Godsent Read online

  It was Latin for “the way.” A way of life, of belief. A manner of living, of being in the world, such that every thought, every action, was part of an ongoing conversation with God: a worshipful conversation destined to facilitate the establishment of the kingdom of God on Earth.

  Conversatio had begun as a monastic order in the early thirteenth century. Like many such orders of the time, it accepted religious and lay members, as well as men and women. All the community had wanted was to be left alone to pursue its meditations and prayers in peace. But as the years passed, Conversatio’s numbers grew, until the Church perceived a threat to its power and authority.

  The Inquisition pounced, pronouncing the order heretical; perhaps it was, for the brothers and sisters of Conversatio had a unique understanding of the Second Coming: they believed that God was going to send a second son to complete the work begun by the first. It was the birth of this second son, rather than the return of Jesus Christ, that the men and women of Conversatio hoped to hasten.

  The doctrine of the second son, as they called it, was derived from a close study of the Old and New Testaments, where many passages, all of which had been misinterpreted or suppressed by the Church, testified to its truth. Jesus Himself had often spoken about the “Son of man”; the Church held that in doing so, He was referring to himself, but Conversatio believed that, on the contrary, He was in fact prophesying about the second son, who would be known as the Son of man rather than the Son of God, though it was unclear from the scriptures what that distinction implied, since the second son, like Jesus, would be unquestionably divine.

  But it was not necessary or even possible for imperfect human beings to comprehend the mysteries of God’s plan; faith, not understanding, was all that was required of them. And many followers of Conversatio clung to their faith in the face of the Inquisition’s cruel and relentless persecution, enduring unspeakable tortures and willingly embracing a martyr’s fate. Many, but not all, or even most. Like the Cathars and other sects branded with the stigma of heresy, Conversatio was crushed without mercy. Its members were killed or converted back to the “true” faith. Its doctrines were expunged from the pages of history.

  Or so it had appeared.

  But appearances were deceiving. In fact, though its ranks were badly decimated, Conversatio had continued to exist secretly both inside and outside the Church. As the years passed, decades and then centuries, the order slowly regained its strength, though never its former numbers. Its leaders had learned the wisdom of concealment. At the same time, they began to cautiously introduce moles into the Church hierarchy that had nearly wiped them out, so that they would never again be taken by surprise.

  By the middle of the twentieth century, it was decided that the time had come for the order to step out of the shadows. Certain Biblical prophecies, as well as classified Vatican documents relating to apparitions of the Virgin Mary, suggested that the coming of the second son was close at hand. Now, as never before, the order required a public face, a kind of mask behind which Conversatio could go out into the world and mingle undetected in its mission. So it was that a group of wealthy and conservative-minded Catholics, most of whom knew nothing of Conversatio even though their businesses—and, in some cases, families—had been thoroughly infiltrated by the order’s agents, were induced to form a lay organization dedicated to rolling back the modernizing influences of Vatican II. This organization called itself The Way.

  Thanks to Lisa, Gordon had been given a glimpse behind the public mask of The Way. He knew the truth about Conversatio . . . and about the Congregation as well.

  The Congregation was the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, formerly known as the Holy Office of the Inquisition. According to the history books, the Inquisition had been abolished centuries ago, but, as with Conversatio, the truth lay outside history books: behind, beneath, beyond. The Inquisition, too, had continued in secret, hidden behind the mask of a new name, but as brutal and unforgiving as ever in its single-minded mission to root out and punish dissenters from the official dogma of the Church.

  The chief weapon in the Congregation’s arsenal was the sacrament of confession, just as it had been for well over a thousand years. The Church had always insisted that the seal of the confessional was absolute, the veil of secrecy inviolate. No civil or secular authority could breach it. What was said in the privacy of the confessional was heard only by Almighty God. But in fact, within the Church, there was no secrecy, no seal. No veil. Information flowed from the priests in the confessionals to their bishops, and from the bishops to the Vatican—and into the avid ears of Inqui sitors, who sifted it word by word for the slightest sign of sin.

  And more.

  For in the patterns that emerged from tens of thousands of confessions reviewed week after week, year after year, century after century, a sordid compendium of the worst in human nature, the Inquisition believed they could glimpse the dark design of the great Adversary. The outlines of Satan’s plan would be visible, they believed, to a sufficiently discerning eye, given an abundance of data. The centerpiece of that plan, which had as its aim the destruction of the Church and the downfall of humanity, was the Antichrist, the son of Satan: a spirit of absolute evil incarnated in flesh and sent to Earth in a blasphemous parody of the birth of Jesus. Because the devil was the prince of lies, it seemed likely that any woman cursed to bring the Antichrist into the world might very well think herself blessed, believing her womb was destined to yield a very different fruit than the unspeakable obscenity that was, in fact, ripening there.

