Temptations of the Flush (Act VIII)

Act VIII – Abyss

* * *

Characters:

LUIGI - gravedigger.
CARDINAL PURVES - elderly incontinent.
LAZZARO - Pope Rightvinger’s acolyte, assassin.
POPE RIGHTVINGER - Pope Emeritus.
STAVROS - mortician
MARIA - cleaning lady

‘In breaking news; homicide at a Vatican-owned guesthouse. Police are appealing for witnesses who may have visited the Valle Giulia precinct of Rome at around 2 am yesterday. A notorious red-light district, the area has long been a focus for criminal activity. Experts have ruled out suicide, saying the crime bears the hallmarks of a ‘ritual killing’. A citywide murder hunt has now been launched. Unconfirmed reports suggest a masked ‘monk’ was seen fleeing the scene, leading to speculation of some sort of vigilante attack. Authorities have warned people not to approach the suspect and to report anything suspicious immediately. Although not yet formally identified, the victim is said to be a senior-ranking official within the Vatican. We will of course keep you up to date with this and other news as it develops. Now, on a lighter note, the extraordinary story of one woman’s claim to have found the rosary of Saint Francis…’

‘Bollocks.’ Luigi removed the headphones as his mind spun. He extended an arm from the hospital bed and picked up the vase resting on his bedside table. Although the single daffodil hadn’t fared well on its regime of surgical spirit, he suspected the draft would prove a tonic for human life. I must warn them, came a voice as the mental fog gave way to an agreeable alcoholic haze.

Due to a miscellany of weekend accidents, medical staff were too distracted to mark his egress. After a surprise encounter with Bertilloni, Luigi learned of the gala banquet at the palace. If Lazzaro struck there’d be carnage! And what if the rogue had accomplices…they could even be planning a mass culling…? A timely warning to the cardinals might bestow honours? Fame? But sod that, it could mean financial rewards…booze money? Fortified with liquor, Luigi shambled determinedly towards the Lateran Palace.

* * *

In the bustle of caterers bearing trays of coffees into the hall, Luigi noticed a familiar face hobbling along the corridor. He made a beeline towards Cardinal Purves who peered up at him quizzically.

‘Luigi my son…is that you?’ he croaked. ‘From the orphanage, am I correct?’

‘Yes,’ Luigi wheezed. ‘Listen, no time to explain…you must warn everyone. I believe there’s a plot…to um…’ Luigi’s voice trailed off as he felt a hostile stare. He glanced up and caught sight of Lazzaro loitering by a pillar. He froze as their eyes met.

‘A plot? Erm, erm…to what end?’ Purves pressed. ‘What must we beware of…?’

‘Backstabbers!’ Luigi blurted as Lazzaro smirked and then bounded towards him.

Purves stared agog as Luigi bolted, sidestepped a knot of waiters and then sped towards the exit. In blind panic, he tore up the dim stairwell. Rapid footfalls echoed from below as he vaulted up another flight, then another, his lungs searing. Gasping, he sprawled headlong through an exit and tumbled out into redolent night air. Dizzy, he slunk into the shadow of a lesser cupola, attempting to arrest his frantic gasps as the cityscape reeled. He took a lug from his flask and peered out towards the exit. Dominating the rooftop, the Dome of St Peter’s Basilica, swathing him in shadow. Tall stone saints perched on ledges, backs turned, and inert to the world they gazed upon.

The door clattered open and the pursuer sprang onto the asphalt roof. Luigi shrank back as Lazzaro crept along a row of statues, sword drawn, until he was obscured behind the vast cupola.

As his head pounded, Luigi realised there was but one fleeting opportunity of escape - the door he’d entered by. Other exits could be locked and any noise would betray him. He dithered, uncertain if his attacker may lurk in ambush.

Startlingly, shadow took form at the periphery of his vision. He quailed, stumbling sideways towards the precipice. He steadied himself against a statue, gasping, as Lazzaro emerged like a spectre and stalked towards him.

‘Here…keep the bleedin’ thing this time!’ Luigi wailed, throwing the gold bracelet at the killer. The blade flashed past his blurring sight. He swooned and slumped to his knees.

Lazzaro’s pale face contorted into a sneer. ‘Too late, gravedigger,’ he snickered. ‘Can you fly, ah? Like these things…?’ He gestured along the saintly effigies. ‘Or perhaps that’s just wishful thinking, ah?’

Luigi began to feel peculiarly detached and resigned to his doom. He mourned his daughter, his life and the sum of all his dashed hopes. ‘You remind me of myself. All that anger…that nihilism. Go on then, take your best shot mate. I care not for this world,’ he cried. ‘You think you can take something I haven’t already lost?’

