The Miracle Part 29

"Well, this must be old home week," said Liz. "Sit down, sit down. What's on your mind?"

Amanda tentatively took a chair. "I have an appointment with Father Ruland in half an hour. I thought maybe you'd like to come along."

"I've been keeping Ruland busy myself. But anyway, what are you seeing him about?"

"Bernadette's journal. What we heard about it from Sister Fran-cesca in Nevers yesterday. I'd like to delve into the matter of the journal a little deeper, find out more about how the church acquired it- how the church was able to be sure of its absolute authenticity-"

"Fbrget it," said Liz. "It's authentic all right. Like I told you before. You can be sure the church wouldn't lead with its chin unless it knew it had the goods."

"How can you be so certain?"

"Because," said Liz, "I don't let any gra.s.s grow under my feet. I met with Father Ruland on that very point early this morning. He dragged out the actual journal Bernadette had kept, the one in which she had confided the Virgin Mary's secrets. Then he displayed the various certifications of authenticity."

"Like putting it through the carbon-14 dating process?"

"No, not that -- that's for ancient papers, parchment, papyrus- Bernadette's journal wasn't old enough to require that kind of test. It was much simpler, really. There were many specimens of Bernadette's handwriting around. The journal script has been compared to those by any number of prominent handwriting experts. There were also numerous other tests made-overkill really-the use of ultra-violet lamp, chemical a.n.a.lysis of the pigments in the ink, close studies by scholars of the style or language usage in the journal, to be positive it jibed with the style and language usage in Bernadette's previous writings, for example, her letters. No, you're wasting your time, Amanda. On authenticity, the church has an airtight case. I think we'd both better drop our researches on Bernadette."

Amanda stiffened. "You can, but I'm not ready to, not yet. Even if it is authentic, I want to know more about the journal, how the church acquired it, and from whom, and whatever else I can find out. Maybe I'll stumble on something, some lead, that'll bring Ken to his senses."

"I can only wish you good luck. For my part, I'm finished with that journal. I'm just going to sit here and wait for the apparition."

"Very well," said Amanda, annoyed. "From here on in, I'll go it alone."

They were in a quiet, plain room of the Rosary Basilica, in a spa.r.s.ely furnished room that Father Ruland had identified as his office. Because Ruland was so open, so generous and cooperative, Amanda made every effort not to let him know that she was a doubter. But she perceived that he was an insightful and sophisticated man, well-versed in the understanding of human nature, and she guessed that he was aware of her doubts from the outset of their meeting.

She sat at an antique wooden table in the middle of the office, and he brought exhibits of Bernadette memorabilia from a fireproof wall safe to impress her. And to cooperate with her on the article about Bernadette that she had told him she was writing for a psychology journal. Ruland's exhibits were mostly paper objects, sc.r.a.ps of paper, letters, doc.u.ments with writings in Bernadette's hand, as well as records of the events at the grotto and of talks between Bernadette and various neighbors and officials of Lourdes who had been witnesses in the year of the apparitions and the years that followed.

"But foremost of all, you are interested in Bernadette's last journal, the one that revealed the most dramatic and exciting of the Virgin Mary's three secrets, and the one that brought about this Reappearance Time," Father Ruland had said, carrying the journal from the safe and laying it down before Amanda. "There it is, our treasure. You may have a look inside for yourself. With care, of course, great care."

"I'm afraid to touch it," said Amanda. "Do you mind opening it, Father?"

"A pleasure, believe me, Mrs. Clayton," said Father Ruland coming around the table. When he had bent down beside her, his handsome and imposing presence and his worldly a.s.surance had briefly dwarfed Amanda's doubts, had made them seem niggling and foolish. Nevertheless, she had remained attentive.

He had pulled the leather-bound folio from its shpcase, and opened it, spreading the pages before Amanda.

Now she was examining two of the pages, and the old-fas.h.i.+oned and slanted script gave Bernadette a reality that she had not possessed for Amanda earlier, not even at Nevers.

"Why, I can read this," Amanda said. "It's in French."

"What did you expect?" inquired Ruland.

