Miracles were a fraud.
Every time the Church sent him out to investigate, a reasonable scientific explanation could be found: either the occurrence was a mere coincidence, or, even more commonly, a scam.
The scams were the worst of all. With today's dramatically advancing technology, it was getting progressively easier to fool some faithful; God fearing country citizen into believing that the site they were seeing was a miracle. Then he would tell someone else, and that person would tell someone, and on and on and on, until some backwoods priest heard about it and somehow, eventually, the Catholic Church found out about it. Then he would be sent out to investigate, one of many the Church kept in reserve, and find that the "miracle" was only an impressive display of lights, smoke, and mirrors, programmed and arranged by a computer. Then the people would go home, questioning their faith and the honesty of their fellow man, and he would feel miserable for being the one who had to tell them.
It was because of frauds like that that he was now fully convinced that the infernal machine, so newly available on the market, was inherently evil.
It was from one of these situations that he was returning.
Sighing to himself, Father Alva Keel picked up his bags and continued down the aisle of the train car to the back exit. He doubted he would ever forget the devastated looks on the congregations' faces. Many of them were older, in their early 70s at least, and he quietly wondered if they would ever get over the shock... in fact he believed he had passed an ambulance in front of one of their houses as he had left for the station.
He stepped off the train, nodding once to the lone porter on the platform as he passed by. The few others he saw on the way to the steps leading to an overhead walkway either smiled or brushed by him quickly and he lost himself to his own thoughts ignoring them completely. He'd have to make a report once he returned to the seminary at Gloucester before he could relax. Somehow the vision of the frowning church seniors awaiting him was hardly comforting.
In the station proper newspaper stands overflowed with magazines and tabloids while warm aromas drifted temptingly from a small cart hidden off to one side. Keel stopped at it to buy a bit of coffee and a warm roll, checking the monitors posted along one wall for the arrival time of his connecting train to Birmingham. A loud strident voice distracted him however, and he easily located the source of it. Across the way a severe blonde haired woman in a red trench coat argued heatedly with the cashier at the ticket counter. The later was nearly cowering behind his desk while the station personnel hurried to appease her. Shaking his head at the scene, he retrieved his change from the cart attendant before continuing on, hardly seeing the small slip of girl watching him from behind the woman's red coat.
The crowds were surprisingly sparse despite the evening hour; hardly any businessmen crowded the platforms or the corridors, and the only rush was when a school group hurried passed him in a blur of somber uniforms. The dull colors reminded him of his own life at catholic school, and he was grateful when the nuns herding them barely even noticed that he was there.
Emptying his coffee, Keel went to toss it into a nearby trash bin . . .
He was distracted, however, by a thick heavy tome, half hidden buried among the rubbish.
Curious, he pulled it out, gently dusting it off with his gloved fingers revealing a light blue cover worn with age. The books spine was broken from some long ago fall, and its corners were bent and swollen from water damage. Inside, the slick pages were wrinkled and stained, covered with neat little lines and musical notes. Here and there sketches could be seen in the margins and someone had pasted in clippings of masterpieces, the pictures still vibrant with color. Keel smiled unconsciously to himself, recognizing the artist's soft style almost at once. Pierre-Auguste Renoir's' work was saturated with hues of red, yellow, blue and green: each paintings strokes telling a story of dancing in French parks or young girls playing at a piano . . . a time of innocence far from the world of today.
He could find no written name on either inside cover, but a note in delicate script read: To my little artist, you are already a master in my heart, Love, Vati
Keel flipped the book over in his hands, as he debated what to do with it. The girl- for it had to be a girl, he could never remember his own father speaking or writing anything to him like that- had probably already left the station by now on a train to some other city, and while she might still be at Birmingham station when he got there, she could have just continued on her way to Leicester, Stratford-apon-avon, or Northampton. It would be best to just leave it with one of the ticket cashiers up front . . . and yet, something kept him from doing it.