Lazzaro pressed the sword to Luigi’s throat. ‘What the fuck would you know about me? Go on, get on the fucking ledge. It’ll look like an accident.’

Luigi complied. He swayed precariously, steadying himself against a marble limb. Distant traffic glimmered beneath him like fireflies as a balmy breeze ruffled his hair. ‘Let go of the anger son…or you’ll never find solace.’

Lazzaro swung the blade at him. ‘Anger?’ he yelled. ‘Oh I’m dealing with the anger alright…an eye for an eye, yeah? Or both eyes if necessary.’

‘What…what happened?’ Luigi stammered. ‘Tell me…let me understand…before I leave this sorry world.’

‘There’s nothing left to understand. And even if there was, it changes nothing. They stole my childhood. They tore my soul apart!’

‘Who did?’ Luigi pressed, ‘You mean those you’ve…slain?’

Lazzaro stepped from back into shadow and eyed the gravedigger somberly. ‘Yeah…Garibaldi and his cohorts…those wolves in shepherd’s clothing. I was twelve when those demons of hell set upon me. I thought the agony would never end, I…’ his voice trailed off and became choked by sobs. The sword wavered in his hand as he wiped his eyes with a sleeve. ‘After they’d finished with me Garibaldi taunted me…beat the shit out of me. Then left me for dead. And I wish, too, that I had died…because nothing survived that inferno but hate.’

Luigi looked down pitifully at the young man. He swigged his flask and then gazed into the churning chasm beneath his feet. ‘So this is your answer…what you’re doing…? This is this justice?’

‘Justice?’ the assassin sniffed with a bitter laugh. ‘It is not justice I seek, it’s retribution. ‘Never can true reconcilement grow where wounds of deadly hate have pierced so deep’*…’ Oh yeah, I’ll see them all in hell my friend.’

‘It’s true they’re not fit to administer the sacraments,’ Luigi said, ‘those who’ve trespassed against you. By rights they should abase themselves at your feet…plead for clemency. But instead they close ranks, prevaricate…connive to evade justice. Believe me, son, I know.’

‘What can you possibly know, uh…a gravedigger, a drunkard…?’

Luigi sighed and tried to drown his melancholy in a long swig. ‘It happened to me too…at the orphanage,’ he confessed gloomily. ‘I lost my innocence before I lost my first tooth. Maybe revenge is the answer? I mean, do you take an eye for the eye or turn the other cheek? I could never quite decide. Anyways, this priest…this vampire of the soul…well, he died before I could find the courage to confront him.’

‘So you let him ruin other lives did you?’ Lazzaro sneered. ‘You’re such a fucking coward!’

‘Perhaps I am, son,’ Luigi conceded desolately. ‘Mind you, I did piss in his grave...during the reading of his eulogy. Then, well…I kind of drank my way out of it I s’pose.’ He lifted his flask in salute and then slurped at it heartily. ‘Cheers…here’s to this wonderful life!’ he spluttered over the rooftops, swaying precariously and belching. ‘‘Cus it don’t get much better than this, does it, ah?’

The question was met by the wail of distant sirens. A buffeting wind picked up causing the gravedigger to teeter at the brink.

‘Get down.’ Lazzaro ordered. ‘I don’t need to kill someone who’s already dead. You’re not even a threat, are you? Look at you; a joker, a derelict… a dead man condemned to life. No one listens to a word you say, do they?’

Luigi gave a hollow laugh. ‘No? Well what about you?’ he inquired of the saint that he clung on to. ‘Are you listening? You got a tongue in yer’ head? No?’ He remonstrated theatrically along the row of plinths. ‘Are any of you fuckers listening, uh? Come on, let’s hear you. What do you have to say for yourselves?’ He pocketed his flask and began to climb up the statue with a fearlessness that only drunkards know.

Lazzaro dropped his sword edged towards the gravedigger. ‘I said get down. I don’t want your blood on my conscience.’

‘Your conscience?’ Luigi laughed feverishly as he shimmied upwards and hauled himself, gasping, onto the shoulders of Saint Michael. ‘Look at it all,’ he wheezed, gesturing expansively. ‘Does any of this pomp and grandeur mean anything? Or is it all just a load of bollocks, uh? A sprawling folly for those chasing the immortality of gods? Is it really anything more than existential narcissism, uh…? Go on, answer me you impotent fucker!’ he bellowed, shaking a fist accusingly at the heavens. ‘Yeah…where are yer’ bleedin’ thunderbolts now, ah?’

Lazzaro began to scale the statue and made a grab for Luigi’s ankle.

‘Oi, get yer’ bleedin…’ Luigi squirmed free as Lazzaro tried to gain purchase on his leg. From somewhere below he heard a thunderous smash, and then strains of classical music. Is that…Ride of The Valkyries...? he pondered absently.

