Wednesday, August 17
At ten minutes to nine in the morning, Michelle Demaillot, of the Sanctuaries Press Bureau, was briskly leading the way across the Rosary Esplanade of the domain to the Medical Bureau. Following her were the town's latest arrivals, Dr. Paul Kleinberg, and his dependable nurse, Esther Levinson.
It was Kleinberg's first real view of any portion of Lourdes in the daylight. Despite the sight of so much religious statuary, the number of invalids in wheelchairs and stretchers, and his misgivings about the shrine, he had to admit that the parade ground, or whatever it was supposed to be, offered up an aura of pastoral peace and serenity on this sunny summer's day.
Dr. Kleinberg and his nurse had caught the last Air Inter flight from Paris late yesterday, and when they had left the plane at the Lourdes airport it had already been nightfall. The press lady, with her car, had been waiting. During the short drive to their accommodations, Kleinberg, who had come straight from his Paris office to Orly Airport to this Pyrenees village, had been too exhausted to bother to glance out the car window as they had passed through Lourdes. At the Hotel Astoria, in the Rue de la Grotte, ordinary single rooms had been reserved for them. After telephoning his wife, Alice, in Neuilly, to tell her and the boys that he had arrived safely and to let her have the number where he might be reached, he had gone straight to bed and slept without a break for nine hours.
Now, as they walked, Kleinberg noticed how rigid and aloof his nurse was. Knowing her, the orphaned daughter of German parents gassed and cremated in the Nazi holocaust, he knew how uncomfortable she was when confronted by any sort of fanaticism, political or religious. Kleinberg felt no similar discomfort in these surroundings. His parents had moved from Vienna to Paris long before the rise of Hitler, and had become naturalized French citizens. He himself had been born a Frenchman, and despite a persistent degree of muted anti-Semitism among a minority in France, Kleinberg felt that he belonged and was a part of this land. His knowledge of French culture was broad, although his acquaintance with the Catholic shrine at Lourdes was limited. He had read about Bernadette and the apparitions and the grotto from time to time in newspapers and magazines, and also had read with mild interest about the occasional cures attributed to Lourdes.
Besides such casual reading, Kleinberg's only knowledge of the holy town had come from his careful perusal of three books involving Dr. Alexis Carrel—one of the books was about Carrel, two written by him—each going into the great physician's one visit to Lourdes in 1903. Kleinberg had acquired and read the Carrel books after he had been invited to join the International Medical Committee of Lourdes, which was assembling in Paris to review and ascertain the so-called miraculous cure of an Englishwoman, Mrs. Edith Moore, suffering from a sarcoma.
Kleinberg had been unable to assist the committee because of a previously scheduled medical meeting in London, but upon his return to Paris the Lourdes people had contacted him again. The members of the International Medical Committee had been favorably disposed toward granting Mrs. Moore's case miraculous status, but had withheld their final approval until they could have the vote of a specialist in sarcoma. Kleinberg was one of the two foremost specialists in France treating malignant growths. The other, Dr. Maurice Duval, whom Kleinberg knew and respected, had been too involved in experimental researches to cooperate. So there was only Kleinberg to bring in as a final consultant, and he had been reluctant to become involved in anything of a religious nature. Yet, learning that Dr. Alexis Carrel had once visited and investigated Lourdes, Kleinberg had given the matter some second thoughts. As a student at the Cochin School of Medicine, attached to the University of Paris, Kleinberg had admired the writings and career of Dr. Carrel. Kleinberg recalled that the scientist had kept an open mind about Lourdes and spent some time there. Kleinberg reread Dr. Carrel, and verified his student recollections. The great Carrel had, indeed, treated Lourdes seriously.
So Paul Kleinberg had agreed to accept the invitation of the International Committee, and go to Lourdes to review the incredible cure of the woman named Edith Moore.
"Here we are," he heard Mademoiselle Demaillot announce.
Where were they? Kleinberg stopped, and looked about to orient himself. They were on a sidewalk on the opposite side of the Rosary Esplanade. They were at the double doors of the entrance to a building made up of rugged large stone blocks. Above the entry, white lettering on a blue sign, were the words: MEDICAL BUREAU/SECRETARIAT.
"Let me take you inside," the press lady was saying. "I'll introduce you to the bureau head, Dr. Berryer, then leave you with him."
Kleinberg and Esther followed Mademoiselle Demaillot inside and found themselves in a spacious anteroom, with two office doors on the right. The press lady gestured off to the second door. "Let me tell Dr. Berryer's secretary you've arrived."
After the press lady had disappeared into the office, Kleinberg and Esther took their bearings. The walls of the anteroom were decorated with what resembled the artifacts of a medical museum. After a quick glance, Esther avoided a closer look at the artifacts, and immediately occupied the corner of a sofa, sitting tight-lipped, eyes on the floor. But Kleinberg was more interested. He began to go around the anteroom, studying the displays.
The large display on the nearest wall was a framed, glass case and bore the name DE RUDDER at the top. Closer inspection of the glass case revealed two copper casts of a man's leg bones, one showing the tibia seriously broken, the other showing it fully healed. Kleinberg read the explanatory legend. Pierre de Rudder, of Jabbeke, Belgium, had fallen from a tree in 1867, and in the fall had broken the tibia in his lower left leg. The bone had a three-centimeter separation or gap at the fracture point, and would not heal. For eight years, de Rudder had been a cripple. Then, after a visit to a replica of the Lourdes grotto in Belgium, de Rudder had been instantly and miraculously cured, his sundered bone totally put together again. After his death, twenty-three years later, three doctors had performed an autopsy on de Rudder. They had found that the three-centimeter gap had, indeed, closed. "The broken bone edges fitted closely. The bone preserves a very obvious mark of the fracture, but without any foreshortening," De Rudder had been declared Lourdes' eighth official miracle cure in 1908.
Kleinberg wrinkled, his nose, and saw his unconscious reaction reflected in the glass of the case, and assessed that his reaction was more of surprise than of doubt.
Since their escort had not yet reappeared, Kleinberg continued to wander around the anteroom, studying the framed photographs on the three walls, and the printed histories of most of the officially recognized miraculous cures of invalids who had sought help from the Lourdes shrine. The earliest was dated 1858. The last one framed and hung was a picture of Serge Perrin, who had suffered "recurring organic hemiphiegia, with ocular lesions, due to cerebral circulatory defects." He had been miraculously and fully cured at the age of forty-one in 1970, and his miracle cure officially recognized in 1978. Kleinberg knew there had been more cures since then, but perhaps the Medical Bureau had not yet had time to mount them.
