The Lost Crown of the Knights Templar

2 For the Love of God

Father Harper sipped a dry sherry from the vigil of his office at St. Columbanus Church. Staring from the stained glass window, he regarded the melting sun, barely coloring the ocean that consumed it. His arm was in a sling, but apart from that small injury, he was healthy and strong. It had been several weeks since an intruder from his past had attempted to kill him under command of a sinister individual by the name of Joseph Karsten, a man that since had allegedly gone missing.

In his absence, Karsten had been relieved of duty as the head of British Intelligence, pending an investigation into claims that he had been abusing his position to put in place a global catastrophe that would have enabled his organization to plummet the world into ungovernable chaos. Father Harper had become a target only after he’d been involved in a rescue mission saving Karsten’s nemesis, David Purdue, from Karsten’s order.

With a troubled sigh he lapped up the sweet burn of the sherry, his stern eyes looking over the coastal town of Oban. He felt liable. He felt responsible for the people here, more than ever since he had been privy to the darker world some of its citizens frequented. Father Harper felt needed, a keeper of the people of Oban.

“I like that,” he muttered to himself as his gaze caressed the beauty of the ocean on the other side of town. “The Keeper of Oban.” Father Harper smiled at the moniker, pleased with the image it instilled. “Now only to get it to catch on,” he said with a smile.

It was a Friday evening and a fresh sea breeze was dressing everything in cool serenity. The priest watched in silence as people went about their plans, excited to meet up and kick back after the week’s work. Distant were the memories of his own stint as a regular Joe twenty odd years ago, when he still considered the mundane things important. Long before he’d discovered that the world was layered like skin, getting stickier and more raw the deeper it went, he’d been just like the blissfully unaware people of Oban he was watching.

All Father Harper hoped for them was that they would never delve into the darker recesses of existence, because down there things became complicated. Down there, the networks of sinew, nerve, tissue and vein were a twisted mass of highways that lead to a myriad of destinations. He sighed and adjusted his collar, checking the time on the mantle clock. With a start he realized that he’d been standing at the window for almost an hour.

“Dr. Beach!” he gasped. “I can’t be late.”

The tall priest locked his office and went to his small home in the back yard of the church grounds to change into plain clothes. On his way out, he encountered Mr. Hayes, the verger-come-sexton-come-general keeper of St. Columbanus. The frail old man smiled and lifted his open hand in greeting.

“Father,” he acknowledged the priest. “Where are you running to as if the devil were chasing you?” Choice words.

“Mr. Hayes, how are you this evening?” Father Harper inquired cordially, trying not to show his haste for fear of coming across as impolite. “Just off to lay a fresh wreath on the Beach’s tombstones before dark. Did you get the package?”

“No, no, still has not arrived, Father,” the old man sighed, running his hand through his thick head of grey hair. His oversized blazer made him look like a pauper, and a hungry one at that. There was no substantial flesh on his bones anymore, which did not look strange, given he was only five feet tall.

“I’m sure it’s just held up somewhere, Mr. Hayes,” Father Harper reassured him with a hand on his shoulder. “Children are sometimes tardy with such things. They have such hectic lives these days.”

“Even the thirty-five-year-olds?” Mr. Hayes asked wearily.

Father Harper chuckled, “Even the thirty-five-year-olds, aye. Don’t fret about it. It should get here before your birthday. Just have faith.”

“Oh, yes. Faith,” Mr. Hayes muttered as he nodded gratefully for the empty reassurance given about his son’s promise to send him a birthday parcel from Perth. He smiled as he made his way up the back steps into the church vestry. “Have a good evening, Father.”

“You too, Mr. Hayes. Don’t lock up too late,” Father Harper said as he skipped onto the smooth green lawn towards his home. Under his breath he added, “And stay out of my sherry.”

On his way across the grass, he couldn’t help but cast a rapid glance at the daffodil patch in the garden under the wych elm trees to the right of his cottage. Most of his parishioners praised his newfound affinity for gardening, but a few of the older male congregates reminded him that his heterosexuality would be challenged by this new-found flower planting hobby.

This had Father Harper in stitches for so many reasons. His sexual orientation was hardly pertinent in his vocation, but even if it were, his appearance was certainly masculine enough for the whole notion to be put out as humor. The moist soil yielded beautiful foliage, especially with the rich nutrients often associated with decomposing matter. But that was not a matter to be dwelling on right now, and the priest entered his cottage to shower and change clothes.

While under the soothing hot water trickling from the showerhead, he closed his eyes and tried not to be too concerned about his recent bed of flowers and what was never to be discovered beneath. Father Harper was no stranger to the ways of the world. His religious duties had never blinded him to the cruel reality of society and the underworld that waited like a trapdoor spider to jolt up and snatch the unsuspecting and the naïve. And with being perfectly aware that the majority of creatures on this earth were predatory in nature, his oath to God never strayed to obligatory falsehoods to preserve the dogma.

Father Harper did what he had to do to save lives, to maintain order, to prevent malice to innocent people, and he did not once second-guess his methods. It was his duty as keeper of the flock to destroy all threats to his people, regardless of the techniques he needed to employ to conserve their peaceful oblivion.

When Joseph Karsten sent his assassin to kill the Beaches, he made the mistake of thinking he could get rid of the priest shortly after dispatching the late Dr. Beach and his lovely wife. It was one thing to shock Oban with the deaths of its prominent couple, but it was quite another thing to leave their children orphans. In his recollection, Father Harper figured that the latter was the primary motive he had for wasting the killer when he showed up in the church office to do the same to the priest.

Murder was sometimes a necessary evil perpetrated by good men for the sake of justice. If anyone ever confronted Father Harper about the hypocrisy in his acts, he would surely remind them that history was filled with such paradoxes. Did the church not kill countless people under the pretense of witchcraft or heresy or for not converting? If genocide could be justified in the name of God, why could a man of the cloth not commit murder to save the lives of his brothers and sisters?

“You know that is a twisted argument, don’t you?” he mumbled in the rush of the water, chastising himself for the admittance of his deeds and the clandestine motives of the religion he served. He opened his eyes and almost jumped at his own reflection in the hazy mirror. Looking back at him was not the man all the people here knew. That chaste, kind, patient man was absent in the face of the real Harper. Features of hardship and scars of experience reminded him of where he had come from, and why he had become a priest so many years ago. Father Harper was not fussy about the church he served, as long as he could serve his god. That need was what took him to Ireland, where he completed seminary and served as deacon until he was sent to Scotland to preside over St. Columbanus in Oban.

He had travelled a long and perilous road on broken glass, barefoot for his god and grateful for the privilege. How could he not find solace in the excuses offered for his occasional lawless deeds in the name of Good?

From the wet tiles of the shower, he stepped out after shutting down the taps. He grabbed the towel and started drying off his huge frame, carefully avoiding that likeness in the looking glass. Father Harper knew that facing the man in the mirror would mean a flashback of every unsavory act he had ever committed for the love of God.