By now, Lazzaro had straddled the opposite arm and attempted to wrestle Luigi from his lofty perch. The music became louder, accompanied by an intermittent droning. As the pair continued to tussle something large and metallic hurtled past, slewing around the dome. They heard a snatch of maniacal laughter. Then, they gazed disbelievingly as the contraption rounded back at them, skimmed the asphalt roof, bounced and then cartwheeled towards them.

 ‘Achtung! Achtung!’ the occupant screamed.

Lazzaro made a lunge for the gravedigger’s arm and wrenched him sideways causing him to topple.

The Kriegvagon slammed into the statue with an almighty crash, knocking it plummeting into an inky abyss. As the flying machine nosedived into Saint Peter’s square there was a hiss as the driver jettisoned free and shot upwards. A clatter of shattering masonry was followed by a distant flare and the peel of an explosion.

As Luigi lay dazed and bruised on the ledge he saw a parachute open in the glowing firmament. Amongst the rubble strewn about him, jutting up, was the remains of the stone angel, sheared off at the ankles. ‘Ah bollocks,’ he muttered. His thoughts turned to Lazzaro. For some moments he considered following him into the void. But then he remembered he still had drink in his flask and shelved the plans.

Luigi watched idly as the parachute wended its way towards the apex of the basilica. As it settled there he discerned a distinct yowling cry. Sirens drew closer. He wanted to call out but giddiness overwhelmed him and his horizons went black.

* * *
 

‘Is he dead?’ came a familiar voice.

Stavros? Luigi’s eyes flickered open. A couple of paramedics were attending him.

‘No, he’s still with us,’ one of the medics said. ‘Nothing broken but he may have concussion.’

Stavros’s face loomed as he grinned down at his colleague. ‘Yet another lucky escape, hmm? So how are you feeling?’

‘Inebriated,’ Luigi slurred, wincing as he turned his head. ‘Lazzaro…dead…?’

‘Yes. So he was the serial killer, eh? Forensics confirmed it. You know it’s fortunate you weren’t diced like the others. Strange though…’

‘What?’ Luigi mumbled.

‘Well, I was there just before he died... before police arrived. I’d come looking for you after you absconded from the hospital. Anyway, he gasped out your name. Then he flung this bracelet at my feet. He wanted you to have it I think? He started blathering something about Saint Michael watching over lost sheep. And that was it…he died.’ Stavros handed Luigi the bracelet.

‘Thanks,’ Luigi muttered tearfully. ‘He saved me.’ He directed his gaze toward the cupola. ‘What about…?’

‘You mean the Emeritus?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Well, the paramedics won’t be able to move him yet. Apparently he’s kind of lodged on the spire. In fact they think he might be impaled on his rectum. So it looks like he’ll have to stay put for now. At least until they can locate a surgeon with a head for heights.’

‘He scored a bullseye uh? Oh well, at least it’ll serve to curtail his usual outpourings.’ Luigi commented with a wry grin.

‘Quite,’ Stavros remarked. ‘Ah well, he’s did always claim the moral high ground... In fact I don’t think the cardinals are too enamoured with him right now. I overheard one of them saying something about getting him to the nunnery…letting the sisters of the Magdalene Laundries ‘take care of him’.’

‘Ah. What about that explosion?’ Luigi asked.

‘Oh that? That must have been the wheelchair colliding with a kebab van. Ah well, maybe God’s a vegetarian, huh?’ Stavros winked mischievously.

Luigi was strapped into a stretcher, hoisted up and carried down the stairwell. As he was taken from the palace and bobbed along through a sea of flashing lights he noticed a police cordon around Lazzaro’s body that lay amongst the wreckage of the fallen idol. Looking down at the broken life, he felt overwhelmed with pathos. He was touched by an inexplicable kinship with a soul twisted by fury and riven by sorrow. To this pitiful state; the once fearful and enigmatic assassin. This monstrosity, this Caliban; worse than the defilers who’d fashioned him…

Criminal, victim…human being.

* * *

After a considerable media hullabaloo, Vatican affairs eventually returned to a semblance of normality. Bertilloni was arrested, further clerical scandals had the kibosh put on them and emollient words abounded. It was business as usual in the shady corridors of power.

Luigi was tasked with the sad duty of collecting the body of cardinal Purves, who’d passed away peacefully on the loo. As he scouted about the apartment for surplus supplies of alcohol, he bumped into Maria who’d been called in to give the place a quick spruce.

‘Ooh, darling, how are you?’ she gushed. ‘You recover from nearly drowning in da toilet, ah? You okay…?’

