is that accordin’ to county records, the septic system on this place isn’t rated for more than six people and, well…” he tapered off as he cast his eyes around the significantly more than six people present.

  “Hmmm… yes, I see how that might be seen as a problem. How about you come inside and we can see where exactly things stand? The coffee isn’t great, but it’s fresh and strong.”

  “I suppose we could.”

  They were soon sitting around the table with hot coffee, fresh bread, some blueprints, and the septic as-built.

  After filling Cade in on a quick sketch of the order (leaving out the more controversial parts), how they’d landed here, and what the plan was in very broad strokes, Thomas tried to explain their current methods and plans. “Truth is, we’re using very little water, knowing the limits of the system, and we have plans for a substantial upgrade very soon.”

  Cade shook his head. “You sound like nice folks, but it’s not so much the water flow as the solids. Looks like you have four or five times what the system is spec’d for.”

  Mickey and Bill, who had joined them, shook their heads. “More like seven or eight,” Bill added unhelpfully. “But I can go get Pete. He’s the guy who knows the most about the system we’ve got on order.” He stood to leave.

  “Doesn’t make a difference what you have on order. You are here now, so you need to have a system that supports you, now. Four dozen men generate a lot of solid waste. There are policies and procedures that need to be followed. If a regulation is being violated, it has to be addressed.”

  “I’ll go find Pete anyway,” Bill replied. “He knows this stuff better than I do. Back in a minute.”

  They watched him go. “You need some sort of proper sanitation solution. Today. Or I have to shut you down.”

  “Shutting down, meaning….?

  “Anything up to arresting you for noncompliance and revoking your certificate of occupancy until you can prove you have adequate facilities. If I have to go that route, then I’d have to inspect everything. New and existing structures, wiring, water, insulation, foundations. Everything. That would be time consuming and expensive. If my boss doesn’t think I’m doing a thorough enough job, it could cause me problems.”

  “Your boss? Who’s he, and what’s his title?” asked Brother Finnegan.

  “Oh, she’s Nishell Lehew. Just got hired by the county to be the inspections and certification manager.” To his credit, his expression stayed professional, but they both observed a hint of disapproval around the edges of his words.

  Bill led Pete in, and he’d been given the thirty-second rundown on the problem. Pete looked unconcerned as he launched into his sales pitch. “We have the SS509, a state-of-the-art system being delivered in about ten days. It’s a pre-fab micro treatment plant that gets shipped in on three semi-trailers. They drop them into a hole side by side, connect a few preinstalled hookups, and bam, good to go for five hundred people.”

  Cade looked more than a little dubious.

  “It was designed for the mining camp and oil-patch communities that spring up in places far from conventional support systems. Plop in some mobile homes on a gravel road, drill a well, put this puppy nearby, and install a generation plant or hook to the grid for power, and you have an instant connection for all the normal services. This thing automates stirring, sludge settling, and extraction, captures waste methane to preheat the air it bubbles through to keep it warm and speed bio-breakdown in the primary digester, and has a really slick scum-skimmer system to snag surface burnables. The residual solids are sanitary enough they are certified for using as fertilizer in the fields to add organics. Humanure. The Army is looking into them for battalion field bases. It’ll be installed downhill from us, so it’ll be simple to gravity feed from the holes here and will get pumped slowly around through the tanks in the unit by a solar-power unit that comes attached.”

  Cade looked over the brochures that Pete had brought. “Looks interesting. But you don’t have a permit for it. And it’s not an approved system. I don’t see anything about it being installed by an approved contractor. And it’s not installed right now. It might, eventually, be a fine thing to have way out here. But…”

  Cade showed the resigned fatalism of a man in a situation he didn’t like but didn’t think he had any real choice. “My new boss is pretty rigid about the rules. Rumor has it she’s looking for s
omeone to make an example of. You understand….”

  “Do you think the SS509 would get approved eventually?” Pete asked, cautious.