Kleinberg heard his name called, and wheeled around.
The press lady was advancing toward him. "Dr. Kleinberg, it appears that Dr. Berryer will be a little late for your appointment. There is a message, and I contacted him by phone at his meeting, and he promises he will be here in ten or fifteen minutes, and offers his apologies."
"No matter," said Kleinberg.
"Maybe you'd prefer to wait in his private office? I'll show Madame Levinson to the examination and X-ray rooms, where you'll find her after your interview. Then I must leave you both."
"Thank you, Mademoiselle Demaillot."
He allowed her to show him into Dr. Berryer's office, and watched her leave. Once he was alone, he set down his medical bag, and again tried to get his bearings. It surprised him to see how small and Spartan was Dr. Berryer's office. No more than eight feet by eight feet, with a desk and chair in the middle, two chairs for visitors, a crammed bookcase. All neat, no disarray. Kleinberg noticed a mirror, and planted himself before it to see if he was presentable. He frowned at the brown receding hairline, at the smallish hooked nose made more prominent by the sunken cheeks. The bags under his eyes had been earned, and were all right, and his sharp chin was still one chin at forty-one. He straightened his knit tie, squared his narrow shoulders, and decided that he was as presentable as he would ever be.
He took a chair to await his tardy host, and realized a feeling of unease, which he had not felt outdoors. It was the displays in the anteroom that had thrown him off a trifle, all those miracles all so unscientific and alien to his nature. He wondered how one like Dr. Alexis Carrel had coped with it.
Dr. Carrel had been severely criticized by fellow scientists for deigning to pay attention to a religious center that claimed miracles and for having confessed that he might have actually witnessed a miracle himself. Carrel's colleagues in science—persons who had once respected him as a member of the faculty of medicine at Lyons University—turned against him for having given credence to Lourdes by visiting it and by having given serious consideration to the inexplicable cures that were going on there. Carrel's colleagues condemned him as "a credulous pietist."
Dr. Carrel had defended his interest in the so-called miracles in the press: "These extraordinary phenomena are of great biological, as well as religious, interest. I consider, therefore, that any campaign against the miracles of Lourdes is unjustified and opposed to the progress of medical science in one of its most important aspects."
Actually, rereading the controversy so many years later, Kleinberg could see that Carrel had been uncertain about the cures at Lourdes and had incurred the anger of the clerical community just as he had provoked the scientific community. For one thing, Carrel had been unhappy about the Medical Bureau. "There is a rosary on the examining table, but no medical tools." Carrel had been equally unhappy about one of Dr. Berryer's predecessors, Dr. Boissarie, who had published best sellers about his medical study of the cures. "He has written these works as if he were a priest rather than a physician," Carrel had complained. "He has indulged in pious consideration rather than scientific observations. He has shunned rigorous analyses and precise deductions."
But the sudden—miraculous?—cure of a French girl, Marie Bailly, swept most of his reservations aside. He had tried to defend what he had witnessed before the scientific community: "At the risk of shocking both believers and nonbelievers, we shall not discuss the question of belief. Rather, we shall say that it makes little difference whether Bernadette was a case of hysteria, a myth, or a madwoman . . . . The only thing that matters is to look at the facts; they can be investigated scientifically; they exist in a realm quite outside of metaphysical interpretation . . . . Science, of course, must be continually on guard against charlatanism and credulousness. But it is also the duty of science not to reject things simply because they appear extraordinary or because science is powerless to explain them."
This from the man who had become a giant at the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research, who had won the Nobel Prize in 1912 for suturing blood vessels, who had experimented in 1935 with an artificial heart designed by Charles Lindbergh.
Sitting there in the stillness of Dr. Berryer's office in the Medical Bureau, Kleinberg closed his eyes. Do not reject things simply because they appear extraordinary. Dr. Carrel's own words. At once, Kleinberg felt more relaxed, less disturbed about the miracles heralded in the anteroom and by his very presence in the playground of the Virgin Mary and the site where he was to reaffirm the miraculous cure of a woman named Edith Moore.
Kleinberg heard the office doorknob turn, and came to his feet as a preoccupied, squarish older man barged into the room.
"Dr. Kleinberg?" the man said, offering a handclasp. "I'm Dr. Berryer, and pleased to meet you. Forgive the delay, but bureaucratic matters can often take more of one's time than medicine."
"No need to apologize," said Dr. Kleinberg affably. "I'm delighted to be here."
"Do sit down," said Dr. Berryer, going around his desk and standing over it to review the various messages waiting for him.
Kleinberg sat down again, and waited as the head of the Medical Bureau swept his messages into a corner, and settled into his swivel chair.
"So glad you could make it," said Dr. Berryer, "knowing how busy you must be."
"I repeat, I'm delighted."
"Is this your first visit to Lourdes?"
"I'm afraid so."
"Well, the Moore examination today shouldn't take up much of your time. You'll be able to have a look around. Do you know anything about Lourdes?"
"Very little, a layman's knowledge," said Kleinberg. "I've seen a few articles on it. Of course, I read the International Committee's summary report on Mrs. Moore. And I've read Dr. Alexis Carrel's memoir on his visit here."
"Ah, poor Carrel," said Dr. Berryer with a forced smile. "For the rest of his life, after leaving here, he waffled between belief and disbelief at what he had seen."
"Understandable, for a man of science."
"I, for one, have never had trouble reconciling religion and science," said Dr. Berryer. "Pasteur had no problem about that. Neither did Einstein. At any rate—" He had folded one hand across the other on top of his desk. "—since there is a little time before Mrs. Moore arrives and you are occupied with her, perhaps I can bore you with a brief fill-in on how we work here—medically . . . that is, scientifically—so that you will feel more at home."
"I'd be pleased to learn what I can."
"Let me give you a bit of background on the process you are specifically involved in, the process of ascertaining cures," said Dr. Berryer. "You are acquainted with this process?"
"Only vaguely," said Kleiuberg. "It would be interesting to know more."
"Very well. Briefly then. To give you a better understanding of why we summoned you in the case of Edith Moore and her sudden cure."
"Her miracle cure," said Kleinberg, with a friendly-curl of his lips.