Somehow he couldn't hand it over to the cashiers or any of the nearby policemen. They would probably just toss it in the rubbish bin again when he turned his back on them and then laugh about the trusting priest at the pub later tonight...
Shaking his head in disgust, Keel snapped it shut with a definitive snap and continued to the platform where his train was to arrive. He quickly located an empty bench nearby and sat, settling his bags at his feet, and opening the book once more. He flipped through its damp pages, noticing the archaic words printed between the bars of music: Latin. The rest were either Italian or German with a lone song in English, almost as if whoever had edited the book had put it in as an afterthought.
The sharp staccato of a woman's high heels echoed on the cold air, punctuating an angry voice that barely rose above a whisper. He looked up to see the woman from the station lobby walking down the platform, carrying an overnight tote in one hand and pulling along a girl by the wrist with the other. Amazingly the child wasn't in tears yet, her eyes continued to stare straight ahead even when the mother tugged on the girls pale blonde braid to get her attention.
Outrage burning in him, Keel closed the book and stood, intending to speak up. His movement caught the girl's attention, her face suddenly lighting up. "Mein buch!"
"Dein...?" The mother turned to look, her expression becoming dark with promised violence. "Dieb!!"
Keel frowned, not understanding, he hadn't stolen anything...
The woman began to advance on him, but the girl reached him first in a blur of dark blue wool. The ten year-old smiled up at him, her cheeks flushed even though she was barely out of breath. "Mein buch... you found it! I thought I'd lost it for good!"
He stared at her for a moment, the blue book beginning to grow heavy in his hand as his mind raced to catch up with the situation. The woman in the red trench coat was only a few feet away when it all came together. Relaxing a little, he moved the book in front of him, holding it with both hands. "Your book... this book?"
"Ja. I thought I'd left it on the train, or that it had fallen out somewhere. Mutter was going to..." She tensed suddenly as her mother's hands fell onto her shoulders. Keel looked up to find the woman's expression was suddenly bright and cheerful.
"Good afternoon, Pater." She smiled, and Keel was suddenly reminded of caged panther he'd seen at a circus once, always waiting for it's chance to attack. "I see you've found Katrien's songbook. She needs it for her performance tonight and we were very afraid we'd lost it, weren't we Katrien?"
"Ja, mutter." Katrien's expression had gone neutral, her eyes staring blankly ahead again, as the Birmingham train pulled into the station.
Keel regarded both of them, not sure of what to say. He began to tap the book on his fingertips, and watched as the mother's expression darkened ever so slightly. She grabbed it, stopping it, her face returning to it's smiling facade. "Could you...?"
"Ah, yes, here you are." He handed it over, letting go of it reluctantly, still feeling as if he should say something. The mother, her smile becoming more brittle by the moment, handed it off to her daughter. "I..."
"Well, danke, once again, Pater. I don't know what we would have done without it, if you hadn't found it." She turned in a swirl of red towards the train, dismissing him immediately as she pulled two tickets from her bag.
The little girl continued to stare up at him, the songbook clutched to her chest. "Es tut mir lied... she's..."
Keel smiled for the first time that day, feeling sorry for the child in front of him. He touched her chin lightly, making her look up at him. "Mach dir keine sorgen."
The girl smiled up at him, her entire face lighting up yet again; the face of a trusting innocent. "Danke..."
"Katrien!" The mother's sharp tone rang out over the platform, managing somehow to overpower the Conductor's last call.
The girl automatically turned and ran down the platform, shouting over her shoulder as she went. "Danke, Pater, Lebewohl!!!"
Keel sighed to himself, watching her as she went, his heart heavy in his chest.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
German to English Glossary (In order of Appearance/use)
*Vati- Father
*Mein buch- My Book
*Dein- your
*Dieb- thief
*Pater- Preist
*Ja, Mutter- Yes, Mother
*Danke- thank you
*Es tut mir lied- I am sorry about that
*Mach dir keine sorgen- Do not worry about it
*Lebewohl- Farewell/Good-Bye
Every time the Church sent him out to investigate, a reasonable scientific explanation could be found: either the occurrence was a mere coincidence, or, even more commonly, a scam.
