The Lost Years

55

On Wednesday evening at eight o’clock, Father Aiden opened the door of the friary of Saint Francis of Assisi Church to find Richard Callahan standing in the doorway. “It’s good of you to see me on such short notice,” Richard said as the priest motioned for him to come in.

Father Aiden looked at the troubled face of his visitor, noting that in place of his usual black slacks and white shirt, Richard was wearing a blue sport shirt with a designer logo and tan slacks. There was a light shadow on his face indicating that he had not shaved recently. When he took Aiden’s extended hand, Aiden could feel that his palm was moist.

It was obvious to him that something was terribly wrong. “My door is always open to you, Richard,” he said mildly. “The other friars are lingering over coffee. Why don’t we go into the sitting room? We’ll have privacy there.”

Richard nodded without speaking. It was clear to Father Aiden that Richard was trying to compose himself. “Richard, I know you’re a coffee drinker,” he said. “I’m sure there’s still some left in the pot in the dining room. Let me get you a cup. In fact, I’ll bring a second cup in for myself. I know how we both like it, black and no sugar.”

“That sounds good.”

At the door of the modest sitting room, Aiden gestured for Richard to go in and said, “I’ll be right back.” When he returned, he put the cups on the coffee table, then closed the door. Richard was sitting on the couch, his shoulders slumped forward, his elbows propped up on his knees, and his hands clasped. Wordlessly, he reached for the coffee. Father Aiden noticed that his hand was trembling. He sat down in the wing chair facing the couch. “How can I help you, Richard?” he asked.

“Father, I’ve made a terrible mistake.” As Father Aiden listened, Richard told him that he always believed that Jonathan had given Lillian the parchment. Then he admitted that he had lied to her. “Father Aiden, I told her that Jonathan had shown it to me, and that he said that he was going to give it to her for safekeeping.

“I knew that there was no way anyone could prove that she had it, and I was desperate to get it back,” Richard explained. “She believed me. She even told me that after Jon dropped her so abruptly that Wednesday evening, she was heartsick. She said that Jon asked her to give the parchment back to him, but she had already put it in her safe-deposit box. She told me she begged him to wait a week before she returned it and pleaded with him to take that time to think more about whether he really wanted to end their relationship.”

Father Aiden nodded without commenting. He thought back to that same day, when, in the late afternoon, Jonathan had told him he could no longer endure the pain of his estrangement from Mariah and the heartbreak Kathleen continued to suffer because of his relationship with Lillian. He had said he was going directly to Lillian’s apartment to tell her of his decision.

Aiden O’Brien remembered sadly that Jonathan then had spoken about his plan to take Kathleen to Venice and said that he would ask Mariah to go with them. Aiden was stunned when Jon said at the time that he had an odd sense that he might not live very much longer, and he needed and wanted to repair the damage his affair with Lillian had inflicted on his family.

“I never saw the parchment and Jonathan never told me he had given it to her,” Richard repeated, then paused, as if too embarrassed to go on. “But Lillian believed me.”

“When did you tell her this?” Father Aiden asked.

“Let me explain. After the funeral, I waited in the cemetery when the others drove to the club for lunch. I had a hunch that Lillian would show up there and I was right. She visited Jonathan’s grave and when she went back to her car, I followed her. That was when I asked her if she had ever seen the parchment. I knew she was lying when she said no. I knew that she almost certainly had it, and I was afraid she would sell it now that Jonathan was dead. But of course I had absolutely no proof.”

Richard reached for the coffee cup that until now he had ignored. He took a long sip before he said, “Father Aiden, as we both know, that parchment is the property of the Vatican Library. That was when I decided to take a different approach with Lillian. I called her and got tough. I told her I knew Jonathan had given it to her, and I was going to the cops to tell them that. She believed me and finally admitted that she had it. I told her that I would give her two million dollars for it.”

“Two million dollars! Where would you get that kind of money?”

“A trust fund my grandfather set up for me. I am sure Lillian must have had at least one other offer, but I promised her I would never disclose that I had actually paid her for it. I told her she could tell people that she realized that it would be wrong to keep it and that she wanted to do the right thing. She was afraid because she had already told the detectives that she didn’t have it. I said to her that I really believed that the prosecutor’s office wouldn’t pursue it any further if she returned it quickly. I swore to her that I would give the parchment back to the Vatican Library and said no matter how much Jonathan had hurt her, she owed it to him to see that it went back there.”

“How were you going to make the payment?” Father Aiden inquired. “If you did it on the level, wouldn’t you or she or both of you have to pay some kind of tax on all this money?”

Richard shook his head. “As the tax laws stand today, I am allowed to give away up to five million dollars in my lifetime. I would report the two million dollars to the IRS as a gift to her. That way she could have the use of the money without having the worry that if she sold the parchment under the table and it somehow came out, she might end up in prison for tax evasion.”

Richard hesitated, then took a long sip of his coffee. “Last night, as we were leaving Mariah’s house, Lillian phoned me and said she would accept my offer. This morning I went downtown to my trustee’s office to sign the paperwork to move the money into her account. But I’ve been calling her all day, and she still hasn’t answered.”

“Why wouldn’t she answer after she agreed to accept your offer?”

“My guess is that she is greedy, she reconsidered, and she probably decided to sell it to some underground collector for a lot more money. I spent the whole day hanging around outside my trustee’s office because if I had reached her, I was going to have her meet me there. At five o’clock, I gave up and went uptown to my parents’ apartment. They were on their way out, but I stayed there for a while, calling Lillian every half hour. Then I decided to come and talk to you.”

“Richard, what I don’t understand is, why are you blaming yourself? You were willing to spend a very considerable amount of your own money to get that parchment back and then return it to the Vatican.”

“I’m blaming myself, Father, because I should have gone about it another way. I should have hired a private detective to follow Lillian around the clock and see where she was going and whom she was meeting. She did admit she had put the parchment in her safe-deposit box. I’m afraid that once she sells it, it will be gone for good. Then if I go to the detectives, it will be her word against mine. I’m already on record with them that I never saw the parchment.”

Richard stopped and looked startled. “My God, I forgot. I was supposed to go talk to the detectives again today. It absolutely went out of my mind. I’ll call them in the morning. But here’s what I need. Father Aiden, you met Lillian at Jonathan’s home a number of times before those pictures were found. I know she respects you. Will you try to talk to her? I’m sure she’s avoiding my calls.”

“I don’t know if it will do any good but of course I will. Do you have her number?”

“It’s right here on my cell,” Richard said.

Father Aiden quickly jotted it down on a slip of paper, then picked up his phone and dialed it and listened as Lillian’s voice mail greeting came on: “You have reached Lillian Stewart. I’m not available to take your call. Please leave a message and I’ll get back to you as soon as possible.”

A computerized voice immediately announced that the mailbox was full.

Richard had been able to hear the recording. “Probably her voice mail is full because of all the messages I left for her today,” he said as he stood up to leave. “Will you try her again in the morning, Father?”

“Of course,” Father Aiden said as he put the receiver down and walked Richard to the door, promising to get in touch with him as soon as he reached Lillian. Then he slowly walked back to the sitting room and settled again into the wing chair, his arthritic knees emitting sharp pains as he lowered his body. He picked up the cup of now less-than-warm coffee. Frowning in concentration, and disappointed, he sadly acknowledged that all of his long experience in dealing with human beings was warning him that his valued friend Richard Callahan had been less than truthful.

“But why?” he asked himself aloud.