Dr. Berryer's eyes, almost sunk behind the puffy cheeks, fixed on his visitor. His tone became less conversational, more pedagogical. "I am not here to define a cure in Lourdes as miraculous. As a doctor, I can merely define such a cure as unusual. It is for the Church to decide if any cure is related to a divine intervention, one that can be recognized as a sign of God. Our doctors affirm that a healing is inexplicable in the realm of science. Our clergymen confirm it can be explained as the work of God. In the Medical Bureau, those are the ground rules."
"I understand."
"The Church has always been less generous than our doctors in its claims. From the time of Bernadette to this day, the Church has claimed less than seventy cures to have been genuinely miraculous. But our doctors, even after rigorous examinations, have been more generous in announcing unusual cures. There have been about five thousand confirmed cures to date. About sixty times more cures than miracles.
"Why all have not qualified as miracles I cannot say. The clergy has its own standards. While millions and millions of visitors have come to Lourdes since 1858, most have been pilgrims seeking spiritual comfort or tourists wishing to satisfy their curiosity. The number of actual invalids who arrive each year represents a small minority. The statistics break down as follows—about one medical cure for every five hundred patients who arrive here, and about one miracle for every thirty thousand patients who show themselves."
Listening, Kleinberg realized that Dr. Berryer's voice had flattened out, lost its inflections, settled into a lecture given many times over.
"Now as to the criteria governing a cure," Dr. Berryer went on. "The illness must be serious, inevitable, incurable. The illness must also be organic, not functional. An organic illness involves a lesion at the organic level, whereas a functional illness—"
Mildly annoyed, Dr. Kleinberg interrupted. He was being treated to a layman's lecture, and not as a medical colleague. "I am acquainted with your criteria, doctor," he broke in.
Momentarily thrown off his verbal rut, Dr. Berryer stammered slightly. "Ah, yes—yes, of course—well, now—Mrs. Moore's hip sarcoma—an organic illness, certainly, and a permanent cure. The last hip sarcoma cure we had, before Mrs. Moore's, dates back to 1963. I have no doubt—and certainly as a specialist in this area, you will agree—that the cure of such sarcoma will be less unusual in the future, as medicine progresses."
Kleinberg nodded. "Great advances are being made already. Dr. Duval in Paris has conducted successful experiments on animals to arrest and cure sarcoma medically."
"Exactly, Dr. Kleinberg. At one time, medicine could not deal with tuberculosis. But today, there are medical means to treat tuberculosis, and so that is one serious illness which depends less on the grotto. But in the present state of science, many sufferers continue to look to the grotto, to prayers, the water, as a means of recovery. Edith Moore, afflicted by hip sarcoma, was such a one." He paused. "You know how she was cured by a visit to the baths during her second visit here? You know her instantaneous cure was confirmed by sixteen physicians, both in London and in Lourdes."
"I do."
"Now as to the process that followed. First, the Medical Bureau here. In the beginning there was no Medical Bureau. There was Dr. Dozous, assisted by Professor Vergez of Montpellier, to sift all claims of cures. There were twelve cases considered, and seven of these were determined by Bishop Laurence's canonical commission in 1862 to be cures that could be attributed to the work of God. The word miracle was not then in use for such cases. After that, as visitors to Lourdes increased, as more patients claimed cures, something had to be done. Dr. Saint-Maclou, who had settled here, established a reception center for visiting doctors to inspect evidence of cures. That was in 1874 and the center was called the Office of Medical Verifications. Gradually, the Verifications Office was enlarged to the present-day Medical Bureau. Shortly after 1947, the National Medical Committee was established and in 1954 this became the International Medical Committee, the one you were invited to sit in on earlier this year."
"And the International Medical Committee has the last word?"
"Medically speaking, yes. The process goes as follows—our Medical Bureau in Lourdes confirms a cure, and then passes the dossier on to the International Committee. There are about thirty members on the committee, physicians from ten different countries, all appointed by the bishop of Tarbes and Lourdes, and they meet for one day a year, as they recently did. During the most recent meeting, the dossier of Edith Moore was presented. The member doctors discussed it at length. A vote was taken, with a two-thirds vote usually enough for approval. After that, the dossier was returned to the bishop of Tarbes and Lourdes. Since Mrs. Moore's diocese was in London, the approved dossier was sent to the bishop of London. He, in turn, appointed a canonical commission to judge if Mrs. Moore's cure was miraculous. As you know, Mrs. Moore's cure was approved by all hands—"
"Yes."
"—but it was not officially announced because the International Committee did not have a sarcoma specialist at their meeting. You were invited, but you were away. Dr. Duval was invited, but he was occupied with his experiments. The International Committee then cast its favorable vote subject to your confirming its judgment. Rather than convene the committee again, it was agreed that if you came to Lourdes and saw Mrs. Moore in person, then the official announcement could be made."
"Well, here I am, ready, willing, and able," said Kleinberg.
Dr. Berryer considered the white digital dock on his desk. "I made an appointment for Edith Moore to meet with you. She should be in the examining room in about a half hour." He stood up. "I know you've studied the report on the case, but that was a summary, and you may prefer to see the diagnosis of each doctor involved."
"That would be useful," said Kleinberg, rising while Dr. Berryer went to the bookcase and removed a handful of manila file folders.
"I'll take you to the examining room, and leave these with you. You'll have time enough to browse through them before your patient arrives."
Kleinberg followed Dr. Berryer out of the office to the examining room. In the undecorated room, between the leather examining table and a wooden cabinet against the wall containing medical instruments, Esther Levinson sat in a chair, leafing through a French magazine. As they entered, she came to her feet, and Kleinberg introduced his nurse to the head of the Medical Bureau.
Inside the door, Dr. Berryer handed the layer of folders over to Kleinberg.
"For your reading pleasure," he said. "When you've confirmed the reports, please let me know."
"I certainly will."
Dr. Berryer had his hand on the knob of the open door, about to leave, when he hesitated and turned back.
He stared at the folders in Kleinberg's hand and then fixed his gaze on Kleinberg himself. Dr. Berryer gave a short cough. "You understand the importance of this case, doctor. Father Ruland, who represents the bishop and the Vatican itself here in Lourdes, thinks it would be of great value to be able to make the announcement of Mrs. Moore's miraculous cure during this exciting Reappearance Time—a confirmed miracle—a lovely present to welcome the return of the Blessed Virgin. So—" He hesitated once more. "Uh, I trust you will judge the reports in your hand—rather open and shut, I would say—entirely on their scientific merit."
