She lowered her eyes. “I don’t believe in an afterlife.”
“You—really?”
“I think the only thing that matters is the state of your soul while you’re alive.”
“Is that—Catholic teaching?”
“Definitely not. Father Fergus and I discuss it all the time. To me, there’s nothing realer in the world than God, and Satan is no less real. Sin is real and God’s forgiveness is real. That’s the message of the Gospel. But there’s not much in the Gospel about the afterlife—John is the only one who talks about it. And doesn’t that seem strange? If the afterlife is so important? When the rich young man asks Jesus how he might have eternal life, Jesus doesn’t give him a straight answer. He seems to say that heaven is loving God and obeying the commandments, and hell is being lost in sin—forsaking God. Father Fergus says I have to believe that Jesus is talking about a literal heaven and hell, because that’s what the Church teaches. But I’ve read those verses a hundred times. The rich young man asks about eternity, and Jesus tells him to give away his money. He says what to do in the present—as if the present is where you find eternity—and I think that’s right. Eternity is a mystery to us, just like God is a mystery. It doesn’t have to mean rejoicing in heaven or burning in hell. It could be a timeless state of grace or bottomless despair. I think there’s eternity in every second we’re alive. So I’m in quite a bit of trouble with Father Fergus.”
Russ stared at the little green-coated woman. He might have just fallen in love with her. It wasn’t only the depth of her engagement with a question of urgency to him. It was hearing, in her words, a thought that had been latent in him without his being able to articulate it. His sense of inferiority became acute. Paradoxically, instead of making him shy of her, it made him want to bury himself in her.
“I should go inside and pray,” she said. “It stinks to feel so close to God and not be a better Catholic. My progress has been stymied for quite some time.”
“Can I come again next week?”
She smiled sadly. “If you don’t mind my saying, you’re not the most promising candidate, Mr. God Doesn’t Mind a Joke.”
“But you’re struggling with the creed yourself.”
“I have good reason to.”
“What—reason?”
“I’d frankly rather—do you think you’ll ever go back to the reservation?”
“Sometime, yes, absolutely.”
“Maybe you can take me along with you. I’d like to see it for myself.”
The thought of taking her to the mesa was like a reward in heaven, amazing but remote. For now, it felt more like a brush-off. “I’d be very happy to show it to you.”
“Good,” she said. “Something to look forward to.” She turned away and added, “You know where to find me.”
Did she mean that he could find her whenever he pleased, or only when he was returning to the reservation? As the words of Jesus were ambiguous, so were hers. He was still struggling to parse the ambiguity, two days later, when an envelope bearing only a Flagstaff postmark, no return address, arrived for him in camp. He took it to his cabin and sat down on his bunk.
Dear Russell,
I was remiss not to thank you again for curing me of my superstition. You were so lovely to put up with me—I felt as if the sun had come out after a month of clouds. I hope you find everything you’re looking for and more.
Yours in God and friendship,
Marion
Here, too, in the farewell flavor of I hope you find, a doubting mind could see ambiguity. But his body knew better. The sensation that gripped it was familiar in its emanation from his nether parts, entirely novel in its suffusion with emotion—with hope and gratitude, the image of one particular person, her soulful eyes, her complicated mind. It was inconceivable that a person so fascinating might feel lesser, and yet there it was, in her own handwriting, unambiguously: put up with me. The words excited him so much, she might have been whispering them in his ear.
The next day, when he requested leave for the afternoon, the quartermaster didn’t even ask what for. George Ginchy still enjoyed his roll calls and assemblies, but since the war ended the camp had only been going through the motions; Ginchy’s quest of the moment was to procure equipment for the football squad he’d organized. The old Willys was somehow still operable, and Russ drove it first to the public library and then, not finding Marion, to her uncle’s house, which he identified by its prickly pears. He was curiously unafraid to knock on the front door. He knew that the marriage of men and women was in the natural course of things, ordained by God, but in his mind, already, the world wasn’t full of women he might potentially someday meet, there was only one woman. In retrospect, their chance encounter at the library had had God’s seal on it. To knock on her door was no more than what God had intended when He created man and woman; which was to say that Russ was now conscious of being a man.