25
‘Don’t be an idiot!’ said Bosco, cold and angry. ‘It’s a woman.’
This was harsh. It was not Gil’s fault that he was completely ignorant of the anatomy of women. How could he be otherwise? If the conclusion he leapt to seemed outlandish it was surely nothing like as monstrous as the truth: that the rock on which the Holy Church of the Hanged Redeemer had been built for the last twenty years was a creature regarded by many moderate theologians as possibly not having a soul at all. Before the stroke had ruined the Pontiff ’s mind it was one much admired by Bosco for its clarity and ruthlessness. Even in the fog of a broken brain this Pope had sought with passion and great enthusiasm the terrible death of the Maid of Blackbird Leys. Gil was almost too stunned, but not quite, to be insulted.
‘Give me the keys to the room,’ said Bosco to Burdett. There was a considerable jangling as Burdett loosened the key of the cremulatory from his vast collection. ‘Have you said anything about this to anyone else?’
‘No, Lord,’ said Burdett.
Bosco looked at the first embalmer.
‘Have you said anything to anyone else?’
‘No, Lord.’
He looked at the second.
‘Have you said anything about this to anyone else?’
The man shook his head, horror-dumb.
‘Stay here until I send Redeemer Gil for you. And cover up that monstrosity.’ He ushered Gil out and locked the door behind him.
It was half an hour, having twice lost their way in the under-streets of Chartres, before Bosco and Gil were back in the Vamian Room. Even then it was ten minutes before either of them spoke – the earthquake still shaking in their souls.
‘How could this have happened?’ asked Gil.
‘It hasn’t. You will arrange for the body to be displayed as normal. In fact everything will proceed as normal. Because nothing that is not normal has happened.’
‘What if there are others?’
‘Then the threat to the One True Faith is deadly. You will prepare an investigation into that possibility but do so in the greatest possible secrecy. You will also prepare an encyclical statement that it is a mortal sin punishable by eternal damnation in the fires of hell to raise the woman question.’
‘The woman question?’
‘Of course.’
There was a beat.
‘What is the woman question?’
Bosco looked at him but it was unclear if he was joking or not.
‘You don’t know?’
‘I require guidance.’
Bosco looked at him for a moment. ‘The woman question concerns what kind of sin it is to enter into any discussion of the ordination of women. The answer is that it is a sin crying out to heaven for vengeance.’
Gil was puzzled. ‘Is anyone discussing it?’
Bosco looked at him. ‘You can ask me – with that hideous gynocoid lying in the basement?’ There was no obvious answer to this.
‘And the three Redeemers in the mortuary. What shall I do about them?’
Bosco sighed. ‘Do you remember the story of Uriah the Hittite.’
‘Yes.’
‘Reassure yourself that they’ll say nothing. I don’t want any more innocent blood on my hands but you must be sure of them. Say nothing. Allow nothing to be said. Do not allow anyone to say anything.’
Something out of the window caught Redeemer Gil’s eye – from the great chimney of the Chapel of Tears white smoke oozed droopily into the damp air.
‘We have a Pope,’ he said to Bosco. ‘Congratulations, Your Holiness.’