Kleinberg's eyebrows went up. "But how else would I possibly judge them?"
Without blinking, Dr. Berryer said, 'Well, whatever we say, we are dealing with what my church agrees is a miracle cure. And—I do know that people of your persuasion don't have much belief in miracles. Anyway, I am sure you will adhere to the facts."
With that, he left the room, closing the door between them.
Dr. Kleinberg's face had darkened as he glowered at the door. "People of your persuasion," he mimicked. "Did you hear that, Esther?"
He turned around to see Esther's features flushed. "I heard," she said. "Maybe you should have told him that someone else of your persuasion, a man named Moses, was involved in a few miracles."
"Never mind. Who gives a damn about a narrow-minded country lout like Berryer? Let's look over these reports, see our Mrs. Moore, and get out of here as soon as we can."
Then, minutes later, as an afterthought, Kleinberg tried to forgive Berryer slightly, remembering that Dr. Alexis Carrel, while not a bigot, had been an Aryan-lover and a race supremacist as well.
An hour and a half had passed, and Dr. Paul Kleinberg was still seated in the examining room alone, once more studying the before-and-after medical reports on Edith Moore's malignant tumor while she was finishing her new work-up and X rays next door.
Fascinated, Kleinberg studied the diagnostic reports on Mrs. Moore's osteosarcoma of the left ilium. It was all there in the seemingly countless microphotographs, the blood tests, the biopsies, the X rays. There was the destructive sarcoma—and then it wasn't there, a total disappearance of the infiltration of the marrow, and reconstruction of the bone elements.
Definitely amazing. In his years of practice, Kleinberg had never seen self-cure such as this one.
Absolutely miraculous—even to a person of his persuasion.
He laid aside the evidence, pleased for the nice, dull English lady. Well, there was nothing left, except for the latest examination and a final new set of X rays and then he would be done. He would be able to confirm to Dr. Berryer and the clergyman called Father Ruland that God was on their side, after all, and that they could announce their miracle with fanfare to the entire world. With that publicity, and the presumed return of the Virgin Mary to Lourdes, they would have not five million faithful pouring into Lourdes next year, but six or seven million, at least.
The door opened, and Kleinberg came to his feet as Mrs. Moore entered, pushing her belt through a last loop on the waistband of her skirt and fastening the buckle.
"All done, and I'll bet you're glad," said Kleinberg, not knowing what else to say to a miracle recipient.
"I'm pleased it's over with," she said with a happy heave and a sigh. Her bland countenance had color in it and she was definitely repressing considerable inner emotion. "Miss Levinson told me to tell you she'll have all the X-rays for you in five or ten minutes."
"Good. I'll just have a look, and then I'll inform Dr. Berryer and prepare my final report. You needn't wait around any longer. I'm sure the Medical Bureau will be in immediate touch with you. Thank you, Mrs. Moore, for enduring all this discomfort one last time."
She took her summer jacket off a wall hanger. "My pleasure, believe me. I appreciate everything. Good-bye, Dr. Kleinberg."
Esther Levinson arrived with the fresh X-rays, turned on the lights in the view box on the wall and pinned up the four X-rays for his scrutiny. Kleinberg rose, and with a practiced eye he studied the negatives, while Esther hovered nearby awaiting his approval.
"Umm, this one," Kleinberg said pointing to the third negative, "it's a bad shot, unclear, somewhat blurred. She must have moved."
"She did not move at all," Esther countered. "She's very professional. She's been through a million X-rays. Mrs. Moore was in position, perfectly rigid."
"Well, I don't know—" Kleinberg murmured. "Tell you what. Remove all of the negatives except this poor one. Pin up two of the other X-rays, the previous ones, taken of this area of the iliac bone after her cure. You'll find them in the dated folders."
As his nurse went to rummage through the folders, Kleinberg continued to inspect the new x rays. Presently, Esther was beside him, taking down three of the negatives and replacing them with previous shots for comparative purposes.
When she had finished, and stepped aside, Kleinberg bent closer to the illuminated X-rays. He studied them in silence, clucking his tongue several times.
Straightening his back at last, he said, "I'm sure it's all right, but I'd still like to get a better picture from this particular angle. Maybe I'm being too much of a perfectionist, but when you're dealing with a so-called miracle, you want to see the results of the miracle one final time."
"We can shoot her again, if that's what you wish."
Kleinberg nodded. "That's what I wish, Esther. Just to do it right. We'll get a better picture, and then we can honestly crown our patient as a miracle woman. Tell you what. Go and see Berryer's secretary. She'll know where to locate our patient. Have her call Mrs. Moore and bring her back for another X-ray at two o'clock. Will you do that?"
"On my way," said Esther.
"I'll meet you in the anteroom in a few minutes. Let's take a look at the town, and I'll treat you to lunch. Then we'll come back and finish with Mrs. Moore and head for Paris. How's that?"
"That's great," said Esther with a rare smile.
Mikel Hurtado awakened with a start. Something had brushed his cheek, touched his lips, and startled him out of a deep sleep. When he opened his eyes, he saw that it was Natale kneeling over him, kissing him a third time.
Reaching for her, to bring her closer, he saw that she instinctively knew that he would do so, and had pulled away. She retreated to her side of the bed, feeling her way to the far edge, groping for her dark glasses on the bedside table. When she found the glasses, and had slipped them on, she swung off the bed and stood up.
"Are you up, Mikel?" she called.
"You bet I'm up."
"I just wanted to be sure, because I wanted to tell you—I love you."
He was sitting now, staring at her. She presented an incongruous sight. She was totally nude from her head to her knees—the rest hidden by the bed—her firm, unblemished being seemed to glow. And she was wearing sunglasses.
"I love you, too," he said softly.
She was groping and finding a fresh brassiere and panty briefs on the chair. "You are the most marvelous lover on earth," she said.
"How would you know?" he asked chidingly.
"I just know," she replied. "I know how I enjoyed you. I know when I'm happy."
The sight of her jiggling breasts and brown nipples, the navel in her flat belly, the triangle of pubic hair between the generous thighs, was beginning to arouse him. "Natale, come back to bed."
"Oh, I want to my darling, but I can't, not yet. Later, but not now. First things first—"
"What comes before us?"
"Mikel, I've got to bathe and dress and go to the grotto to pray. What time is it?"
He picked up his watch. "Just past ten-thirty, morning."
"I'll have to hurry. Rosa takes me to the grotto at eleven-fifteen every day."