  Cade said nothing while he looked over the brochure and blueprints they had laid out on the table. After a couple of minutes, he spoke. “Likely so. Almost certainly if the Army approves it and a certified installer puts it in. But that’s speculation at this point.”

  “But to solve a problem, we have to define it and possible avenues to a solution.” Pete sounded optimistic and upbeat. “So your boss says we gotta have a working septic solution that works for 45 guys, or however many we have here, right?” Cade nodded, frowning. “So if we have that, she gets off your back, and we’re good?”

  “Depends. Are all 45 of you actually living here? If this is their formal address, then I’m pretty sure that the structure wouldn’t pass the fire code for that many.”

  “Oh… Well, not everyone is inside all the time, and we have fire-watch, so it might be a bit less than that at any one time.”

  “I’m not sure if that would be enough, but I don’t have that information with me.”

  “We’ll work on that…. Okay, what about a honey-bucket? Anyone local?”

  Cade shrugged. “Sure. That could work. Nearest one is about… eighty, eighty-five miles, I think.” He had a pained expression. “Look. It sounds like you’re really trying to do good things here. I respect that. I really do. But I’ve also got a job to do, and the regs are pretty clear. I have some things scheduled for tomorrow and some I can get to the day after. But now that notice is given, I can’t put off a proper inspection any longer than the next time I’m out here. So you’ve got until Thursday. It’s the best I can do.”

  “So how many honey-buckets?”

  Inspector Wilson thought about it for a moment. “If we classify it as a construction site, one for every ten people.”

  “Hey, that’s great! We can do five, easily,” replied Thomas.

  “But then you can’t be sleeping here. Construction zone means no occupancy.”

  “Oh.”

  “If it’s an outdoor concert or show, it’s one per 30. If it’s a campground, it is… one per twelve, I think. I’ll have to check on that one.”

  A few more minutes of dead-ended niceties later, no progress was being made beyond adding things to Wilson’s list of items to check on, so they wrapped it up and walked him to his truck.

  “I really wish there was more that I could do, Father. I do. But my hands are tied. Procedures and regulations have to be followed.” He looked honestly sad as he climbed in his truck and drove away.

  “Well. Ain’t that just a kick in the shorts,” Pete said for them all. “Any ideas?”

  “A few,” said Mickey. “But we’re going to need to make some phone calls. Maybe a lot of them.”

  Watchers

  Every age and understanding should have its proper discipline.

  The Holy Rule of Saint Benedict, Ch. XXX (Correction of youths)

  The temperature that morning was slightly above freezing, and the snow was slowly thawing in a dry wind. A few patches of bare ground were being slowly exposed. Luke found Abbot Cranberry working in the covered arena swinging a hammer and helping frame in the next few cells. (The monks had been surprised when informed that the proper name for the individual monk’s rooms at a monastery was cell and that plant cells were called that because when they were first seen under the early microscopes, they were tiny, rectangular, and stacked together like the monk’s cells).

  Luke walked toward the abbot, beckoned him over to a quiet corner.

  “What’s up?”

  “We’re being watched,” was Luke’s terse reply.

  “Watched?”

  “Yes. Flashes of light reflected from binoculars. Or a scope. Up in the trees on the ridge.”

  “You sure?”

  “Positive. Saw it twice. Not the first time I’ve spotted someone in the hills with bad glass discipline.” His voice was tight, visage grim.

  “Any idea who you think it is?”

  “Nope. Figured I’d run it by you first. See if you had any thoughts.”

  “Hmmm… Not exactly something I’d ever considered.”

  “Most of us have done recon. A squad could circle around the far side and take a look. See if it’s anything official or just a couple of locals nosing around.”

  “Well, I don’t know….”

  “We don’t have to confront anyone. It’d be easier to deal with if we know who it was or at least had an idea.”

  “Yes, I suppose so.”

  “We’ll be quiet as church mice. They’d never know we were there if they are official. We can arrange a distraction if we need to sneak up or away.”

  “No need to put the fear of God in them if they are harmless.”

  “Not fear of God. Just property rights. Almost as good in some parts.”

