A Love Forbidden

  "Magnificent city," he marveled, gawking at the glittering vista all around and below. "Now, tell me about Walter. I'm anxious to meet him. Do you have children?"

  "Walter died five years ago. An auto accident."

  "Leah!" Jay stretched his hand across the table and took hers.

  She witnessed the jumble of emotions her news unleashed in her guest. The feeling closest to the surface was embarrassment. "There's no way you could have known." For some reason, it was important for her to tell Jay about the accident. "We don't know how it happened. He was driving home from Half Moon Bay. That's on the coast south of here. He'd been to see a business client. It was after dark, but the road was clear. It wasn't raining or anything. He-- He didn't hit anyone. The car went off the road and struck an oak tree. The first thing everyone suspected was alcohol, but they didn't know my Walter. He was the athletic type. Jogger. Health foods. Kept himself in great shape. Never overindulged. In college, they called him 'Straight Arrow' Barton."

  "Could he have fallen asleep?"

  "It would have been a first for him. The police think a deer might have dashed in front of the car." She had covered this ground a million times over the past five years. Time, the great healer, allowed her to tell the story now without breaking down. She didn't want to spend her first evening with Jay, grieving her loss. "The children and I--I have two, a boy thirteen, Todd, we call him Teddy, and a girl eleven, Monica." She fished in her purse for pictures. "We've done quite well. Walt's business interests and life insurance created an estate that has given us a comfortable life. We miss him terribly."

  While she spoke, Jay retreated into a secret place inside. Leah thought it was related to her story of Walt's death and talk of her children. "What is it? You look uncomfortable."

  "I was just aware that in my country, a priest in clerical garb would never be seen alone with a woman in an elegant restaurant like this. I suppose it isn't much different over here."

  "In San Francisco?" Leah couldn't hold back a rush of anger. "This is one of the most liberal cities in the U.S. It's different here. Trust me." What she wanted to tell him was far different. Has nothing changed? After all this time, is your first concern still for your own reputation? What did she expect? Her memory leapt to an image of Jay, naked after an hour of love-making, scampering for cover at the sound of a passing car, carrying his crumpled clothes in his arms.

  "'Babylon by the Bay.'" Jay said. "I read it in one of your newspapers on the plane."

  "Don't worry about your reputation. It's safe with me. Good God!" She scanned the busy restaurant. "What could I do to you here?"

  Jay flashed a familiar, adolescent grin. "It's what I might do to you that worries me. You look elegant."

  Leah brushed at an imaginary wrinkle in her pearl-white blouse. "This old thing? I got it on sale last year." This time, the blood rushing up her neck had nothing to do with anger. Don't let him see you blushing like a school girl, especially not tonight. You have nothing in common any more. He's in thick with Montenegro and his crowd of bullies.

  Over coffee, they reminisced about the time they had shared in Santa Teresita, the good times and the not so good . . . their first impressions of each other . . . the earthquake . . . long days and nights in the clinic ward. They kept their sharing on safe ground. Neither spoke of love, or of that one glorious afternoon at the waterfall.

  Leah studied him. Despite being put off by his earlier concern for his priestly image, she discovered a more mature Jay than the one she had known years before. There was a new humility in his demeanor. It said, I may have had all the answers fourteen years ago, but I've learned a lot since then. The more I learn, the less I'm sure of.

  She might like this man even more than his younger version.

  Before Jay's letter arrived, Leah was sure that time and her life with Walter had thoroughly doused all passion for him. On the contrary. She had been with Jay only a few hours and already the same stirrings she always felt in his presence had reawakened like old Rip Van Winkle.

  * * *

  By the time they left Victor's, they had made a good start in filling the vacuum of years. It was as if they had parted only yesterday. Their reunion applied a healing salve to an old wound.

  Despite the warmth of their coming together, the same brambled wall separated them. Although more settled and at ease with himself, Jay was what he had always been, a priest of the Church of Rome. His chosen celibate life held him bound until death. Most significant of all, he had come with a round-trip ticket that would take him back to Santo Sangre, away from her and back to the parish duties that had once divided them--and would again. She had no desire to reenter that world.