"I'd been told she usually wrote in some native patois or village dialect that no one-"

"Ah, yes, Mrs. Clayton, that much is trae. She was brought up speaking not a dialect but a special language of the Pyrenees. But by the time she wrote this version of the events as a nun in Nevers, she had learned the fundamentals of the French language. You know, to satisfy many people after 1858, Bernadette made a number of accounts in writing of her experience at the grotto, some for clergymen, others for jouraahsts and historians. This account was the last one she set down on paper, to make a chronology of what happened to her one final time before memory of the apparitions escaped her and before her serious illness would make writing impossible."

"I'd like to know more about the journal. Father Ruland."

"I'm delighted with your interest," the priest said, closing the bound journal, and pressing it back into its shpcase. He went to the wall safe, deposited the precious journal and the other memorabiha inside it, shut the door, twirled the k.n.o.b to lock it, and returned to the table, sitting down across from Amanda. "I'll tell you whatever you want to know."

"I've been wondering how you found the journal." "By chance. Well, not exactly. I've been fascinated by Bernadette all my life, ever since my seminary days. There was little I did not know about her. Along the way, I began to suspect that Bernadette had completed a chronological journal of the high points in her life. There was evidence that she had undertaken such a journal, between bouts of illness, at the Convent of Saint-Gildard. But I had not been able to prove that such a journal had ever been completed or, indeed, if it had, to learn what had happened to it. The superior general at Saint-Gildard knew, of course, of my interest. Then, about two years ago, a bit more, I heard from her. In preparing for a public exhibit of Bernadette's written corpus, in gathering artifacts related to her life, the copy of a letter was found addressed to Basile Lagues, a fanner in the village of Bartrds near here."

"I've heard about Bartres," said Amanda. "Bernadette had written Lagues in French, then realized he might not be able to read it and she had rewritten the letter in the patois of Bigorre, the local language we spoke about. The original version of the letter, the French one, was found among Bernadette's papers. She'd written the letter in 1878, the year before her death, to tell the Lagues family, princ.i.p.ally the elder Lagues, who was Basile, that she had finished a journal and was sending it to them as a memento and appreciation of their life together."

Amanda's brow had furrowed. "The Lagues family?" "The relations.h.i.+p between Bernadette and the Lagues family played an important role in Bernadette's life," said Father Ruland. "Marie and Basile Lagues were a young couple, industrious farmers in Bartrds, to the north of Lourdes. Bernadette's father owned a mill at the time, and the Lagues were among his customers. Shortly after Bernadette was born in 1844, her mother, Louise, had an accident. A burning candle fell from the fireplace mantel and set fire to the bodice of her dress. She suffered superficial b.u.ms on her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, but these were sufficient to make it impossible to breastfeed Bernadette. So she scouted about for an available wet-nurse. Just about that time, Marie Lagues in Bartres lost her firstborn son, Jean, and she wanted another baby to suckle. She agreed to take in the infant Bernadette as a temporary foster child and breastfeed her for five francs a month. After Bernadette had been weaned, Marie Lagues did not want to give her up, but at last did 8o after nearly a year and a half. That was the beginning of the relations.h.i.+p between Bernadette and the Lagues family."

"When did she see them again?" asked Amanda, "For one more period in 1857 and 1858 when Bernadette was thirteen," said Father Ruland. "By then things had worsened for the Soubirous family in Lourdes. Bernadette's father was doing poorly, unable to earn money. There were siblings, more mouths to feed. A cholera epidemic had almost taken Bernadette's life. There was a famine on the land. Meanwhile, the nearby Lagues family had survived and fared well. They owned a large property, many cows and sheep, and having a number of children by now, they were prepared to take on an additional servant. They agreed to accept Bernadette a second time. She would work as a mother's helper and shepherdess, and in return receive shelter, food, and an education. So Bernadette moved in with the Lagues family in Bartres. It wasn't exactly an idyllic life. There wasn't much food on the table, although more than there had been in Lourdes. And Marie Lagues had developed a kind of love-hate relations.h.i.+p with Bernadette. She wanted her about, but was severe, difl&cult, sometimes mean. Also, she often treated Bernadette as a slave. Yet, there were compensations. The alt.i.tude and air in Bartres were good for Bernadette's health. The girl enjoyed relaxing on the hillsides with the sheep, daydreaming and building toy altars and praying. Although her foster mother did httle to educate her, Bernadette gained the affection of the local parish priest, a kindly man named Abbe Ader, who tried to help her."