‘Yeah, mustn’t grumble,’ Luigi shrugged. ‘Oh, and thanks for rescuing me. I mean, my life very nearly went down the pan.’

‘Ooh don’t mention it,’ Maria crooned. ‘Speaking of toilets, y’know I had to help clear up that great big toilet they call the ‘banqueting hall’.’ She pulled a disdainful frown.

‘Really?’

‘Oooh, them dirty bastardos!’ Maria fumed. ‘Why can’t they shit in da lavatory like the rest of us, uh? Da poo-poo everywhere mate…on da carpet, da walls…’

‘Shocking,’ Luigi commiserated.

‘Oh-ho,’ she whinnied as she crossed herself, ‘I tell you they even shit on da bloody candelabra!’

‘Blimey, that must have been one hell of a bleedin’ party.’ Luigi remarked.

‘Yeah, I tell you mate. They must’ve been squirting it from da bloody chandeliers. But I don’t mind really…‘cause my sweetheart, His Holiness Franco, he give me Saint Francis rosary.’

‘I guess that must have been some consolation,’ the gravedigger humoured her.

‘Aw it was,’ Maria simpered. ‘So I tell him he should ‘come to mamma’ and I feed my baby some boobie,’. ‘He like-a-da ‘titanic titties’ y’know?’ the buxom cleaning lady explained whilst cupping an ample bosom.

‘Um….right.’ Luigi tittered, averting his gave somewhat.

‘Anyway, so after I change his dirty diaper and smack his naughty arse it’s bath time. So I scrub him down and then he beg mamma give him a soapy-tit-wank. But, y’know, he’s a true gentleman.’ Maria asserted with a knowing wink. ‘I mean, he never even made a grab for my piss-flaps.’

‘How very classy,’ Luigi slurred with a lopsided grin. ‘Right, well, I’d best cart off this bleedin’ stiff before my new governor starts whining.’

THE END

* Lucifer, Paradise Lost by John Milton.
 
© Edwin Black 2013

 

Temptations of the Flush (Act II)

Act II - Hollow Throne

Characters:

CARDINAL BERTILLONI – senior administrator, Vatican City.
CARDINAL SODOMIA – financial advisör and chinwagger.
POPE RIGHTVINGER – outgoing pope.
POPE FRANCO – incoming pope.
CARDINAL FELATITTIO – screaming queen.
SIGNORE GARIBALDI – mafioso boss and utter cad.

* * *

In a sumptuous anteroom within St Peter’s Basilica, a coterie of cardinals thronged about a dais endowed with a peculiar throne…

‘It’s most improper I say,’ Cardinal Sodomio lisped agitatedly to his counterpart amid a general hubbub of gossiping and conniving. As if to emphasise his point he wobbled his clammy jowls disapprovingly. ‘I mean, this hasn’t been part of Curia protocol since the Middle Ages. It’s outrageous.’

‘Indubitably,’ Cardinal Bertilloni concurred noncommittally, ‘a travesty even by his standards.’

‘I mean really, who’s going to hide something like that under their bushel anyway?’ Sodomia grumbled. ‘And besides which, why in God’s name are we still waiting, hmm?’ He attempted to elevate a hefty, squat frame onto tiptoe and peer over a polka-dot pimpling of zucchettos.

‘God knows’. Bertilloni elongated a hoary neck and reconnoitred the entrance. ‘Still no sign of them,’ he reported back, glancing at the time again.

‘Well, I suspect it’s the Emeritus holding things up – Rightvinger,’ His rubicund associate muttered conspiratorially behind a sleeve. ‘In fact, I have it on good authority he’s awaiting delivery of some state-of-the-art wheelchair…complements of Fritz von Vinkel no less.’

‘Oh really?’ Bertilloni shot his accomplice a quizzical look. ‘You mean the new holier-than-thou dickwad heading up the IOR*?’

‘Oh, so you’ve met him?’ Sodomio responded with a rhetorical air.

‘Met him? Oh I’ve met him alright.’ Bertilloni sneered. ‘But he’s evidently not acquainted himself with us. He hasn’t stopped bellyaching about möney laundering for the Garibaldi fämily and payoffs to all those bum-boy blackmailers since he arrived. And now he’s whining about donations to far-right terror groups. Last I heard he was poking around the catacombs trying to locate that shipment of Nazi gold from Croatia. Honestly, one wonders why the prick even took the job if he had scruples.’

‘Ah well, perhaps he’ll find a suitable bridge to dangle himself from like the other guy, hmm? Well, with a little helping hand from Signore Garibaldi, naturally.’

‘We’d best give him enough rope then.’ Bertilloni muttered scathingly. He glanced at his watch for the umpteenth time. ‘So what’s all this about a wheelchäir?’