"Rosa?"
"She's that friend of my family in Rome who comes to Lourdes every summer as a handmaid. She's been taking care of me."
That instant, Hurtado remembered what had last been on his mind before falling asleep.
First things first. He, too, had a priority and an idea of how to pull it off.
"I'll take you to the grotto," he said. "Let's go together."
"I'd like to but—Mikel, what about the police? Maybe you should stay away from them or go out of town."
"The police," he said. "They're mistaken. I should tell you what's going on." He couldn't tell her the truth, that he was here to destroy what meant so much to her. Yet, he rationalized, she didn't need the grotto to achieve her hopes. She had faith. That was enough. Nor need she ever know his role in what was soon to happen. He was prepared to make up some fanciful story for her, a mistake in identity, a false lead from an enemy, something. "Let me explain—"
"You don't have to explain anything to me," she said firmly. "I told you that before. I don't need it. I trust you. You still want to take me to the grotto? You think it's safe?"
"Of course it is. Yesterday I didn't want to be questioned in my room. But it's safe now." And he believed it was. He was positive that whatever Lopez had done, he had not given the Lourdes police a description of the terrorist. Obviously, Lopez wanted to frighten him off, not get him caught.
"Then we'll go. We can leave Rosa a note on the door—"
"I can write it for you."
"Yes. Write, 'Dear Rosa, a friend has taken me to the grotto. You can find me there. Natale.' Now I'd better have my bath and dress."
He watched her making her way to the bathroom.
First things first, he reminded himself.
"Natale, is there anything else I can do for you? I see your flight bag, your carry-on, sitting on the table. There are some plastic bottles and a candle in front of it. Are they going to the grotto?"
She was at the bathroom door. "Yes, I meant to pack them in the flight bag. I want to light my candle. And fill the bottles with water to take back to my relatives."
His heart skipped. "I'd be glad to pack them."
"Would you?"
"Right away. Write a note to Rosa, and pack your flight bag. Have I got it all?"
"And love me," she said lightly, and she closed herself in the bathroom.
Tempted as he was to go after her, carry her back to the bed, love her as he had never loved anyone before, he restrained himself.
After he heard the tub water running, he crawled out of bed. He scribbled the note to leave behind for the woman named Rosa. He knelt, pulled his suitcase out from under the bed, and unlocked it. Tenderly, he lifted the packages containing the sticks of dynamite, detonator, timepiece, wiring and carried them to the table. As he had planned—rather hoped was possible—he laid his wrapped explosives inside Natale's flight bag. Then, he stuffed in a folded shopping bag, and he covered his packages with her large candle and plastic bottles. He drew the zipper on the flight bag.
He was waiting, smoking, when she emerged, clad in her brassiere and panties. He intercepted her on the way to the closet, to embrace and kiss her fervently.
"Oh, Mikel, I want you so," she breathed, but drew away. "Later. After. I'd better get dressed."
"Later," he agreed. "I'd better get ready, too."
He sought his travel kit in the suitcase and brought it into the bathroom. After brushing his teeth, he shaved, then quickly bathed, dried himself, combed his hair, and dressed.
"Ready, Mikel?" he heard her call.
"Be right with you."
In seconds he emerged, and saw her fumbling at the table. He snatched up the packed bag before she reached it. "I have your bag," he said. "And I have the note for Rosa." With his free hand, he took her arm. "Now, to the grotto," he said.
Ten minutes later, as they neared the ramp leading to the domain, Hurtado had his plan formulated.
The police had their cordon across the top of the ramp, again, and they were stopping only the pilgrims and tourists carrying anything, and were searching through each package or bag before passing the visitors through.
Crossing the street, Hurtado said to Natale, "We'll have to get in line here and go through a police inspection."
"Will it be all right?" Natale whispered.
"No problem," he said.
He hoped.
They were inching ahead, and getting close to two of the policemen. This was the moment to make his move as he had planned it.
He took Natale's arm once more. "Querida, do you mind if I leave you for a few seconds? I forgot my cigarettes—and even if they don't like smoking down there—I'd feel better to have a pack handy. Here, you take your bag for the moment. I'll run across the street to the café. Catch up with you along the ramp." He handed her the bag. "You've got just ten steps to take before you reach the police."
"All right, Mikel," she said, grasping the handle of the flight bag.
Quickly, he stepped away from her, and retreated to the back of the line of visitors, making sure to fall in where he had a full view of the police inspection. If something went wrong, he wasn't certain what he'd be able to do for her. But he felt nothing would go wrong. Police, like most authorities, had a weakness for a number of human afflictions.
He craned his neck to keep Natale in view, and then he saw her standing with the bag before two uniformed policemen. He saw her hand groping in front of her, trying to find out if she had arrived at the police guards. He saw the two policemen observing her, looking down at her bag, then up at her face. He saw one policeman make a gesture toward his eyes, plainly indicating that she was blind. He saw the other policeman nod understandingly, and put his hand on Natale's shoulder, sending her on her way down the ramp uninspected.
Hurtado exhaled, and breathed easily once more.
In a few minutes, he was before the officers, empty-handed. They glanced at him, and one waved him through. Despite the pebble in his shoe, and the limp that resulted, Hurtado went swiftly down the ramp, and near the bottom he caught up with Natale.
"Here I am," he said. He took the flight bag from her. "Everything all right?"
"Thanks for taking the bag," she said. "I didn't know it would be so heavy."
"My fault," he said cheerfully. "I stuffed a camera and a pair of large binoculars under your things. Wanted to get a picture and close-up view of the domain area from a distance. Natale, one day you'll be able to look through both of them yourself."
"If the Blessed Virgin takes notice of my prayer," she said uncertainly. "Anyway, you must tell me what you see."
"I will," he promised.
Now that they had managed to get his explosives through, he felt elated. He was closer to his goal and success. Guiding Natale toward the grotto, he saw that it was swarming with worshippers. There were even police spotted about. He would be able to ascend the hill next to the grotto and secret the explosives, of that he was sure, but setting the explosives in place behind the statue of the Virgin Mary, and wiring it to the detonator, would be impossible in the daylight. He would have to return when it was dark, around midnight, and the worshippers were asleep and the police guards had gone off duty.
Ahead, at the rear of the many benches facing the grotto, he saw an elderly woman rise from her seat and move away. Hurriedly, he led Natale to the bench and settled her into the empty place.