"I heard that he tried to influence her interest in the Virgin Mary," Amanda dared to say.

"Ah, you heard that from Father Cayoux over in Cauterets, I imagine."

"I don't remember," Amanda lied.

"No matter." Father Ruland remained unconcerned. "We don't know how much influence Abbe Ader had on Bernadette. It is true that one day, watching Bernadette, he said aloud that if the Virgin Mary ever returned to earth again, the Blessed Lady would most likely appear before just such a simple peasant girl. But actual influence on her? We don't have any real evidence of that. Ader gave her catechism lessons, but soon that came to an end. He left Bartres to take up a career in the Benedictine order, and not long afterward Bernadette told her parents that she was tired of Bartres and wanted to come home to Lourdes, and she did, in January of 1858, after a stay of eight months in Bartres."

"And just a month later in Lourdes," said Amanda, "Bernadette saw her first apparition of the Virgin Mary in the grotto at Ma.s.sabielle."

"Yes," Father Ruland conceded. "Anyway, after she had gone off to be a nun at Nevers, Bernadette seemed to hold some kind of residue of affection for the Lagues and the interlude in Bartres. Especially for Papa Lagues and his three surviving children. So one last time she set down on paper her recollections of the stirring and mystical events of her short life in a journal. Once the journal was completed, Bernadette, aware of her special standing in the eyes of the Church, decided to send it to the Lagues family as a keepsake and remembrance of her. Well, when I had this clue, I went to Bartrds in search of that journal, which Fm sure the Lagues had never read, since it was in French. Marie and Basile, the original possessors of it, had long been dead. But, after a persistent hunt, I was able to trace the odyssey of this journal. It had come down from relative to relative and finally fallen into the hands of a distant Lagues cousin."

"Who was the cousin?"

"A middle-aged widow in Bartrds named Eugenie Gautier, who lived with an adolescent nephew named Jean and who was his guardian. Yes, Madame Gautier had the musty old journal somewhere around. I doubt if she had ever read it. She had no interest in the long-gone Bernadette. Her entire devotion was to her growing nephew and his support. When I approached her and asked to see the journal, and suggested that I might want to purchase it as a relic for the Church, Madame Gautier put me off briefly until she could hastily read it. Then, for the first time coming across Bernadette's revelations of the secrets that she had heard from the Blessed Virgin, especially that in the near future the Virgin would be returning to Lourdes, Madame Gautier knew what a treasure she possessed, and I soon knew about it as well. The bargaining with her was difficult and took a considerable time. Her original demands were outrageous. But at last we effected a compromise and the church purchased the journal for a considerable sum of money. Madame Gautier was left well-to-do. In fact, she bought a new house, where she lives comfortably today."

Amanda's curiosity had heightened. "This journal, did you buy all of it? I understand there was an earlier section in which Bernadette recounted some of her earlier years?"

"We had wanted to purchase it all, of course. But our primary interest was in Bernadette's final recounting of the events at the grotto. So I studied that earlier section, and it did not offer much, merely the hards.h.i.+ps of her growing up in Lourdes, something about her daily work as a shepherdess in Bartres, but I would have acquired it just to keep our oeuvre complete. That proved impossible. Nfadame Gautier was reluctant to sell it. I think she wanted to keep that section of the journal as a memento for her nephew, because it recorded what life was like in the old days in Bartrds. It was unimportant. I had what I wanted -the electrifying knowledge that the Virgin Mary would return to Lourdes this year. Now I think you know everything I can tell you about our acquisition. I hope it will satisfy you for the psychology paper you plan to write."

"It is all wonderful," said Amanda. "You've given me everything I wanted." She prepared to leave. "I was just thinking. It might be fun to drive over to Bartres and have a look around."