  So it was that the Inquisitors took special note of any reports of virgin births or conceptions. They rated such reports according to a scale that ran from low to high potentials: potential mothers; potential sons. Most cases along the spectrum from low to high they observed and ultimately rejected as ordinary sinners or insane persons. But a very few of the highest of high potentials merited more than mere observation. In those cases, the Inquisition acted. If the birth hadn’t yet occurred, the mother-to-be was abducted, confined, questioned closely. And the child, whether male or female, was put to death as soon as it was born—after being baptized, of course, for there was, after all, a chance that the child was not the devil’s spawn, and such a child deserved its place in Heaven . . . while if it was the devil’s brat, why, then the touch of holy water would burn like fire, causing the infant to cry out and in doing so supply proof of its true nature (as, in fact, happened more often than not). The mother, if she were properly repentant, was permitted a life of service and absolution in a nunnery. Failing that, she would follow her child to hell.

  If, on the other hand, the birth had already taken place, then there was no time to lose, and mother and child were summarily put to death.

  The Inquisition reckoned that, since its inception, it had thwarted the devil’s plans innumerable times in this way. But they were not complacent. The devil would not give up until the Antichrist survived.

  Conversatio had no quarrel with killing the Antichrist. But in its zeal to eliminate Satan’s spawn, the Inquisition was also running the risk of eliminating the second son. Indeed, from the perspective of the Inquisition, there was no difference between the two. This Conversatio could not permit. They would defend the women and children that the Inquisition sought to destroy, for only in that way could they defend the as-yet-unborn second son. Using information funneled to them by their contacts within the Inquisition, Conversatio dispatched its agents to high potentials before the Inquisition’s killers could arrive. Sometimes they got there too late. But just as often they arrived in time. If the child in question had already been born, and was a boy, the agents would abduct the boy, leaving the mother to her fate. If the mother was still expecting, then she would be abducted and kept in a secure location until she gave birth, after which the child, if it was a boy, would be taken from her and raised by a childless couple specially selected by Conversatio for that purpose. Afterward the mothers, and any girl children, were sen
t to nunneries maintained by Conversatio. Meanwhile, the couple chosen to raise the potential second son would be observing their charge closely; if it seemed that he was the Antichrist, it was their duty to kill him. If he was just an ordinary boy, they were expected to raise him in the traditions of Conversatio, so that, in time, he too would become an agent. But if he was the prophesied second son, then they were to safeguard his life with their own until he could begin the work that God had given him to do.

  The Inquisition, of course, fought back against its unknown adversary. Soon they realized that Conversatio was responsible. They also realized that they had been infiltrated. Thus began a game of cat and mouse between Conversatio and the Inquisition that continued until the present day.

  As the years went by, the Inquisition was quick to seize upon anything that could give it an advantage in its race to identify and reach high potentials before Conversatio. A major breakthrough occurred in 1786, when the radical ideas of a Hessian engineer named J. H. Müller reached the Vatican. Müller had conceived of a calculating machine, the precursor to modern computers. Though Müller’s ideas earned him nothing but scorn in his native land, the Inquisition was quick to see how such a device could aid them in their holy quest. An intensive program was secretly launched to build what was called a “Müller box.” By 1822, when the English inventor and mathematician Charles Babbage began work on his own calculating machine, which he developed independently of Müller and called a “difference engine,” the Vatican had successfully built and operated more than a dozen Müller boxes. Adding Babbage’s ideas to the mix yielded computers of remarkably advanced design and capabilities, especially when linked in parallel processing networks. The computer revolution was still more than a century away in the secular world, but in the secret laboratories of the Church, located in Roman catacombs buried deep beneath the Vatican, it had already arrived.

  At present, the Congregation’s grasp of computer science and programming was far in advance of the rest of the world. A video or audio record of every confession was automatically transmitted electronically to the Vatican, where a powerful program tirelessly prowled through the ever-growing database using a sophisticated search algorithm. This program was the direct descendant of the first piece of software the Inquisition had developed in the mid-1790s and was continually being upgraded; indeed, it had attained a level of complexity such that no human mind could fully comprehend it, and for the last decade it had been upgrading itself, improving its own code, though considerable debate existed within the Congregation as to whether this ability was proof of intelligence, and, if so, what the theological implications of such a development would be. The existence of this program, called Grand Inquisitor, or GI for short, was known only to the pope, the ten cardinals who oversaw the Congregation, and the priests/scientists who monitored a system they no longer understood.

  Conversatio spies had communicated the existence of Grand Inquisitor to their contacts right from the start, and over the years, with some interruptions, had been able to smuggle out enough information to give the order’s field agents continued opportunities to compete with the Congregation for access to high potentials.

  Which was how, exactly a year ago today, Gordon and Lisa had come to find themselves entrusted with a newborn boy.

  They didn’t know where the baby had come from, who his mother had been, or what had happened to her. They knew absolutely nothing about the boy’s history; that way they couldn’t accidentally reveal anything that might help the Congregation and Grand Inquisitor track him down. The only thing they knew about him, apart from the name on the birth certificate supplied by the agents who delivered the child, was that he was a high potential. But that was all they needed to know.