The scams were the worst of all. With today's dramatically advancing technology, it was getting progressively easier to fool some faithful; God fearing country citizen into believing that the site they were seeing was a miracle. Then he would tell someone else, and that person would tell someone, and on and on and on, until some backwoods priest heard about it and somehow, eventually, the Catholic Church found out about it. Then he would be sent out to investigate, one of many the Church kept in reserve, and find that the "miracle" was only an impressive display of lights, smoke, and mirrors, programmed and arranged by a computer. Then the people would go home, questioning their faith and the honesty of their fellow man, and he would feel miserable for being the one who had to tell them.
It was because of frauds like that that he was now fully convinced that the infernal machine, so newly available on the market, was inherently evil.
It was from one of these situations that he was returning.
Sighing to himself, Father Alva Keel picked up his bags and continued down the aisle of the train car to the back exit. He doubted he would ever forget the devastated looks on the congregations' faces. Many of them were older, in their early 70s at least, and he quietly wondered if they would ever get over the shock... in fact he believed he had passed an ambulance in front of one of their houses as he had left for the station.
He stepped off the train, nodding once to the lone porter on the platform as he passed by. The few others he saw on the way to the steps leading to an overhead walkway either smiled or brushed by him quickly and he lost himself to his own thoughts ignoring them completely. He'd have to make a report once he returned to the seminary at Gloucester before he could relax. Somehow the vision of the frowning church seniors awaiting him was hardly comforting.
In the station proper newspaper stands overflowed with magazines and tabloids while warm aromas drifted temptingly from a small cart hidden off to one side. Keel stopped at it to buy a bit of coffee and a warm roll, checking the monitors posted along one wall for the arrival time of his connecting train to Birmingham. A loud strident voice distracted him however, and he easily located the source of it. Across the way a severe blonde haired woman in a red trench coat argued heatedly with the cashier at the ticket counter. The later was nearly cowering behind his desk while the station personnel hurried to appease her. Shaking his head at the scene, he retrieved his change from the cart attendant before continuing on, hardly seeing the small slip of girl watching him from behind the woman's red coat.
The crowds were surprisingly sparse despite the evening hour; hardly any businessmen crowded the platforms or the corridors, and the only rush was when a school group hurried passed him in a blur of somber uniforms. The dull colors reminded him of his own life at catholic school, and he was grateful when the nuns herding them barely even noticed that he was there.
Emptying his coffee, Keel went to toss it into a nearby trash bin . . .
He was distracted, however, by a thick heavy tome, half hidden buried among the rubbish.
Curious, he pulled it out, gently dusting it off with his gloved fingers revealing a light blue cover worn with age. The books spine was broken from some long ago fall, and its corners were bent and swollen from water damage. Inside, the slick pages were wrinkled and stained, covered with neat little lines and musical notes. Here and there sketches could be seen in the margins and someone had pasted in clippings of masterpieces, the pictures still vibrant with color. Keel smiled unconsciously to himself, recognizing the artist's soft style almost at once. Pierre-Auguste Renoir's' work was saturated with hues of red, yellow, blue and green: each paintings strokes telling a story of dancing in French parks or young girls playing at a piano . . . a time of innocence far from the world of today.
He could find no written name on either inside cover, but a note in delicate script read: To my little artist, you are already a master in my heart, Love, Vati
Keel flipped the book over in his hands, as he debated what to do with it. The girl- for it had to be a girl, he could never remember his own father speaking or writing anything to him like that- had probably already left the station by now on a train to some other city, and while she might still be at Birmingham station when he got there, she could have just continued on her way to Leicester, Stratford-apon-avon, or Northampton. It would be best to just leave it with one of the ticket cashiers up front . . . and yet, something kept him from doing it.