He told Natale exactly where he had seated her, and her position in relation to the grotto. "You just sit here and pray," he said. "I'll take the bag with me, and see that your candle is lighted. And I'll fill the bottles with water."
"You're so sweet, Mikel."
"I do this for all my loves," he said lightly, and bent down and kissed the smile off her lips. "Be back soon."
Slowly, easily, he picked his way through the crowd on the far side of the grotto. No one was paying any attention to anything except the cave in the hillside. It was almost too easy to drift away, and be interested in the foliage of the hillside, and move up it unhurriedly inspecting the plants and gradually disappear behind a group of trees.
He continued climbing a short distance, until the grotto itself was hidden from view. He sought the depression behind the large oak tree he had spotted earlier, and he found it filled with fallen leaves, broken branches, bits of other vegetation. Setting down Natale's flight bag, he knelt and began using both hands to scoop the debris out of the hole. When he had finished his excavation, he was pleased. The depression would be deep enough to hold and hide his equipment.
Emptying Natale's bag of the bottles and candle, he gingerly took out his own packages containing the sticks of dynamite, the detonator, the clock, the wiring, the tape, and the shopping bag. Casting about to see if he had by chance been followed, or, indeed, if there were any other climbers in the vicinity, he was satisfied that he was quite alone. He resumed work, lowering his packages into the hole, covering them with the folded shopping bag. Quickly, he scooped up the debris beside the hole, the dead leaves, branches, brush, and covered the shopping bag with them until the explosives and other materials were completely buried out of sight.
Rising, he examined his handiwork. The leafy surface of the ground looked untouched, as if it had been arranged by nature. Carefully, he restored Natale's bottles and candle to her flight bag. Then, with one hand, he dusted all signs of the foliage from his jacket and trousers. Taking up the bag, careful of his footing, he began his descent, noting every obvious landmark that would guide him on his return late that night.
When he came off the hill, he was sure that almost no one had seen him, or if they had, they would have small curiosity about this nature lover and exercise freak. Ready to melt into the crowd surrounding the grotto, he became aware of the flight bag in his hand. He had told Natale that he would take care of her candle and her plastic bottles. He searched off toward the baths, saw the rows of flickering candles nearby, and went to them and piously lighted Natale's candle and placed it alongside the others. Next, dutifully, he approached a water gutter with a spigot at either end where pilgrims were lined up taking their turns filling a variety of containers. Finally, his turn came. He uncapped each of Natale's empty plastic bottles, several shaped like the Virgin Mary, and filled all of them, one by one, with the supposedly curative water, and then capped each bottle and set it in the flight bag.
All there was left to do was to return to Natale, and guide her back to the hotel for lunch.
Weaving through the people milling about the grotto, he thought of Natale, of how attracted he was to her. He thought of her vivacity and her magnificent body and her passion, and suddenly he was impatient to take her to the hotel, get lunch over with if she was hungry, and return to her room for another memorable coupling. Anticipating this, he wondered about something else. He wondered how serious he was about her, and how much he wanted to deal with her in the future. Was she the woman he had always fantasied about and hoped to live with for the rest of his life? Was it possible to devote one's years to an afflicted person, one who would forever be afflicted? He did not know, or even know if she was interested in giving her own life over to an unseen Basque revolutionary—and a struggling author. Well, he told himself, it would all work itself out some way.
He had expected to find her on the bench as he had left her, occupied with silent prayer or meditating behind those dark glasses. Instead, when she came into sight, he saw that she was engaged in an animated conversation with a vaguely familiar older woman, a rather tall woman with black hair drawn back severely into a bun, who was seated beside her.
Puzzled, he advanced upon the pair. The older woman was speaking now, and Natale listening, as Hurtado came upon them. He waited for the other woman to finish, and then he stepped closer, and touched Natale on the shoulder.
"Natale," he said, "It's Mikel. I have all your bottles—"
Natale twisted toward him, a smile on her upturned face, as she reached for his hand. "Mikel, you must meet someone dear to me. The lady I'm talking to is Rosa Zennaro, our family friend from Rome and my helper here in Lourdes."
"Yes, of course," said Hurtado, offering her a bow and a smile, "the one for whom we left the note. Pleased to meet you, Signora Zennaro."
"The pleasure is mine," said Rosa. "Natale has been telling me all about you—"
"Not quite all," said Natale to Hurtado, blushing.
"—and that you are competing to replace me by becoming her brancardier," Rosa finished.
"I'm sure that would be impossible," said Hurtado. "I saw you two deep in conversation, and I really didn't mean to interrupt."
"Nothing important," said Rosa. "I was merely telling Natale about the statue of the Virgin Mary in the niche beside the grotto." She pointed off. "There it is. You can't miss it."
Hurtado peered off guiltily, unable to admit that he knew it well, had been closer to it than either of them, and the plans he had for its demise. "Yes," he said. "Quite attractive."
"But Bernadette didn't think so, Mikel." Natale turned, fumbling for Rosa's arm and tugging it. "Rosa, tell Mikel about the statue—he'll be so interested."
Without protest, Rosa launched into telling the story a second time. "There had been a plaster statuette of the Virgin in the niche next to the grotto, placed there by the townsfolk. Two sisters in Lyons, much devoted to the grotto, wanted to replace it with a larger and more accurate statue of the apparition that Bernadette had seen. They commissioned a well-known sculptor, Joseph Fabisch, of the Lyons Academy of Arts, to prepare it. Fabisch traveled down to Lourdes to interview Bernadette and get a description from her of what the Virgin had looked like when She had announced that She was the Immaculate Conception. To describe what Bernadette had seen, Fabisch later recorded, 'Bernadette got up with the greatest simplicity. She joined her hands and raised her eyes to heaven. I have never seen anything more beautiful . . . . Neither Mino da Fiesole, nor Perugino, nor Raphael have ever done anything so sweet and yet so profound as was the look of that young girl, consumptive to her fingertips.' Somewhat according to Bernadette's specifications, but allowing himself a degree of artist's license, Fabisch carved his large statue out of Carrara marble. When Father Peyramale received the statue in Lourdes, and showed it to Bernadette, she exclaimed, 'No, that's not it!'"
Natale was delighted. "Bernadette couldn't pretend about anything."