  She also had to keep in mind the questionable nature of his mission to POCI/USA. This reality strung barbed wire atop the wall. So, she had overpowering reasons to keep Jay at a safe distance, while playing host and tour guide.

  "Good night," she said in the hallway outside his room. It was the period at the end of the last sentence in their reunion's first chapter.

  "The time's gone so quickly." Jay unlocked the door and let it swing open. "I thought we might talk some more." His eyes pleaded for a few more minutes of her evening.

  "This isn't Santa Teresita, and it's not the '70s. I have two kids at home waiting for their mother." The words came out more bitchily than Leah intended, but that was all right. She needed to take charge of this situation.

  "I understand. I'm sorry." He had a hurt, lost-puppy look that Leah found equally endearing and infuriating. "Well, thanks for picking me up."

  Leah walked to the elevator and turned. He was still watching from the doorway to his room. "I'll be in the lobby at eight-thirty sharp to pick you up. We'll go straight to my office."

  "Good night," he called, as the shiny aluminum doors sealed her off from him.

  Alone in the elevator, Leah let the back wall support her. It had been an exhausting and emotionally treacherous evening. "Let this weekend go fast," she prayed.

  20

  When Leah arrived at the St. Francis the next morning, Jay was waiting for her. Whatever conflicts might yet divide them during the course of the day ahead, she was glad to see him.

  "I've been sitting here a long time," he said. "Guess I'm kind of nervous. My meetings in Rome and Amsterdam were difficult, but this is . . . well, it's different."

  "Thanks for being honest. It is a bit awkward, isn't it?" So far, so good. If he continues to be this open, she thought, the day might not turn out so bad after all. Jay was out of uniform, in a pair of charcoal gray slacks and a long-sleeve, white pullover. "I'm glad you dressed . . . comfortably."

  Jay winced. "About my comment at dinner last night. It was uncalled for. I apologize." He gestured toward his informal attire. "You can take me anywhere you like."

  After leaving Jay last night, Leah had thought about her own reaction--or overreaction, as she finally concluded. "I should have been more sensitive. Jet travel forces us to change quickly from one culture to another."

  "Let's call it even. We can start the day with a clean slate."

  "Agreed."

  * * *

  The Flood Building on Market Street was a mini-United Nations. Many of the countries enjoying diplomatic relations with the U.S. had their consular offices there. An ideal location for POCI/USA. Leah introduced Jay to Sandy and announced, "Conference room in ten minutes. Is Phil on board?"

  "All accounted for." Sandy mouthed to her boss when Jay's back was turned, "He's gorgeous!"

  Sandy was more than Leah's secretary. She was her best friend, someone with whom Leah could be completely open--well, almost completely. Sandy knew Leah and Jay had worked together in Santo Sangre. She knew they were friends. Leah hadn't shared the more intimate details of their relationship. Everyone has at least one big secret, she decided on her wedding day. This one's mine.

  "Let's get some coffee." Leah led Jay into a small kitchenette off the corridor. "If you're ready
to talk, we're ready to listen." It was difficult not to sound as if she had already made up her mind that Jay was a minor fool on a big fool's mission.

  "Ready." It wasn't a confident "ready." More like the response of a death row prisoner to the long-dreaded midnight summons.

  Leah took her place at the head of the rectangular folding table. Jay sat to her left in front of the window. Sandy shuffled some file folders at the other end, opposite Leah, and prepared to take minutes on a lined yellow pad.

  They had just settled in when Phil Sydney entered. Phil had served as Field Organizer for POCI/USA for the past eleven months. It was his job to go out on the road to nurture struggling Cells and organize new ones, particularly on college campuses. Leah considered the former Lawrence Livermore Lab employee-turned-community-organizer a real find.

  Phil had come to her on the recommendation of Dr. Harry Morton, head of the philosophy department at Cal and a POCI/USA Advisery Board member. Harry and Leah shared an occasional night out. She liked him a lot, but not nearly as much as he liked her and wanted her to like him. But, Harry was one of those rare men contented with what they can get, even when they cannot get as much as they want.

  Phil dropped heavily into the chair at Leah's right and shoved the "World" section of the morning Chronicle in front of her. "Better look at this."