"There's not too much to see, but the town hasn't changed a great deal in a century and you might get a picture of the way of life in Bernadette's time."

"Yes, I'll drive there. Did you say-does Madame Gautier still live there?"

"She's there all right. I'm told she purchased a house not far from the Lagues' Maison Burg, which is now a museum in Bartres."

"Do you think I could meet Madame Gautier?"

"I don't know," said Father Ruland, seeing Amanda to the door. "I found her a crusty and tart lady, and not exactly hospitable. I can't imagine she's changed much. But see what you can do with her. Good luck."

There was a call Dr. Paul Kleinberg was expecting from Paris before he could proceed further in the case of Edith Moore. The call he was waiting for would be from Dr. Maurice Duval, whose secretary had notified Kleinberg early this morning that Duval would be phoning him at eight-thirty in the evening.

Ignoring his restlessness, Kleinberg slouched in the armchair of his claustrophobic room in the Hotel Astoria, trying to catch up on his reading of recently published medical papers (two by Duval himself), while keeping an eye on the clock. When the hands of the clock told him it was eight-thirty, he s.h.i.+fted his attention to the telephone on the table beside him, and was grateful when it rang immediately.

He took up the receiver, hoping it was his colleague and was pleased when he heard Duval's hurried, ebullient voice.

"That you, Paul?" Duval called out.

"It's I."

"Long time, too long," said Duval. "Last place I expected to hear from you was Lourdes. What on earth are you doing there?"

"Delving into a holy miracle," said Kleinberg.

Duval gave a barking laugh. "All miracles these days take place in geneticists' laboratories."

"Not too loud. Wouldn't want them to hear you in Lourdes. But as a matter of fact, that's why I wanted to speak to you, about the scientific miracles you've been performing."

"My favorite subject, Paul," said Duval. "What's on your mind?"

"I know you abandoned routine sarcoma surgery to concentrate on experiments in genetic replacement and engineering-"

"Let me revise that slightly," Duval interrupted. "I abandoned standard sarcoma surgery, yes-as being ineffective, or at least not effective enough-but I did not abandon my primary interest in sarcoma. I have been largely devoting myself to genetic experiments, but mainly in the area of sarcoma."

So far, so good, thought Kleinberg. "I'm acquainted with the reports, the papers you've published on your experiments on monkeys, rabbits, mice. They indicate great progress."

"Enormous progress," Duval corrected him, "enormous advances in the abihty to replace diseased genes with healthy ones. In two papers this year-"

"I've just caught up on your most recent published work, Maurice, and I take your word for it that there have been incredible strides in gene-replacement techniques."

"You have my word," said Duval with total a.s.surance.

"Very well. Let me go to the purpose of my call. I have three questions for you. If your answers are what I want, I'll have a fourth question. Are you ready?"

"Go ahead."

The first question was the feeler. He posed it. "Have you ever, at this stage in your progress, performed genetic modification and replacement for sarcoma in a human being?"

"No, not yet. But I have done other gene transplants successfully. Working in the area that Dr. Martin Cline pioneered in 1980 in California, I've treated persons afflicted with beta thala.s.semia-the blood disorder that is potentially fatal. I've conducted genetic-replacement experiments on these cases, introduced healthy genes into the defective cells, and I've had an extremely high rate of success."

"All right, my second question," said Kleinberg. "Could you undertake the same type of surgery in a sarcoma case?"

"Certainly. For some time I've been hoping to do so. It is the exact area I've been experimenting in. That is the final step I've been preparing for. I could do it"

"Third question. What would you predict would be your chances of success-a full recovery for the patient?"

"Presuming the patient is in an otherwise stable condition, why, I'd say chances for an effective surgery, a full recovery, would be seventy percent."

"That high?" with wonder.

"I'm conservative, Paul. Yes, at least that high."

"My last question was not my last question. It was merely a comment of surprise and, indeed, pleasure. Here is my fourth question. I guess the all-important one. Would you be willing to perform such an operation on a patient I have in my charge as soon as possible?"

"Why, you need only say when and I'd arrange my schedule somehow. a.s.suming I have the patient's unequivocal consent."