  Gordon and Lisa had been at the top of the list to receive a high potential for nearly a year. They had been given new names, new identities. They had severed all contact with their families and friends. Such were the sacrifices demanded of those who would serve Conversatio as surrogate parents, protectors and, God forbid, possible executioners of a high potential.

  But not once in the last year had Gordon and Lisa regretted their decision. From the moment they laid eyes on the baby, they felt their hearts open to him without reservation. He was so sweet, so beautiful, so intelligent. They knew right away that he couldn’t possibly be evil. Of course, they prayed that he was the second son, as did each pair of surrogate parents, but really, it would be enough for Gordon and Lisa if he just turned out to be a normal, healthy boy. To be the loving parents of such a child, to raise him to love God and his fellow men, and to help prepare the way for the second son, that seemed like blessing enough to them.

  Now, as he listened to Lisa getting the boy ready for bed, Gordon sent up a silent prayer of thanks. Despite the ever-present danger of discovery, the periods of stress and tedium that went with the job of being a Conversatio field agent and surrogate, the last year had been the happiest of his life. Having a child had brought him and Lisa closer together, added a richness to their lives that he couldn’t have imagined without experiencing it for himself. It wasn’t that the boy had become the center of their marriage, though in fact he had; it was more that having him at the center had provided a strength and stability that Gordon hadn’t even realized was missing from the marriage before. He felt as though he and Lisa had been like two planets orbiting each other in the dark; now, with his arrival, a sun had suddenly appeared in the space between them, bathing them in light and warmth and love. The whole world appeared different to him now, a richer, more interesting, and beautiful place. It really was a miracle.

  With a sigh, he returned to the report.

  He wondered who would read his words. Did his unencrypted reports go to a single person, the same one each time, or were they circulated among a number of people, each looking for a different thing? He didn’t know. His knowledge of how Conversatio was structured, let alone the identity of its leadership, was purposefully kept limited so that, if captured by the Congregation, he could betray no one when he broke under their tortures, as he would inevitably break, for the Congregation was as advanced in the art of persuasion as they were in the science of computers.

  But in his mind’s eye, Gordon had always pictured a single person reading his reports. An older man, wise and gentle, but strong too, when he had to be. He pictured him as silver haired, with a long, white beard. Someone who could be trusted to take care of those who served under him and to always do the right thing. The first time he’d described this imaginary being to Lisa, she’d laughed in his face.

  “Why, don’t you see who that is?” she’d asked.

  “Um, no.”

  “It’s Santa Claus, you big dope!”

  And he’d started laughing too, because she was right. It was Santa Claus. But it was also Merlin the Magician and Gandalf the Gray: all those hoary old figures of stupendous power and benign authority rolled into one, up to and including God Himself. That’s whom he was really writing to, regardless of what particular human eyes read the words. Realizing that didn’t make writing the reports any more enjoyable, but it did leave him strangely at peace once he’d finished, as if he’d just made his confession and received absolution for his sins.

  That was another sacrifice he and Lisa had made. No more confessions. No more Catholic masses, for that matter. No Catholic church was safe for them to enter now. Instead, they attended a local Methodist church, because not attending any services at all would bring them to the Congregation’s attention as much or more as setting foot inside the confessional of a Catholic church.

  After another hour, Gordon was finished at last. He read over the report one more time. Then he folded it and slipped it into the envelope addressed to this week’s PO box: some town in Maine he’d never heard of. He sealed the envelope in a plastic sandwich baggie, which he placed into his briefcase. Only then did he peel off the latex gloves he’d worn through the entire operation. He hated using the gloves; they made his palms swe
at and itch, but it was important to leave no physical evidence behind in case the letter was intercepted. Tomorrow, on his lunch break, he would drive to a mailbox, don another pair of gloves, unseal the baggie, remove the envelope, and drop it through the slot.

  Gordon pulled off the gloves and tossed them in the trash. Then, one by one, he fed into the shredder the sheets of notebook paper on which, as though solving a complex mathematical equation, he’d worked out the encryption for the report. And every other sheet in that particular notebook, including the cardboard backing. That done, he did the same with the one-time pad that had served as the basis for the encryption. The posts on eBay and Craigslist that would supply him with the address of next week’s PO box would also provide the means of generating the next one-time pad.

  Once he’d finished the shredding, he took what was left of the papers into the living room, where he burned them in the fireplace. This had seemed excessive at first; he’d asked his instructor why, if he was going to burn the papers anyway, it was necessary to bother shredding them. The answer was sobering. No one quite knew Grand Inquisitor’s limits when it came to reconstructing information, but Conversatio’s scientists thought that GI would be easily capable of putting a shredded document back together; similarly, burned papers could theoretically be reconstructed from ash fragments. But it was thought, or rather hoped, that the combination of shredding and burning would be sufficient to defeat GI.

  “Dinner’s ready, hon,” Lisa called from the kitchen.

  “Be right there,” he answered.

  But although he was hungry, and the smell of roasted chicken was difficult to resist, Gordon didn’t go directly to dinner. Instead, he stopped off at the baby’s room to say goodnight to his son.