  He wasn't the usual upbeat Phil. Leah dismissed his tone as being related to their guest, not to the newspaper he had just pushed under her nose. Tucked between a photograph of a student riot in Manila and the Macy's lingerie ad was an article picked up from one of the wire services. It bore the headline, "Interpol Enters POCI Case." Leah began reading aloud, rapidly at first.

  Amsterdam police reported finding the partially clothed body of . . .

  Her pace slowed, when she reached the victim's name.

  . . . Elli Vander Hoorst, 15, floating in The Ij. She was the daughter of Prisoners of Conscience International (POCI) executive director Willie Vander Hoorst.

  Leah's voice cracked. She handed the paper back to Phil, who continued reading.

  Her throat had been cut. Medical examiners revealed that there was evidence of sexual assault. Dutch authorities have called Interpol into the case to investigate a possible link between the Vander Hoorst murder and the death in Rome the day before of Marcello Pontieri, son of Carlo Pontieri, Director of POCI/ITALY . . . .

  Leah fell back in her chair as if someone had thrust a dagger into her chest. The Vander Hoorst and Pontieri families were dear and personal friends. She shot a hateful glance at Jay, who stared straight ahead at no one. The look in his eyes revealed his thoughts were far from San Francisco. "I can't believe it!" The sounds were more like groans than words. "It's not possible!"

  "Oh, Leah!" Jay said.

  She ignored him. When he reached out to touch her arm, she recoiled. He withdrew.

  "Wretched coincidence, if it is one," Phil said.

  "Why haven't I heard anything about this before now?" Leah said.

  "Maybe you did." He produced a telegram from the patch pocket of his corduroy jacket. "This arrived just before you got here."

  Leah tore away the flap and slid the yellow insert from inside. "It's from Willie." With hands trembling, she read the message to herself.

  Was about to send sad news . . . . Carlo's son, Marcello, murdered . . . . Now I suffer terrible loss . . . My beloved Elli . . . . No apparent connection . . . . Nonetheless, advising national directors . . . take precautions.

  What can I do for my friends? Which of the typical, feeble memorial gestures would have any meaning in this situation? Every POCI employee and volunteer in the world had been raped and murdered in the flesh of the innocents, Marcello Pontieri and Elli Vander Hoorst. She chose action over the emotional paralysis that had spread through her mind and body. "I'll go to Amsterdam and Rome."

  "What about--?" Sandy nodded toward their visitor from Santo Sangre, who had retreated deep into his chair.

  What about Jay? News of the POCI children's murders had changed everything. No longer could she dismiss him as a harmless dupe on a doomed mission. Accident or design linked him to two murders involving her best friends.

  "I think you should go," Phil said. Rage contorted his face. "I can meet with Father de Córdova." He talked about Jay as if the priest were not in the same room. "I'll hear him out." His voice became bitter. "Even give him the five dollar tour, if he wants to see the city."

  Jay showed no visible reaction to the conversation swirling around him.

  "Losing Teddy or Monica would destroy me," Leah said to no one in particular. She laid the telegram on the table, as gently and lovingly as she would have laid the lifeless body of young Elli Vander Hoorst. She had to be with Willie and Carlo and their wives in their time of sorrow. That mission was more important than indulging the might-have-beens of her irretrievable past.

  But, what about Jay? Either he's genuinely shocked, or he's one hell of an actor. She gave him the benefit of the doubt, for the moment. That meant she couldn't just walk out, leaving him alone in a sterile hotel room to deal with whatever he was going through. I owe him more than that.

  Slowly, Leah recovered from the initial blow. Her mind sputtered to life and began to function again. "Thanks for the offer, Phil. I don't have to leave today."

  She turned to Jay. During the discussion of the twin tragedies, he had become the invisible man the room. He looked like a kid condemned to be a perpetual outsider when he wanted desperately to be part of the insider group. "We just can't deal with Montenegro right now. I'm sorry. I hope you understand."

  "Yes," he whispered.

  "When do you leave San Francisco?"

  "Sunday at noon."