"I don't have that consent yet," Kleinberg admitted. "I wanted to speak to you first before speaking to the patient. a.s.suming I obtain consent, when would be the earliest you could proceed?"

"Where are we -- what day is this?"

"Thursday," said Kleinberg.

"I'm busy, you know, but I'm always busy. Perhaps the weekend would be best. Perhaps even Sunday. Yes, that might be possible."

"Would it be an imposition to ask if you could come down to Lourdes for the surgery? It would be more convenient at this end."

"Lourdes? Why not? I've wanted to visit the place ever since I read Carrel."

"It's as unusual, perhaps as remarkable, as Carrel reported."

"I'd look forward."

"Now I've got to get the patient's consent. To be honest with you, Maurice, I'm not sure I can do that. But I'm going to try very hard. She's a seriously ailing woman, but for personal reasons there may be formidable resistance. However, let me see. Meanwhile, in the event I can persuade her, you'll want to know her case history in advance."

"Certainly."

"There's an extensive file on her covering five years, right up to my own tests and X rays yesterday. It is really a unique case. Of course, I hate to bother you with all this if we can't go ahead."

"No bother, no bother. I'm eager to review the history."

"Thank you. I think what I'll do is fly my nurse, Esther Levinson, back to Paris with the file. She can deliver it to your office in the morning."

"Excellent."

One thing continued to bother Kleinberg, and he toyed with bring- ing it up frankly or keeping it to himself. He decided to get it off his chest. "Just one thing-"

"Yes. Paul?"

"I wonder how you can be so confident about using gene replacement on a human being when you've never attempted it on a human before?"

There was a long pause on the other end. Dr. Duval, usually so quick and direct on all questions, did not seem ready to answer this one. The silence stretched, and Kleinberg waited.

"Well," said Dr. Duval at last, "I-I can answer your question to your satisfaction, but what I will say to you must be strictly between us. This is a serious secret I am about to tell you."

"I promise you, it is between us. You have my pledge."

"Good enough," said Dr. Duval. "Why am I so confident my gene replacement can work on a human being? I will tell you. Because it has worked on a human being-on three, to be exact. I hed to you earlier, saying I've experimented only on animals, never on a human. I did employ the procedure, gene replacement, on three terminally ill patients outside Paris eighteen months ago. Two were sarcoma cases. All of them not only survived, but today all of them are well and active."

Kleinberg was astounded. "My G.o.d, Maurice, I never dreamed- why, I congratulate you. Once this is known, you will be nominated for the n.o.bel Prize. What a giant breakthrough."

"Thank you, thank you, but it will never be known. If it becomes known that I acted without permission of the medical conmiittees, the ethical committees, I will be severely punished. No, this procedure is not supposed to be ready for ten more years, maybe longer, while those committees weigh the propriety of using it on humans. When they give permission, then it can be done publicly. Meanwhile, a lot of good people, who could have been saved, are going to die. You understand, Paul, it's medical politics in the name of judicious caution."

"I understand."

"Initiative of the kind I have undertaken is not always appreciated. To mention our Dr. Chne in California once more. He used a recombinant molecule on one case in Naples and another in Jerusalem, and when it was found out, the U.S. National Inst.i.tute cancelled all of his research grants. I think he lost $250,000 in support. I couldn't afford that."

"You needn't worry, Maurice. Our medical colleagues will never know why you went to Lourdes. I've gotten a great lift out of everything you've just told me. And I really appreciate your getting involved with this case on such short notice."

"Paul, believe me, this is another opportunity and a challenge. Nfind you, and at the risk of repeating myself, it must all be done on the quiet. I don't even want to chance using any Lourdes hospital personnel. I prefer to get my a.s.sistants from among formers students I have in Lyons. So you see how cautious I have to be. Once again I say, I would find personal publicity disastrous. Since, for the fourth time, Fd be ignoring going through proper channels, there certainly would be a lot of noses out of joint, and it could cause me immeasurable harm and certainly the loss of most grants. Premature, the committees would insist. But you and I know that everything is premature until it is done."