Somehow he couldn't hand it over to the cashiers or any of the nearby policemen. They would probably just toss it in the rubbish bin again when he turned his back on them and then laugh about the trusting priest at the pub later tonight...
Shaking his head in disgust, Keel snapped it shut with a definitive snap and continued to the platform where his train was to arrive. He quickly located an empty bench nearby and sat, settling his bags at his feet, and opening the book once more. He flipped through its damp pages, noticing the archaic words printed between the bars of music: Latin. The rest were either Italian or German with a lone song in English, almost as if whoever had edited the book had put it in as an afterthought.
The sharp staccato of a woman's high heels echoed on the cold air, punctuating an angry voice that barely rose above a whisper. He looked up to see the woman from the station lobby walking down the platform, carrying an overnight tote in one hand and pulling along a girl by the wrist with the other. Amazingly the child wasn't in tears yet, her eyes continued to stare straight ahead even when the mother tugged on the girls pale blonde braid to get her attention.
Outrage burning in him, Keel closed the book and stood, intending to speak up. His movement caught the girl's attention, her face suddenly lighting up. "Mein buch!"
"Dein...?" The mother turned to look, her expression becoming dark with promised violence. "Dieb!!"
Keel frowned, not understanding, he hadn't stolen anything...
The woman began to advance on him, but the girl reached him first in a blur of dark blue wool. The ten year-old smiled up at him, her cheeks flushed even though she was barely out of breath. "Mein buch... you found it! I thought I'd lost it for good!"
He stared at her for a moment, the blue book beginning to grow heavy in his hand as his mind raced to catch up with the situation. The woman in the red trench coat was only a few feet away when it all came together. Relaxing a little, he moved the book in front of him, holding it with both hands. "Your book... this book?"
"Ja. I thought I'd left it on the train, or that it had fallen out somewhere. Mutter was going to..." She tensed suddenly as her mother's hands fell onto her shoulders. Keel looked up to find the woman's expression was suddenly bright and cheerful.
"Good afternoon, Pater." She smiled, and Keel was suddenly reminded of caged panther he'd seen at a circus once, always waiting for it's chance to attack. "I see you've found Katrien's songbook. She needs it for her performance tonight and we were very afraid we'd lost it, weren't we Katrien?"
"Ja, mutter." Katrien's expression had gone neutral, her eyes staring blankly ahead again, as the Birmingham train pulled into the station.
Keel regarded both of them, not sure of what to say. He began to tap the book on his fingertips, and watched as the mother's expression darkened ever so slightly. She grabbed it, stopping it, her face returning to it's smiling facade. "Could you...?"
"Ah, yes, here you are." He handed it over, letting go of it reluctantly, still feeling as if he should say something. The mother, her smile becoming more brittle by the moment, handed it off to her daughter. "I..."
"Well, danke, once again, Pater. I don't know what we would have done without it, if you hadn't found it." She turned in a swirl of red towards the train, dismissing him immediately as she pulled two tickets from her bag.
The little girl continued to stare up at him, the songbook clutched to her chest. "Es tut mir lied... she's..."
Keel smiled for the first time that day, feeling sorry for the child in front of him. He touched her chin lightly, making her look up at him. "Mach dir keine sorgen."
The girl smiled up at him, her entire face lighting up yet again; the face of a trusting innocent. "Danke..."
"Katrien!" The mother's sharp tone rang out over the platform, managing somehow to overpower the Conductor's last call.
The girl automatically turned and ran down the platform, shouting over her shoulder as she went. "Danke, Pater, Lebewohl!!!"
Keel sighed to himself, watching her as she went, his heart heavy in his chest.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
German to English Glossary (In order of Appearance/use)
*Vati- Father
*Mein buch- My Book
*Dein- your
*Dieb- thief
*Pater- Preist
*Ja, Mutter- Yes, Mother
*Danke- thank you
*Es tut mir lied- I am sorry about that
*Mach dir keine sorgen- Do not worry about it
*Lebewohl- Farewell/Good-Bye