  "I'll get a plane out Sunday night." Leah's voice was dull as a butter knife, her mouth tight from holding back the dam straining to burst within her. "Sandy, make reservations for me to fly to Amsterdam. Get me an open ticket from there to Rome and back here. On second thought, make it three. I'm taking Teddy and Monica with me. Charge it on my TWA card."

  "Sure." Sandy's eyes swam in a pool of unshed tears.

  Jay stirred in his seat. His eyes flashed at Leah. His lips parted, but no sound came out.

  "Yes?" Leah said, inviting his comment on the proceedings.

  He slumped back in his chair. "Later. I'll tell you later."

  Sandy's normally placid oval features stretched tight across her forehead and cheeks. Her colorless lips narrowed. "Oh, Leah, it's terrible. What do you make of it?"

  "Make of it?" Leah said, her voice raspy and high pitched. "What's to make of it?"

  Sandy didn't always find it easy to put her thoughts into words. She took her time responding. "Guess I'm not much of a believer in coincidence."

  Leah read the last paragraph of the Chron article, about the Interpol investigation of a possible conspiracy in the two deaths.

  Authorities found identical religious medallions depicting an angel with a sword of flame in a pocket of each victim's clothing.

  "I'm right!" Sandy looked ill. "I don't want to be, but I am."

  "Willie suggests taking precautions. What's there to do? I wouldn't know where to begin--any more than he or Carlo did. I can't let myself get paranoid." By now, Leah had hoped to know where Jay stood in relation to POCI and the government of Santo Sangre. The Chronicle story prevented her from clearing up that mystery. Whether he was on her side or not, intuition told her she wasn't in danger from him, at least not directly. It had to be a terrible coincidence that he had just come from visiting her two colleagues in Europe.

  She decided to keep Jay with her. She needed fresh air and space to breathe freely, to think and plan and mourn and worry. Instead of returning to her car, she hustled him into a cab in front of her building.

  "Fisherman's Wharf," she told the driver.

  * * *

  The air at bay's edge was pure, swift, and nicely chilled, like a bottle of Napa Valley white. It slapped at them, col
oring their cheeks. Although rolls of fog draped the Golden Gate, the broad inner bay played in late-morning sunshine. A setting for fall honeymooners, Leah thought, and fall mourners. In contrast to the bustle and excitement of the Wharf's environment, Leah's mood was leaden and distant. They walked for over an hour in almost total silence, lost in their separate struggles to deal with the morning's news.

  Leah was glad to have Jay with her, though she refused to let him share her grief. When their legs gave out, they sought refuge in the Franciscan Restaurant. After their waiter had presented their meals and departed, they picked indifferently at twin Caesar salads. Overnight, the reminiscing chit-chat, the catching up on old times, had vanished. While waiting for their coffee, Jay stared vacantly at Alcatraz, the Rock, symbol of the isolation that numbed Leah's soul.

  Leah needed Jay to declare himself. She had to know where he fit into her suddenly complex and confusing universe, if he did. "Say anything, but please say something!"

  His features evolved into grave concern, cast in plaster. When he made no response, she grew even more irritated. She could handle any reaction or explanation. She wasn't prepared to deal with a catatonic. He looked at her, started to speak, but slumped again into his chair, with a shrug and a barely audible groan. He looked physically ill.

  Leah gave up. She left Jay to his time of personal reflection, mourning, triumph, or whatever was going on inside him, although nothing in his body language spoke of pleasure at what had transpired. Were you involved in a plot to kill the Pontieri and Vander Hoorst children? she wanted to ask. Are you having second thoughts and tearing yourself apart with remorse? She had to know if Jay had prostituted himself, his ministry, and his former integrity for Montenegro's favor, gold, or whatever ecclesiastical reward they had dangled in front of him? If you have, the Jay de Córdova I once knew no longer exists.

  "Take precautions," Willie advised. Dealing with Jay had to be her first. She watched every movement of his eyes, the slightest twitch of his facial muscles. I'm assuming you're involved in this mess, at least until you prove you're not. The frown on his high forehead furrowed deeper and deeper. Why did you come back into my life? Willie and Carlo and their families were like her own flesh and blood. Whatever internal conflict you're suffering, pal, you can never match the grief and pain I feel.