"Bernadette did not withhold her criticism," Rosa went on. "She considered the statue too tall, too mature, too fancy, and she insisted that by making the Virgin raise her eyes but not her head to heaven, the sculptor had given her a goiter. Nevertheless, the statue was placed in the niche with great ceremony on April 4, 1863. Bernadette was not allowed to attend, presumably because curiosity-seekers might bother her. But I suspect that she was kept away because she might be too frank and make a negative remark about the statue."
"Very amusing," said Hurtado, feeling guiltier than ever. "Well, shall we all have lunch? You'll join us, won't you, Mrs. Zennaro?"
"Thank you," said Rosa. "I'd enjoy that."
"Mikel, you go ahead of us, please. I want a few moments alone with Rosa, to discuss something personal. We'll be right behind you."
"Okay," said Hurtado, starting away.
But before he was out of earshot, he could overhear Natale and Rosa conversing in stage whispers. They were still speaking in English.
Natale was saying, "Rosa, isn't he wonderful? I'd give anything to see him. Do you mind—would you give me some idea what he looks like?"
Rosa was answering, "He's ugly as sin, like something monstrous out of Goya. Pop eyes, squashed nose, crooked teeth, and as big as a gorilla."
"Now I know that's untrue," said Natale laughing. "You're joking, aren't you?"
"Joking completely, dear one. He's as handsome as you could have wished for. He looks like an artist—"
"He's a writer," said Natale.
"I can believe that. He is perhaps five foot ten, slight but sinewy, strong face with dark soulful eyes, straight longish nose, full lips, determined jaw, and close-cropped dark auburn hair. Very intense all around, like one who knows what he is after and is going to get it."
Listening, Hurtado mouthed a soft amen, and trudged on up the ramp.
For Gisele Dupree, it had been a leisurely morning. She had had no tour group to guide until early afternoon, so after lying abed late, she had decided to dress and go out and take care of a few odds and ends.
On the Avenue Bernadette Soubirous, she had stopped to purchase some cosmetics—eye-liner, lipstick, moisturizer—to bolster her new resolve to begin wearing make-up again. Then she had gone along the Rue de la Grotte until she reached a leather store that had a red wallet she liked, and she had decided to buy it. At the last moment, about to stock up on food, she had remembered the roll of film that she had taken of her Nantes pilgrim group at the grotto the day before yesterday. For a gratuity, she had been guaranteed a forty-eight-hour delivery. She had detoured to the camera shop, picked up the color prints, and promised herself to chop them at the tour group's hotel after lunch. Tucking the packet of prints in her purse, she had set off for the food shops, determined to cut her lunch and dinner bills by eating at Dominique's apartment for the remainder of the week.
In the tiny dining room of the cool apartment, after heating some tomato soup, preparing a chopped egg salad, and putting jelly on a croissant, she sat down with a few days of accumulated copies of Le Figáro to catch up on the news that was already old. She had started to read when she recalled the packet of photographs and decided to see if they had all come out well, since she had never been one of the world's best photographers. Finding the packet in her purse, she took it back to the table, pulled out the prints and resumed digging into her salad.
The prints of the group, mostly posed and static, had come out fairly well, at least each one was in focus. As she turned them over, one by one, she counted nine of them. Then, to her surprise, there were three more photographs of a complete stranger, some lone older man standing in the sun near the grotto. The pictures had been shot in rapid succession, the first of the older man just standing in the sun, his suit clinging to him, obviously because he'd been in the baths, with a slight blur resembling the feathers of a small bird fluttering in front of his shirt. The second picture showed him bending down, picking up what might have been the bird with outspread wings. And finally the third picture showed the man fastening the bird—no, not a bird, but a mustache—to his upper lip, and with that photograph he was no longer a stranger. She recognized him.
He was Samuel Talley, her former client, the professor from New York.
Instantly, recollection came. As she had been photographing the tour group, she had seen Talley standing alone near them. As a lark, she had diverted the lens of her camera to focus on him and had taken three automatic fast snapshots of him. Perhaps she had done it for fun, to please him with a record of his visit to the grotto, which could be plainly seen in the distance behind him, or perhaps there had been an ulterior motive, to please him in order to wheedle another tip from him. She had a long way to go to reach that translator's school in Paris, but still those tips added up, each one counted.
Anyway, the pictures of Talley were crazy.
She had ceased eating to consider each picture again. At first the sequence made no sense, and then she realized that it did. The crazy thing was the mustache, the flowing Talley mustache. It was false, a false mustache. She recreated the scene. He had come out of the baths, and his mustache had fallen off, because he had been immersed in the water. He had stooped to retrieve it. He had pasted it back on his upper lip.
Funny.
But odd, also. She had thought his shaggy mustache real. But here she could see it was false, a disguise.
Why on earth would a nobody professor from far away want to wear a disguise in a place where he was a foreigner and unknown?
Unless, of course, he didn't want to be recognized, and was therefore not unknown, and therefore a visitor who might be known but preferred to be in Lourdes unknown.
The intrigue side of her mind was going a mile a minute now—a favorite expression from America—and her curiosity was thoroughly aroused.
Why the devil would a nonentity of a professor worry about being seen in Lourdes? Maybe he was trying to avoid a onetime French girlfriend who might be here? Maybe he was trying to avoid a local creditor in Lourdes whom he owed for a previous extravagance beyond his means? Or—
Maybe he wasn't Samuel Talley at all. Maybe his name was false just like his mustache. Maybe he was someone else, someone more important, someone who for some reason did not want to be identified with Lourdes.
Someone important?
Gisele threw aside the second and third photographs, and concentrated on the first one, the one of Talley sans mustache, the older man with his face exposed, looking as he really looked. Gisele brought the photograph up closer, narrowing her eyes, staring at the Slavic countenance in the picture. There were thousands and thousands of important faces in the world, and she knew only a few of them, mainly those that belonged to entertainers or politicians she had seen featured in the daily newspapers. Yet this particular photograph of the man who called himself Talley, the man who had lost his false mustache, had a look of familiarity about him.
It was as if she had seen him somewhere before.
The obviously Slavic features, now with the upper lip growth out of the way. An upper lip with a wart. Slavic features on a man who had told her he was an American of Russian parentage and taught Russian at Columbia University, and yet might be somebody else. But—
Gisele blinked. Why not Russian, really Russian?
Then like a bolt it struck her, recognition struck her.
She had seen this man before, or his double, in person, in the newspapers. She ransacked through recent memory, the UN months. Yes, that's where she had seen the face with the wart. Her lover, Charles Sarrat, had taken her to a UN reception, and she had seen the great man, had been awed to see him up close. And again, just the day before yesterday, on the front page of Le Figáro.
