The first thing Rector Bates does when I step into the office is to hit me in the face. He knocks me down, stands over me until I scramble out from under him and stand up again.
“You bastard,” he says. Then he goes and sits down and holds his head in his hands.
When he lifts his head he looks all around the room, seems unwilling to meet my gaze.
“I’ve been a fool,” he says. “I never should have believed you.”
“I thought the Spirit told you to believe.”
“I heard what I wanted to hear. You’ve used me all along, Fochs,” he says.
“Have I?”
“Your babysitter called me,” he says. “I went over and saw her. Jesus, what you did to her, Fochs.”
“She’s lying,” I say.
“She’s not lying,” he says. “She’s a twenty-year-old woman,” he says. “She has no reason to lie. And those kids,” he says. “They weren’t lying either. The only liar is you.”
“I never lied.”
“You should hang for what you did,” he says. “At the very least you should spend the rest of your life in jail. All those people who trusted you.”
I start to protest. He raises his hand, stops me.
“You won’t go to jail,” he says. “The woman has agreed not to press charges. Besides, it would be too damaging for us. We’ve invested ourselves too thoroughly in this.”
It seems to me that it is less in their interest to cover it up, but I am not in a position where I would care to say so. Instead, I smile.
“What are you smiling about?” he asks.
“Nothing,” I say.
“If it was my choice,” he says. Then he stands, paces rapidly, sits down again. He leans forward, places his palms on the desk. “I must respect the wishes of my spiritual betters,” he says.
“Whose choice is it?”
“I can’t say,” he says. “My burden in this is to be obedient.”
I just nod.
“Go home,” he says. “Get out of here. Get out of my sight.”
So I leave. So I go home.
In a few days my daughter begins to trust me again. The next time I am gentler with her. I am still provost, I still go to church every Sunday, nothing having changed except I have been forbidden by my area rector to conduct private interviews with the youth.
Still, I get a few in. An interview with the Bavens boy, for instance. He proves a good pupil, better than I would have suspected.
It goes on for a month maybe, the area rector not speaking to me at all. I have free run of the youth. My daughter and I become closer. God loves me.
Rector Bates calls me into his office again. This time he is at least civil.
“Things have been arranged, Fochs,” he says. “I don’t like it, but it’s not my place to complain.”
“Arranged?”
“Don’t ask me who,” he says. “I can’t tell you that.” He leans across the desk. “You are moving,” he says.
“Moving?”
“You’ve been given a job,” he says. “I’m not sure who has agreed to it or how many general authorities know. I know at least one does. And I respect him.”
“What do you mean, moving?”
“They’ve arranged a job for you. At the Church College. You’ll be teaching accounting. Any hint of nonsense and you’re through.”
I put up a show of resistance. “What if I don’t like it?”
“It doesn’t matter,” he says. “You’ll do it.”
“And if I don’t?”
“Then you’re on your own.”
I reach across the desk and shake his hand. He takes it reluctantly.
After a few minutes, I walk out of the office, whistling. I am a free man, and pure. I am on my way home to celebrate with my daughter. I have been forgiven. We are allowed to begin again, with new souls to save. We are all of us about to be reborn.