Sodomia cast his eyes askance then sidled closer to his associate. ‘Well, Vinkel’s previous employer used to build battleships for the Nazis. But they were also involved in covert wartime research. Vinkel got wind of this and managed to lay his hands on blueprints for the ‘Kriegvagon’. It’s combat-ready wheelchair. Turns out the Third Reich planned to station homicidal heaven-dodgers on the Western Front. Anyway, I hear Rightvinger’s expecting delivery of a prototype.’

‘God help us all,’ Bertilloni groaned.

‘Quite,’ Sodomia commented. ‘So what do you think of our new heavenly-harbinger?’ he quizzed, scratching listlessly at a heavily perspiring arse-cleft.

‘Pope Franco? Not much. I mean the only reason that bastard got in was down to the spoiler-effect on my own candidacy,’ Bertilloni seethed. ‘I was deliberately scuppered from the outset.’

‘Why am I not surprised? I mean, if the swines can’t build their own little empires they gang up and put their weight behind the weakest candidate. That way they can wheedle more grace and favour,’ Sodomia reflected. ‘But then pettiness and pharisaism are among the few causes that actually unite us.’

‘True,’ his counterpart murmured, staring impassively into the middle distance.

‘But what of God’s choice, I wonder?’ Sodomia ventured with more than a trace of irony.

‘Who..?’ Bertilloni said distractedly, ‘…oh, him. Frankly, I think he favours a laissez-faire approach don’t you? …Prefers to leave it to his temporal agents to wade into those stygian depths of politics and human folly.’

His counterpart nodded in agreement and glanced at his wristwatch. ‘Well this is intolerable,’ he hissed. ‘Where the hell is he?’

Belated but on cue, the doors swung outwards. Pope Emeritus trundled grandly into the hall in full ceremonial finery and on an enormous whining, whirring contraption - evocative of a lunar landing vehicle. He caused some of the cardinals to start as he cut a meandering swathe towards the platform. Following him, an entourage led by his strutting successor clad in a simple white smock.

Hydraulics hissed as Rightvinger awkwardly wheeled about face to his audience. With the flick of a switch his seat elevated until he was nigh on pulpit-level.  ‘Welcome, my…ah…ah…esteemed cardinals,’ he announced in a warbling German accent. ‘We must be succinct for once, since our new pope-elect here, Pope Franco, wishes to conclude matters swiftly. So without further ado, we wish to inform za Curia that we have reinstated the sedia stercoraria - as you will observe.’ He motioned towards the hollow-bottomed wooden seat.

‘As you are no doubt aware,’ he went on, ‘those plotting revolutionaries among za fräulein species will stop at nothing to infiltrate our ranks. After due cogitation, we decided to safeguard against the possibility of a lady-bottom ever contaminating the seat of Saint Peter. Of course, we must never permit zis effrontery. Accordingly we have made provision, henceforth, for all appointees to undergo za test. A test that, without wishing to seem vulgar, will ensure nature has endowed the candidate elect with the prerequisite (if redundant) trappings of office.’

There was a hussed titter amongst the assembly. A hand shakily arose from the ranks.

’Yes? ’ The outgoing pope called out, inclining his head down towards the inquirer.

‘Um…what, precisely… does that mean your Holiness?’ A doddery, rheumy-eyed cardinal piped up.

Momentarily, the Rightvinger became introspective. ‘Err…what it means, is zat the investiture will observe with tradition; graced below waist and yet bereft of a cleft.’

‘But I don’t….’ the rather befuddled questioner began to splutter and attempted to hawk up some phlegm. ‘I don’t… (ahem-ahem) …understand…?’ he gurgled.

Rightvinger glared at him. ‘Good God man is it not obvious? Our pope must demonstrate he’s enhanced with a lance…adorned with a horn… y’know…a wrinkler with a sprinkler? Is it so hard to grasp? I mean, should we now question God’s divine misogyny? Certainly not! Zis is why his temporal representative must be replete with a meat and have za knob for the job.’ His expression pacified somewhat as his gaze flitted to a canvas of the Virgin Mary. ‘In short my good cardinals, we wish to guarantee that those who ‘amen-us’ are packing za penis.’

‘Ah…hmm…I think…I understand,’ the muddled prelate burbled as look of relief finally ranged across his features. ‘So we uphold the testicles in our vestibules and keep the testes in our vestries. And I suppose, similarly, one might maintain a throbbing-gristle to preach the epistle?’

Rightvinger glowered at him but before he had a chance to vent his spleen he was forestalled.

‘Oh!’ the cardinal exclaimed, ‘oh dear…if you will kindly excuse me gentlemen…I think I need to power my nose.’ With that, he lurched and shambled towards the exit awkwardly. The gathering afforded him a wide berth.