Her hand streaked to the backlog of unread copies of the newspapers. The day-before-yesterday's edition, the front page, and there it was, and there he was on the front page before her. One of the three candidates being speculated upon as the possible successor to the ailing premier of the Soviet Union. There he was in the paper, the very face in the color photograph she had taken at the grotto.
Sergei Tikhanov, foreign minister of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.
It couldn't be, it just couldn't be. But it might be, almost certainly it might be.
Quickly, she had the faces side by side, the one in the Paris newspaper, the one in the photograph she had taken playfully yesterday at the grotto, and she was comparing them.
Absolutely, they were one and the same. Samuel Talley, of the false mustache, was actually the renowned and mighty Sergei Tikhanov.
My God, Holy Jesus, if this were true.
The clever and deductive side of her mind was racing now, outlining possibilities, one logical possibility.
The successor to the leadership of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was ill. As Talley, he had admitted that he was ill. He was in line for the top job in Russia. But he was ill, and maybe doctors didn't give him much hope. So he was trying for any cure, and Lourdes had been in the headlines these past weeks. In desperation, he had made the decision to visit Lourdes. But as a leader of the biggest atheistic state in the world, he dared not let it be known that he was indulging in a romantic and wild enterprise like seeking succor from the Virgin Mary at the foremost Catholic shrine. Therefore, he had come here under a pseudonym, and wearing a disguise.
Gisele sat back, shaken by the enormity of her discovery.
If true.
The discovery was a prize, but it had to be true, verified, proved. There could be no mistake. Her only evidence was the very clear snapshot of Talley-Tikhanov taken near the grotto, and the one in the photograph resembled the image in her memory of the Soviet foreign minister she had seen up close briefly at the United Nations reception. But memory could be faulty, inexact. Then there was the photograph in the newspaper, clear yet not totally clear because it was reproduced on cheap newsprint.
What additional evidence did she need?
For one thing, a better photograph of Tikhanov that would be clearer than the one in the newspaper, a real print that she could hold beside her own clear snapshot taken at the grotto.
And one more thing. Absolute evidence that Talley, the name, was fake, that it was not his own name but as much a disguise as his mustache. If that could be proved, that Talley wasn't Talley, and a truer picture of Tikhanov showed him to be the one at the grotto, then there would be no more doubt. She would be able to expose someone who, at any cost, did not want to be exposed. She would be on to a big one, the biggest break in her young life.
But first the evidence.
Gisele considered the next step, actually two steps, and in moments she knew exactly what to do.
First, the truer photograph of the actual Foreign Minister Tikhanov. Once she had that evidence, she could take her second step. The first step, the better photograph, had to come from somewhere, obviously a photo agency or a newspaper photo file. That was a problem. Lourdes had no photo agency and its newspaper would be too small and too limited to have a folder of portraits of a Soviet foreign minister in its files. Only the big city paper would have such files. Like Marseilles, Lyons, Paris. If she could contact one of those newspapers—and then she had an idea how to do so.
Her good friend, Michelle Demalliot, head of the Sanctuaries Press Bureau, might be the one person to help her.
Gisele had an eye on the clock. There wasn't time enough to go down to the press center and talk to Michelle, and get back into town in time for her tour. Well, she needn't do it in person. The telephone would be enough. Pushing aside her half-finished salad, she went into the living room, found the white and red telephone book titled Hautes-Pyrénées which listed telephone numbers in Lourdes and Tarbes. Finding the listing for the Sanctuaries Press Bureau, she sat next to the phone and dialed the number.
An unfamiliar female voice answered.
"Is Michelle Demalliot there?" Gisele asked.
"She's just going out the door to lunch. I'll try to catch her."
"Please! Tell her Gisele Dupree is calling."
Gisele held on, and then was relieved to hear Michelle's voice on the phone.
"Hello, Michelle, it's Gisele. I don't want to make you late for lunch, but I need a favor."
"Of course. What?"
"I need some still photographs of the Soviet Union's foreign minister, you know, Sergei Tikhanov. I need them as soon as possible."
"Whatever for?"
"Because—because when I was at the United Nations—remember?—I saw him and met him, and some small magazine has asked me to write a short piece on him, but they won't buy it without a picture. So I wondered if you had any press people still coming to Lourdes, today, tomorrow, whom you might talk into bringing a few pictures of Tikhanov along? Can you think of anyone?"
"Well, everyone is mostly here waiting for the Reappearance, but there may be a few more—wait, let me see."
Michelle left the phone for thirty seconds and then she was back on the line.
"I just checked. You may be in luck. I have someone coming in this evening from Paris, a photographer from Paris-Match, to do a layout of the activity here and hang around to photograph the person who sees the Virgin Mary, if someone does. I could call him at Paris-Match, probably catch him. If I do, you want a photograph of Sergei Tikhanov?"
"A good clear glossy portrait of his face from their file. I'll pay for it. If I can see a couple of shots all the better. Can you call me back? Here's the number I'm at." She read off Dominique's phone number.
"All right, Gisele, let me call Paris right this second. If I can't pull it off in five minutes, I'll let you know. If he can bring your pictures, I won't bother to call back. You'll know they'll be here tonight. You can pick them up at the Press Bureau around eight tonight. How's that?"
"Super. You're a doll, Michelle. Thanks a million!"
She hung up thinking, A million, a million, God knows what it might be worth if it was true.
She sat there beside the phone, hoping it would not ring. She sat waiting for five minutes, six, seven, ten. No ring.
That meant her friend had reached Paris-Match. That meant the photographs of Tikhanov would be in her hands tonight.
Step one on its way.
Next, step two. To find out if Talley really was Samuel Talley, a professor in the language department at Columbia University. Gisele knew exactly how to find out. Her old American friend Roy Zimborg had graduated from Columbia University. She glanced at the mantel clock. She had no time for the call to New York now. She'd better be off to her job. Besides, it would be terrible to wake Zimborg at this early hour in New York. It would be better late tonight, maybe midnight, when it would be six in the evening in New York and when she had already seen the Paris-Match photograph and had ascertained that it was the same person she had caught in her own amateur's snapshot at the grotto.
She sat very still, a smile wreathing her face.
A miracle was happening in Lourdes, after all, a personal miracle all her own.
By tonight she might have her ticket and her passport to the United Nations. She could not think of it as blackmail. Only as good fortune to one who was so deserving.