  “We don’t want to make waves, Luke,” Thomas cautioned. “We’ll be here a while.”

  “Understood. But I grew up in a place kinda like this. Folks get a reputation. If they think they can’t show up uninvited and not be noticed, they won’t.”

  “Be careful.”

  “Roger that. We can deal with the situation, whatever it is.”

  Abbot Cranberry stood still for a few minutes, pondering what it might mean, as he watched Luke head over for the brothers doing construction. He whispered to four of them quietly and then helped out while two of those he talked to left by different doors. When Thomas finally walked over to join them and go back to work framing, Luke and the other one left, again by different routes than the first pair had used. It struck him that not making any sort of sudden group movements that were out of sync with routine activities made a lot of sense. For the first time he realized just how professional and deliberate some of the actions he saw were, and it shocked him to his core to fully realize for the first time that he was actually surrounded by trained killers, for whom ‘deal with a situation’ might include some really ungodly solutions. He crossed himself and said a silent prayer that the squad he’d just unleashed went forth under God’s guidance.

  * * *

  Twenty minutes later, on the ridge overlooking the ranch that was slowly becoming a monastery, two boys ages sixteen and seventeen observed the scene below. They wore the same camouflage they used during hunting season. One was laying prone and using a cheap pair of binoculars with his elbows propped on the ground, and the other sat bent over a low tripod using his dad’s expensive spotting scope.

  “Hey, look at that!” whispered Jake, looking through his binoculars. “The guy behind the truck.”

  Next to him, Tony took his eye from the scope a moment and then loosened the ball-head and adjusted where the scope was aimed. In his now very close view he watched as one of the brothers, carrying an armful of snowballs, sneaked up on a pair of them standing talking and pointing toward the old tractor, parked near the entrance to the arena. “Oh, man, are they going to get it!” Tony positively chortled at the prospect of watching the imminent fight.

  The attacker took a position behind the truck, peeked over, and then stood up and started hurling icy projectiles at the two from about twenty feet away. The first three were solid hits, and the cold war was on in earnest. The two who were attacked fell back but quickly rallied when they reached the snow-berm next to the arena and created their own ammunition and returned “fire.” Very quickly, there was a whirling maelstrom of monks as the rest of them charged in and started flinging snowballs, dodging, laughing, and running every which way as they formed, abandoned, and reformed teams.

  “Wow, right in the face with that one!” exclaimed Jake.

  “Yeah, oh! Great throw! On the left! Look at that team!”

  A group had grabbed sheets of plywood and made a hasty wall next to the “ammo-pile” of the snow berm and were making a great play for dominance of anyone near enough to throw at.

  The fight continued furiously.

&nbs
p; Without warning, one of the brothers shouted a word, stood straight upright, and faced the two boys, pointing directly at them as though he could see them clear as day. All the monks ceased the play-fighting instantly, stood erect as well, and stared in the same direction, motionless.

  Silent and motionless, Jake and Tony stared back at the dozens of faces watching them. “That’s not good,” whispered Tony in the suddenly silent air.

  “Let’s get out of here!” hissed Jake as he dropped the binoculars to be carried by the strap around his neck while crawling backward to get below the crest of the hill. Next to him, Tony used only slightly more care to secure the tripod and spotting scope, and he started crawling on all fours backward as well. They crawled backward about ten feet before scrambling to their feet, turning, and running—

  —right into a line of six monks standing, bigger than life, not fifteen feet behind where they’d been watching.

  A silent line of sentinels with stern faces, arms crossed, stances wide, and leaving no avenue of escape.

  “Do you think God would approve of you spying on his followers? On private property, no less?” Luke’s voice was quiet but demanded an answer.

  “We were just trying to, I mean—” Jake started to say.

  Luke held up his hand to forestall further words.

  “And what will your parents say when they learn?” added Mickey softly, knowingly.

  “But we didn’t mean anything!”

  “Maybe, maybe not. But the fact is you were trespassing. And clearly spying on us. And that is not neighborly. Or godly.”