‘If we may proceed?’ Rightvinger growled, scowling at a muddy discolouration that had mysteriously appeared on the rich Persian carpet. He twiddled a joystick and turned himself to his victorious successor. ‘Now, if you will be good enough to mount za chair, yes?’ As he fidgeted a muffled trump emanated from the base of his Kriegvagon, swiftly followed by a sluicing sound and then the whoosh of air. ‘You will of course excuse us, gentlemen,’ he muttered nonchalantly, ‘it was merely a little effluvia.’

In stark contrast to his self-effacing public performances, a cocksure Pope Franco mounted the platform and with all the imperious bearing of an emperor. He and hitched up the back of his smock as far as modesty would allow and lowered himself into a reclining position. ‘We are ready,’ he stated simply as he shifted uncomfortably.

Rightvinger turned to the assembly. ‘Now, we require a candidate to undertake an inspection of za ‘hanging fruit’. Do we have a volunteer…anyone?’

A tall, gaunt figure began willowing towards the front ‘Ooh, ‘scuse me dear… can I just squeeze by… I believe this is where my services are required…’

As he sidled up to the front row he was unceremoniously barged aside by a rival of vastly superior girth who then bulldozed his way to the fore.

‘Oh no you don’t dear! I’m ‘aving some o’ that,’ the man-mountain spat viciously at his rival. ‘Coming through!’  He announced, lolloping up to the dais.

‘Gentlemen, gentlemen…there’s no need to fight,’ Rightvinger admonished. He eyed the forerunner severely. ‘Hmm, Cardinal Felatittio - what a surprise,’ he muttered sardonically. ‘Good. I think we are ready. Cardinal, if you would be so good as to-’

‘Just tell me how you like it your Holiness,’ Felatittio butted in as he rubbed plump hands together gleefully.

‘Just get on with it!’ the reclining pope bawled angrily.

‘Ooh yes your holiness. With pleasure your holiness,’ the corpulent prelate gushed and simpered. ‘I believe I know what I’m doing here.’ He lowered himself clumsily onto a supplicant knee and promptly slid a fat arm upwards between his prey’s legs. In moments he began to grapple at something fleshy.

‘Oouff!’ Pope Franco howled. ‘That’s my fuh…haark…king haemorrhoid you bumbling imbecile!’

‘Oops, sorry dear,’ the grovelling cardinal apologised. He abased himself further in an attempt to peer up the skirt. After a series of ungainly pulsating motions, reminiscent of a floundering dungong, he finally caught sight of his quarry. ‘Oo-ooh! It’s a big one too!’ He announced shrilly from under the smock.

There was a subdued ripple of applause among the audience.

Meanwhile, Cardinal Felatittio inched further in, hoping to give the holy sceptre a worshipful gobble on the sly.

However his plan was thwarted by the eagle-eyed Rightvinger. ‘Will you desist from your wanton bootlicking!’ he thundered from on high. ‘Halt I say, we command you!’

The beached-walrus-of-a-cardinal peered out from under the smock whilst cupping the pope’s testicles lovingly. ‘Sorry your Holiness, but I wanted to be unequivocal, y’know dearie…I mean your Holiness…?’

‘Get your hands off me you abominable wretch!’ Pope Franco bellowed. He extricated himself from the unwelcome tryst and hoisted himself up. He then glared up at Rightvinger. ‘He just tried to play dingdong with my bell-end!’

‘Well there’s not much chance of that flaccid thing chiming is there sweetheart…?’ Cardinal Felatittio bitched as he clambered to his feet and waddled back to join the onlookers.

‘Good. Matters are concluded.’ Rightvinger announced. ‘Thank you gentlemen. I’m sure we all wish my successor well in his enthronement upon the holy seat of Saint Peter. May Almighty God shower him with his blessings. In nomine Patris et fillii…yada-yada.’ He lowered his chair and bade his successor follow him to his private quarters.

As the congregation dispersed and formed into gossiping enclaves, Bertilloni slunk off and passed through the Sistine Chapel. Momentarily he gazed up at Archangel Michael reading from the book of the damned. Saint Michael…the cardinal mused…who thrust into hell those who prowl the world seeking the ruin of souls...wielder of the sword of God, herald of judgement… He slunk into an alcove and withdrew a cell phone.

‘What is it?’ A gruff voice growled at him.

‘We have a problem,’ he murmured, ‘there’s been another ‘mishap’…an archbishop, no less.’ There was a long pause. The cardinal stared into the gloom with icy, deadpan eyes.

‘So what do you want me to do about it…ah? You handle operations. I supply the boys and girls, you supply the premises…remember?’

