Sins of the Fathers

Chapter 15

The service had just gotten under way when I arrived. I slipped into a rear pew, took a small black book from the rack, and found the place. I’d missed the invocation and the first hymn, but I was in time for the reading of the Law.

He seemed taller than I remembered. Perhaps the pulpit added an impression of height. His voice was rich and commanding, and he spoke the Law with absolute certainty.

The room was not crowded. There were perhaps eighty persons present, most of them my age or older, with only a few family groups with children. The church could have accommodated four or five times the number in attendance. I guessed most of the congregation had made the pilgrimage to the suburbs in the past twenty years, their places taken by Irish and Italians whose former neighborhoods were now black and Puerto Rican.

Were there more people in attendance today than normally? Their minister had experienced great personal tragedy. He had not conducted the service the preceding Sunday. This would be their first official glimpse of him since the murder and suicide. Would curiosity bring more of them out? Or would restraint and embarrassment — and the cold air of morning — keep many at home?

Unequivocal statements, these commandments. They brooked no argument. Not Thou shalt not kill except in special circumstances.

I rubbed at a pulse point in my temple. Could he see me? I remembered his thick glasses and decided he could not. And I was far in the back, and off to the side.

We stood up and sang a psalm.

The service took a little over an hour. The Old Testament reading was from Isaiah, the New Testament reading from Mark. There was another hymn, a prayer, still another hymn. The offering was taken and consecrated. I put a five on the plate.

The sermon, as promised, dealt with the proposition that the road to Hell was paved with good intentions. It was not enough for us to act with the best and most righteous goals in mind, Martin Vanderpoel told us, because the highest purpose could be betrayed if it were advanced by actions which were not good and righteous in and of themselves.

I didn’t pay too much attention to how he elaborated on this because my mind got caught up in the central thesis of the argument and played with it. I wondered whether it was worse for men to do the wrong things for the right reason or the right things for the wrong reason. It wasn’t the first time I wondered, or the last.

Then we were standing, and his arms were spread, his robed draping like the wings of an enormous bird, his voice vibrant and resonant.

Amen.

A few people slipped out of the church without stopping for a few words with Reverend Vanderpoel. The rest lined up for a handshake. I managed to be at the end of the line. When it was finally my turn Vanderpoel blinked at me. He knew my face was familiar, but he couldn’t figure out why.

Then he said, “Why, it’s Mr. Scudder! I certainly never expected to see you at our services.”

“It was enjoyable.”

“I’m pleased to hear you say that. I hardly anticipated seeing you again, and I didn’t dream of hoping that our incidental meeting might lead you to search for the presence of God.” He looked past my shoulder, a half-smile on his lips. “He does work in mysterious ways, does He not?”

“So it seems.”

“That a particular tragedy could have this effect upon a person like yourself. I imagine I might find myself using that as a theme for a sermon at some later date.”

“I’d like to talk to you, Reverend Vanderpoel. In private, I think.”

“Oh, dear,” he said. “I’m quite pressed for time today, I’m afraid. I’m sure you have a great many questions about religion, one is always filled with questions that seem to have a great need for immediate answers, but—”

“I don’t want to talk about religion, sir.”

“Oh?”

“It’s about your son and Wendy Hanniford.”

“I already told you all that I know.”

“I’m afraid I have to tell you some things, sir. And we’d better have that conversation now, and it really will have to be private.”

“Oh?” He looked at me intently, and I watched the play of emotions on his face. “Very well,” he said. “I do have a few tasks that need to be attended to. I’ll just be a moment.”

I waited, and he wasn’t more than ten minutes. Then he took me companionably by the arm and led me through the back of the church and through a door into the rectory. We wound up in the room we had been in before. The electric fire glowed on the hearth, and again he stood in front of it and warmed his long-fingered hands.

“I like a cup of coffee after morning services,” he said. “You’ll join me?”

“No, thank you.”

He left the room and came back with coffee. “Well, Mr. Scudder? What’s so urgent?” His tone was deliberately light, but there was tension underneath it.

“I enjoyed the services this morning,” I said.

“Yes, so you said, and I’m pleased to hear it. However—”

“I was hoping for a different Old Testament text.”

“Isaiah is difficult to grasp, I agree. A poet and a man of vision. There are some interesting commentaries on today’s reading if you’re interested.”

“I was hoping the reading might be from Genesis.”

“Oh, we don’t start over until Whitsunday, you know. But why Genesis?”

“A particular portion of Genesis, actually.”

“Oh?”

“The Twenty-second Chapter.”

He closed his eyes for a moment and frowned in concentration. He opened them and shrugged apologetically. “I used to have a fair memory for chapter and verse. It’s been one of the casualties of the aging process, I’m afraid. Shall I look it up?”

I said, “ ‘And it came to pass after these things, that God did tempt Abraham, and said unto him, Abraham; and he said, Behold, here I am. And he said, Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of.’ ”

“The temptation of Abraham. ‘God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering.’ A very beautiful passage.” His eyes fixed on me. “It’s unusual that you can quote Scripture, Mr. Scudder.”

“I had reason to read that passage the other day. It stayed with me.”

“Oh?”

“I thought you might care to explain the chapter to me.”

“At some other time, certainly, but I scarcely see the urgency of—”

“Don’t you?”

He looked at me. I got to my feet and took a step toward him. I said, “I think you do. I think you could explain to me the interesting parallels between Abraham and yourself. You could tell me what happens when God doesn’t oblige by providing a lamb for the burnt offering. You could tell me more about how the road to Hell is paved with good intentions.”

“Mr. Scudder—”

“You could tell me why you were able to murder Wendy Hanniford. And why you let Richie die in your place.”