"I wish you would call me Vittorio, as you used to! I am not shocked, Ralph, nor disappointed. It is as Our Lord Jesus Christ wills, and I think perhaps you had a great lesson to learn which could not be learned in any way less destructive. God is mysterious, His reasons beyond our poor comprehension. But I think what you did was not done lightly, your vows thrown away as having no value. I know you very well. I know you to be proud, very much in love with the idea of being a priest, very conscious of your exclusiveness. It is possible that you needed this particular lesson to reduce that pride, make you understand that you are first a man, and therefore not as exclusive as you think. Is it not so?" "Yes. I lacked humility, and I believe in a way I aspired to be God Himself. I've sinned most grievously and inexcusably. I can't forgive myself, so how can I hope for divine forgiveness?"
"The pride, Ralph, the pride! It is not your place to forgive, do you not understand that yet? Only God can forgive. Only God! And He will forgive if the sincere repentance is there. He has forgiven greater sins from far greater saints, you know, as well as from far greater villains. Do you think Prince Lucifer is not forgiven? He was forgiven in the very moment of his rebellion. His fate as ruler of Hell is his own, not God's doing. Did he not say it? "Better to rule in Hell than serve in Heaven!" For he could not overcome his pride, he could not bear to subjugate his will to the Will of Someone else, even though that Someone was God Himself. I do not want to see you make the same mistake, my dearest friend. Humility was the one quality you lacked, and it is the very quality which makes a great saint-or a great man. Until you can leave the matter of forgiveness to God, you will not have acquired true humility."
The strong face twisted. "Yes, I know you're right. I must accept what I am without question, only strive to be better without having pride in what I am. I repent, therefore I shall confess and await forgiveness. I do repent, bitterly." He sighed; his eyes betrayed the conflict his measured words couldn't, not in this room.
"And yet, Vittorio, in a way there was nothing else I could do. Either I ruined her, or I took the ruin upon myself. At the time there didn't seem to be a choice, because I do love her. It wasn't her fault that I've never wanted the love to extend to a physical plane. Her fate became more important than my own, you see. Until that moment I had always considered myself first, as more important than she, because I was a priest, and she was a lesser being. But I saw that I was responsible for what she is .... I should have let her go when she was a child, but I didn't. I kept her in my heart and she knew it. If I had truly plucked her out she would have known that, too, and she would have become someone I couldn't influence." He smiled. "You see that I have much to repent. I tried a little creating of my own."
"It was the Rose?"
The head went back; Archbishop Ralph looked at the elaborate ceiling with its gilded moldings and baroque Murano chandelier. "Could it have been anyone else? She's my only attempt at creation."
"And will she be all right, the Rose? Did you do her more harm by this than in denying her?"
"I don't know, Vittorio. I wish I did! At the time it just seemed the only thing to do. I'm not gifted with Promethean foresight, and emotional involvement makes one a poor judge. Besides, it simply . . . happened! But I think perhaps she needed most what I gave her, the recognition of her identity as a woman. I don't mean that she didn't know she was a woman. Imean 1 didn't know. If I had first met her as a woman it might have been different, but I knew her as a child for many years."
"You sound rather priggish, Ralph, and not yet ready for forgiveness. It hurts, does it not? That you could have been human enough to yield to human weakness. Was it really done in such a spirit of noble self-sacrifice?" Startled, he looked into the liquid dark eyes, saw himself reflected in them as two tiny manikins of insignificant proportion. "No," he said. "I'm a man, and as a man I found a pleasure in her I didn't dream existed. I didn't know a woman felt like that, or could be the source of such profound joy. I wanted never to leave her, not only because of her body, but because I just loved to be with her-talk to her, not talk to her, eat the meals she cooked, smile at her, share her thoughts. I shall miss her as long as I live." There was something in the sallow ascetic visage which unaccountably reminded him of Meggie's face in that moment of parting; the sight of a spiritual burden being taken up, the resoluteness of a character well able to go forward in spite of its loads, its griefs, its pain. What had he known, the red silk cardinal whose only human addiction seemed to be his languid Abyssinian cat?
"I can't repent of what I had with her in that way," Ralph went on when His Eminence didn't speak. "I repent the breaking of vows as solemn and binding as my life. I can never again approach my priestly duties in the same light, with the same zeal. I repent that bitterly. But Meggie?" The look on his face when he uttered her name made Cardinal Vittorio turn away to do battle with his own thoughts.
"To repent of Meggie would be to murder her." He passed his hand tiredly across his eyes. "I don't know if that's very clear, or even if it gets close to saying what I mean. I can't for the life of me ever seem to express what I feel for Meggie adequately." He leanedforward in his chair as the Cardinal turned back, and watched his twin images grow a little larger. Vittorio's eyes were like mirrors; they threw back what they saw and didn't permit one a glimpse of what went on behind them. Meggie's eyes were exactly the opposite; they went down and down and down, all the way to her soul. "Meggie is a benediction," he said. "She's a holy thing to me, a different kind of sacrament."