As soon as I returned, she yanked the jar out of my hands, grabbed a spoon, and headed back down into her workshop. I thought about it for a few moments, telling myself that she couldn’t possibly…and then peered down from the top step to see that indeed she was.

Between drags on her cigarette she was thrusting the instant coffee into her mouth, chomping at the crystals like a baseball player working over a wad of chewing tobacco, and washing it all down with the brewed coffee in her oversized mug.

The doorbell rang.

If you are like most people, a doorbell rings and you answer it; but for me, it’s more complicated. For me, it is a test of will. What if the visitor is a Girl Scout selling cookies? What if she takes one look at me, wets her pants, and faints? How could I explain an unconscious, urine-soaked Girl Scout on my front porch? For someone who looks the way I do, that’s pretty much an invitation for the good townspeople to light their torches and chase you to the old windmill.

I decided to take my chances and face the challenge, even if it was a Girl Scout. When I opened the door, I saw a middle-aged man and woman, probably husband and wife, in good clothing. The woman pulled back as if she were Nosferatu and I the sun. (Occasionally, I find it enjoyable to cast someone else in the role of monster.) The man instinctively stepped in front of his vampiric wife and shielded her with his arm. Her lips drew up over her teeth.

“Yes?”

“I, ah-we,” the heroic man stuttered, not quite sure of what to make of me, while the woman shrank back farther and smaller. The man, steeling his nerves, blurted, “We wanted to visit the church! That’s all!” Just in case I was as stupid as I was burned, he hitched his thumb in the direction of St. Romanus. “We saw that it’s-ah, ah-closed, and then we saw this place with, you know, all the gargoyles and stuff, like that, like a church has, and-so, you know, we naturally thought that maybe this place is like, ah, ah, ah, affiliated with the church. Or something.” He paused. “Is it?”

“No.”

Marianne Engel was doing something new with her stonework: adorning each emerging statue with a number. The first was 27, the next was 26, the third was 25; she was currently working on number 24.

When I asked her about it, she said, “My Three Masters recently told me that I had only twenty-seven hearts remaining. This is the countdown.”

I waited until I saw the participants in Father Shanahan’s Thursday night Bible study class start to shuffle out. It was time to head over to St. Romanus and complain about the parishioners who mistook the fortress for some sort of Christian outreach program.

I walked up the church’s front steps, looked left and right, and went through the front door. My steps echoed, but Shanahan-standing in the middle of the pews, looking up at the windows-didn’t seem to notice. He was in deep contemplation of a stained-glass representation of Christ on the crucifix. It was strange to see someone observing such a thing at night, because there was no light to stream in and make Jesus look all shiny and superior.

He was unaware of my presence until I spoke, offering him the proverbial penny for his thoughts. My wretched voice startled him, as did my plasticked face when he turned, but he regained his composure promptly. With a quick laugh he suggested that, for once, he might even be able to offer full value on that penny.

“Strange how one can look at this every day”-he said, indicating the Christ-“and still find something new. The four arms of the cross represent the four elements of the Earth, of course, but see how Christ is pinned to it, with His arms outstretched and His feet together? It forms a triangle, and three is the number of God. The Holy Trinity. Three days of the resurrection. Heaven, Hell, and Purgatory. You get the idea. So four meets three, Earth meets Heaven. Which is perfect, of course, for is not Jesus the Son of both God and Man?”

He adjusted his glasses, and chuckled a bit. “You caught me in a bit of a fancy, I’m afraid. Can I help you?”

“I live next door.”

“Yes, I’ve seen you.”

“I’m an atheist.”

“Well, God believes in you,” he said. “May I offer you a cup of tea?”

He indicated his room tucked away behind the pulpit and, for some reason, I decided to follow him. Two chairs sat in front of his desk, obviously for couples who thought that a bit of the good word might help their troubled marriages. On his desk, beside a Bible, was a picture of him with his arm slung across the shoulder of another man. Next to them was a woman, quite pretty, and what appeared to be her teenaged son. The woman’s head was tilted towards her husband but her gaze was steadfastly focused upon Father Shanahan, who looked somewhat uncomfortable in his white collar. When I asked whether these were his brother and his sister-in-law, Shanahan seemed surprised that I could place them so quickly. “Do we look that much alike, my brother and I?”

“His wife is an attractive woman,” I said.

Father Shanahan cleared his throat as he poured some water into his electric kettle. “Yes. But then again, so’s Marianne.”

“You’ve met her.”

“She knows her Bible, even better than I do, but she always declines my invitations to attend Mass. Says the problem with most Christians is that they show up at church once a week to pray that God’s will be done-and when it is, they complain.” He placed two cups on the desk, as well as a small pitcher of milk. “Can’t say that I entirely disagree with her.”

He sat down in front of me and adjusted his glasses once again, even though they were already sitting correctly. I expected he would make some small talk, so it was surprising when he said, “Is it possible to take off your mask during our conversation?”

The way he asked made it clear that he was not intimidated by the mask, but simply curious about my appearance. I explained that my rehabilitation required it to remain on at all times. He nodded understandingly, but I could see just a hint of disappointment across his features. I suggested that I could take it off for a moment, if he really wanted to see what was beneath. He nodded that he would like that, yes.

When I removed the mask, he leaned forward to take a closer look. He scratched behind his ears and moved side to side so that he could inspect me from all angles. When he was finished, I asked, “Do I look like you hoped?”

“I had no expectations. I considered studying medicine before I entered the seminary. I still have subscriptions to some journals.”

The moment of his career decision came, he explained while pouring the tea, when he learned that emergency room doctors were taught to consider incoming heart attack victims as already dead. It’s a method to cope: if the patient lives the doctor can believe that he has brought someone back but if the patient “remains” dead, the doctor knows that it wasn’t anything he did wrong.

“But only God has the power over life and death,” Father Shanahan said. “While a doctor can extend a man’s physical life, a priest might help him achieve life everlasting.”

“Do you really believe that?”

“It’s a job requirement.”

“Let me ask you a question. Is it possible to believe in souls without believing in God?”

“For some, perhaps.” Shanahan took a sip from his cup. “But not for me.”

Number 24 was finished. Number 23 was finished. Number 22 was finished. It was the last week of November, and Marianne Engel finally returned upstairs. She seemed to have reached the limits of how long a body could go without a proper meal or the comfort of a real bed.