A conflagration of anger engulfed Bertilloni. He struggled against an impulse to deface a nearby depiction of the Resurrection. ‘Did you order the hit?’

‘Who’s asking? Who is that? You asking me?’ came the menacing retort. ‘You asking me who I choose to waste and who I choose to don’t waste? Hey you must be out of your fuckin’ mind buddy! Listen, I don’t give a shit about them pious perverts who patronise your whorehouses. This is strictly business, ah? So long as they gimme the dough, I don’t give a fuck if they’re banging the maggots outta’ their own dead grandmother.’

Bertilloni took his crucifix and stabbed at the mural. Fragments of plaster fell as he gouged at the eyes of the Creator.

‘Hey, you there? Where d’you go…?’

Bertilloni became placid. ‘It would appear we have an assassin in our midst. And he’s receiving help.’

‘So what? You think I got some hidden agenda or somethin’? You think I wanna wind up operations now, while all the dough’s rolling in? Hey, now that would be goddamn sacrilegious right?’

‘The point is someone’s onto us!’ Bertilloni snarled. ‘Two cardinals executed in the same place is hardly an act of God!’ He exhaled slowly in an attempt to curtail his rage. ‘I think it’s Fritz von Vinkel. He’s too interested in those bank transactions.’

‘Well maybe he’ll find himself hanging under Blackfriars Bridge like that other prick, Calvino, ah? Oh yeah, I’m sure you appreciated the irony of our choice of bridge given your Dominican business ventures, eh cardinal? Anyway, he was about blab to that bitch reporter he was banging so we had to waste him fast.’

‘Listen Garibaldi, the spotlight of the world is on Rome right now. I’m not sure if I can pull the veil over another ‘accident’.’

‘I told you not to use my motherfuckin’ name Bertilloni! Are you fuckin’ nuts? Okay, tell you what; let’s say I get one o’ my crew to sniff around…check out a few places…ah?’

‘I need this sorted.’

‘Yeah, yeah, whatever. Hey, I said I’d look into it, right? Period.’

The phöne went dead.

The cardinal’s searing gaze fell upon a scroll adorning the defaced fresco it read: ‘Deus videt omnia’; God sees everything. He drew out a marker and scrawled furiously over it: ‘Deus est forsit manu temptans’;

- God is probably short-sighted.

* Institute for the Works of Religion (Vatican Bank).

© Edwin Black 2013

Temptations of the Flush (preamble)

Fondest greetings and thank you to all those who’ve enquired after my health. As you will note from a recent photograph, I’ve shed a few pounds of late. Alas, I fear my course of cølonic irrigation proved rather more rigorous than anticipated. Never mind, my physician assures me I should make a satisfactory recøvery.
 
Much has changed since my last posting - not least, in the ranks of the world’s second favourite death cult[1]. Ah yes, Europe’s last theocracy, Vatican City, has undergone a regime change, shuffling out one tin god for the next. As media pundits jostled like flies about an elephant’s sphincter, a release of fumes signalled the deliberation was finally over. Jorge Bergoglio, alias ‘Pope Francis’ emerged victorious and successfully plopped himself onto the seät of St Peter. He’s being promoted as an ascetic, shunning earthly luxury and exemplifying spiritual pulchritude. But for now, let’s focus on the shrivelled old misanthrope who preceded him if we may.
 
During his reign, Joseph Aloisius Ratzinger presided over the exodus of 5 million Catholics from his European flock[2]. So why, despite the threat of eternal sadomasochistic torment, have so many chosen to vote with their feet? Could this represent a  peripeteia in European consciousness about an organisation that extols virtue and yet embodies vice?
 
Doubtless, this avalanche of clerical child abuse lawsuits and the Vatileaks scandal have provided us mere mortals a glimpse into the roiling mire of hypocrisy, perfidy and endemic corruption that must surely stink to the high heavens. Yet in spite of its evident turpitude, the Holy See still presumes to act as humanity’s moral arbiter.
 
‘God’s Rottweiler’ announced that he’ll remain in Vatican City ‘withdrawing into präyer… hidden from the world’. However, according to Reuters[3], his plan to skulk in this sovereign state has more to do with the fact that it will ‘offer legal protection from any attempt to prosecute him in connection with sexual abuse cases around the world.’ In fact Ratzinger has already been cited in a lawsuit[4] involving ‘conspiring to cover up the molestation of three boys in Texas by Juan Carlos Patino-Arango in Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston’. However, he managed to evade legal proceedings after an intervention by US President George W. Bush, who granted him immunity from prosecution. Nonetheless, in the US alone, from 2003-2009, 1551 clerical abuse victims received over $1.1 billion in compensation[5]. But then this really is the tip of a titanic iceberg of global proportions[6].
 
