Dimiter by William Peter Blatty Read Free Book Online Page A

blows to my head and my back; no, nothing, no power, no pleading angel, could stay me from my frenzy of lapping and slurping until many strong men at last wrenched me away. And that’s where it began, I think, my revulsion at my own humanity. Until that moment I hadn’t been broken. There had even been a day when a guard brought me news that my elderly mother, grievously ill, had been put in an ambulance, and that the driver and hisvery young helper, on their way to a hospital, because they were running so late and it soon would be dark and they would miss their dinner, they decided that the whole thing was too much trouble and they stopped and dumped my mother down the side of a mountain. By the way, the driver’s helper was Vlora’s son. Yes, the torturer. The very same one. The guard told me he was sorry and as a consolation he gave me an apricot. An apricot in place of my mother.
    “And yet that night, while grieving alone in my freezing cell and suddenly doubting the existence of God in the face of the suffering of the innocent, I heard God’s voice. Oh, yes, really and actually—
his voice
! ‘James, when did I ask you to solve the Problem of Evil?’ he chided. ‘That is
my
problem,’ he told me. ‘What I ask is that you be the best priest that you can be.’ He sounded rather cross, like the God of Job, perhaps because he saw me surreptitiously glancing all around the cell in search of hidden microphones and loudspeakers. Then ‘Trust me,’ he said, ‘and leave the brooding and theology to me.’ Oh, well, this was God, alright, no doubt about it, and apparently lonely for those days in the desert when he’d make his appearance in the form of a cloud, or, at night, as a burning pillar of evasions. I had a few caveats to offer but prudently said nothing as I wanted no insufferable blasts about my whereabouts when he was laying the foundations of the world. Talk about torture! Never mind, though, it all ended well. Oh, I confess I’d grown nervous when I heard him say, ‘Trust me,’ but mostly his words had a wonderful effect and from that moment I determined to become a great priest, consoling and caring for my fellow prisoners, encouraging and giving as much as I could. ‘I will go to the altar of God,’ my heart sang, ‘unto God who gives joy to my youth.’ And then I saw the warm piss pouringdown on my face. It was after this incident, I think, that it finally dawned upon me that even if God existed it was simply not possible that he could love me.
    “Oh, I did say Mass after that in the labor camp at Mali, where we worked in swamps, an interminable army of men in rags sinking down into mud slopping up to our chests. I even heard some confessions, such as they were. Can you imagine the paucity of sins in such a place? But don’t think I was brave. They just didn’t care about these things. Only baptism. That’s what they hated and feared. But I baptized no one; no, no infant that was born in the camp.” The priest lowered his head and his voice. “I am here because I failed to fulfill my work quota.” For a time he fell silent. Then abruptly he burst into tears, sobbing wrenchingly and beating his chest with a fist. “
Mea culpa, mea culpa!”
he kept repeating. When he’d recovered, he leaned back against the wall of the cell and turned his head to look over at the Prisoner.
    “Are you a priest?” he asked softly in the darkness.
    He waited, and then went on. “Yes, I think so. I can smell the holy oils on your hands. Would you hear my confession, please, Father?”
    No response. The only sound was a single drip of the faucet.
    “They’ll be coming to get us soon. That’s alright, all of life is preparation for death. Yet I’d hoped to face God with—well—it’s just all of those babies that I’ve kept from his sight . . .” His voice trailed off, and as tears coursed down his cheeks he crumpled to the merciless stone of the floor with a muffled groan made of all the