We Shall Not Sleep_ A Novel - Anne Perry [134]
He had only just let her go when Matthew opened the door.
“Are you all right?” Matthew asked, then decided that the question was unnecessary.
“Yes…thank you,” Joseph replied. “We should go. We can’t be far from the coast now, but there isn’t much time.”
“We’ve got a lot more help,” Matthew told him. “Food, petrol, and someone to show us the best roads. We could make it tonight.”
Joseph was startled. “How did you do that?”
“Guilt,” Matthew answered simply. “They felt like hell.”
Joseph was embarrassed. For the first time in years he had completely lost control of himself. He had wanted to kill the man who had kicked Monique. He might have, if Matthew had not stopped him. That was a frightening thought. He had had no idea that there was so much rage inside him, or bottled-up pain.
“The man I…hit. Is he all right?”
Matthew rolled his eyes. “He’ll live, but you broke his nose and jaw and two or three ribs. Good thing he’s fairly heavily built, or you might have done worse. You took him totally by surprise. He didn’t imagine that the priest would try to kill him, or you might not have come out of it so well.”
“You don’t need to belabor the point,” Joseph said a little tartly. “His behavior was unforgivable.”
“That rather is the point, Joe.” Matthew looked at him steadily, not moving from the spot where he stood. “You can’t leave them like this. You’ve pretty well consigned them to hell and left them in no doubt that you meant it. That isn’t how you’d like it to stay.” He said it with certainty, no shadow in his eyes.
Joseph did not want to go back and face them again. It was deeply embarrassing, and he did not forgive them for what they had done to Monique. He could not tell them it was excusable. It would betray his own beliefs, and no one with an ounce of sense would believe him anyway.
“I can’t offer them any forgiveness,” he said aloud. “There’s no penance I know of that’s going to heal what they just did. To say there is would be a lie.”
“There’s always a way back, Joe, from anywhere,” Matthew replied. “You told me that. If you can’t help them, what hope is there for any of us?”
“It’s time to begin,” Lizzie said, touching Joseph’s hand lightly. “You don’t have to lie to them. Tell them how hard it will be, just don’t say it’s impossible.”
He climbed out of the ambulance, standing a little unsteadily at first, then turned and thanked her. Matthew was waiting. He followed him to where the villagers were gathered together with a pile of food in boxes and three cans of petrol. They were the most precious things they had; perhaps a week’s supply. There were also spark plugs and a small tin of oil. They looked frightened, and hopeful.
Suddenly Joseph wanted to tell them they were forgiven, but that would be weariness, gratitude, and pity speaking, the desire to escape, and none of those made it the right thing to do. It would be facile, an escape for himself.
“Thank you,” he said to them, looking at the pile. “We know what a great gift all of this is, and how much it represents of what you have. I would like to say that it will redeem you from what you did to Monique, but that would not be true. You don’t deserve that. Like all of us, you need honesty. The way back from such a sin is longer and far harder than that, which you know as well as I do. But never forget that the way does exist, and you can walk it if you wish to enough. I can’t tell you how to find it, because I don’t know. But your chance to pay the price will come, if you want it enough to look for it, and accept it.”
They stared at him, shifting awkwardly from foot to foot. No one spoke. Hope sprang to life in one or two faces. In others it died. They had been expecting something easier.
“I apologize for standing in judgment of you,” Joseph went on. “I have no right to. That is something you will have to do for yourselves. You know what you did, and why, and what drove you. And you know she didn’t deserve it. Begin by not lying to yourselves. What I say is true, for you, for me, for everyone.”
One of the older men nodded.