From 1981 until 2005, Ratzinger headed the ‘Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith’. He was directly responsible for investigating child abuse accusations within the Catholic Church. But rather than submitting evidence of criminality to the appropriate civil authorities, he conspired in a systematic policy of shit-shovelling sexual predators from one diocese to the next - thus allowing further commission of crimes against the vulnerable. (The sheer hubris of the man is breathtaking!)
 
Shortly after the rat(zinger) abandoned his sinking ship, a couple of thunderbolts struck St Peter’s Basilica. One can’t help but wonder if ‘The Almighty’ was getting in some tärget practice for those who remain a disgrace to the deity that they purport to represent.
 
But I mustn’t allow my epistemological objections to institutional religion to get the better of me. We shouldn’t forget Ratzinger’s other services to humankind. For example, although he scorns the concept of female equality within the priesthood, he’s maintained a strict equal opportunities policy for pederasts, repressed homosexuals and (apparently) ‘reluctant’ ex-members of the Hitler Youth’s anti-aircraft unit. He’s also lobbied against stem-cell reseärch thereby assisting sufferers with conditions such as Parkinson’s disease and multiple sclerøsis to meet their Maker at the earliest opportunity[7]. And we mustn’t overlook his efforts to prevent the abuse of underage rubber. Then there’s Ratzinger’s impressive authoring of 66 page-turners (most of them vanity published through Ignatius Press, an imprint owned by a friend and former pupil).
 
Coinciding with the commotion at the Holy See, it seems cracks have also been showing in the Catholic Church of Scotland. News that ‘His Eminence’ Cardinal Keith O’Brien was in fact a cassock-lifter left parishioners stunned. Although O’Brien spearheaded a series of crusades against gay equality laws, his inclination to ‘stick up’ for junior clergy clearly got the better of him. His ignominious fall from grace (and office) led him to confess that he’d ‘fallen beneath the standards expected of him’[8]. Ah well, perhaps he ran out of communion wafers and had to improvise…?
 
Meanwhile, as well as hosting Red Nose Day this year, the BBC presented a series of ‘Brownnose Days’, lapping up the unfolding ‘drama’ at the Vatican. In fact the BBC news team exhibited the kind of slobbering, slavering and drooling behaviour usually seen among rutting wildebeest. It’s even been rumoured that the ensuing deluge of saliva led the BBC to finally evacuate Television Centre and relocate. (But at least it served to disguise the spattering of incriminating DNA left there by the late Sir Jimmy Savile.)
 
The question arises whether Lord Patten, BBC Trust chairman, prevailed upon producers to ensure such prolonged coverage of Vatican affairs. Certainly, Patten’s Catholic upbringing might have inclined him to lavish oral gratification upon elderly men of the cloth. And, in spite of widespread public indifference, it was still deemed appropriate to shove it down our throats without due consensus. But then, this is hardly a new concept in theological or indeed clerical circles…
 
In fact Patten was appointed Prime Minister David Cameron’s ‘personal representative’ during Pope Benedict’s visit to the UK in 2010. At the time The Tablet [9] described him as ‘the country’s leading lay Roman Catholic’. But surely Lord Patten’s gratuitous kissing of the papal ringpiece rather impugns the BBC’s claim to impartiality...?
 
If you enjoyed this dissenting voice in the papal fawn-fest, why not watch this space for my forthcoming tale: ‘Temptations of the Flush’…
 
Thanks for reading,
Edwin x
 
END NOTES
1. Catholics worldwide: 1.2 billion. Muslims worldwide: 1.6 billion (Christian World Database, 2013)
2. 2003 - 282 million European Catholics (Vatican source). 2012 - 277 million European Catholics. (World Christian Database.)
3. ‘Pope will have security, immunity by remaining in the Vatican’. (Reuters Feb 15, 2013.)
4. United States District Court for the Southern District of Texas Houston Division, Civil Action No. H-05-1047 (2005).
5. ‘Catholic sex abuse cases’ (Wikepedia.org, Note 2.)
6. The Boston Globe, ‘Abuse in the Catholic Church - World doesn’t share US view of scandal’ by Michael Paulson, (8 April 2002). Also see: 'Roman Catholic sex abuse cases by country' (Wikipedia).
7. US National Library of Medicine National Institutes of Health, 2006: PMC1664668.
8. ‘Cardinal Keith O'Brien sorry for sexual misconduct’ (BBC News, 3 March 2013).
9. The Tablet, Sept. 2010.
 
QUOTE OF THE DAY
‘Hypocrisy is a tribute that vice pays to virtue.’ François de La Rochefoucauld,