Bless Me, Ultima: Chapters 16-19

And catechism loomed in the future for all of us.

His blind eye was a dark blue pit and the other glared yellow in the dust.

I found the courage to shout back, and I crossed my thumb over my first finger and held it up to ward off his evil, for I truly thought he was the reincarnation of the devil.

I shouted with defiance.

But where there is no acknowledgment of guilt and penance done for the wrong, there can be no forgiveness--

"Man was not made to know so much," the old ladies cried in hushed, hoarse voices.

The rich rancheros sucked the earth dry with their deep wells, and so the heavy snows had to come to replenish the water in the earth.

"Maybe it's like the priest said," I finally stammered, "maybe God puts obstacles in front of us so that we will have to overcome them.

The line moved past the water fonts where we wet our fin­gers and genuflected as we made the sign of the cross.

Venial sins were small sins, like saying bad words or not going to the Stations of the Cross during

If you died with a venial sin on your soul you could not enter heaven until the sin was absolved by prayers or rosaries or masses from your family on earth.

"Abel's right," Ernie said emphatically, "Florence needs the practice!

The wind whistled around the church, and as the sun sank in the west one penetrating ray of light gathered the colors of the stained glass window and softly laid them, like flowers, around the Virgin's altar.

They line up silently, eyes downcast, bony fingers counting the beads of the rosary, lips mumbling prayers.

Millions of worlds are born, evolve, and pass away into nebulous, unmeasured skies; and there is still eter­nity.

Each new question, each new cate­chism chapter, each new story seemed to open up a thousand facets concerning the salvation of my soul.

Inevitably it was he whom I saw burning in the roaring inferno of eternal damnation.

Then there was an interlude of silence while the priest and his attendants moved to the second station, Christ receiving
the cross.

Inside the prayers were like muffled cries against a storm which seemed to engulf the world.

I cried to appease them, "I shall be your priest!"

Florence was calmly accepting the sacrilegious game we were playing, but then it didn't matter to him, he didn't believe.

"That's enough practice," I said and started to take off the cumbersome costume, but they wouldn't let me.

He was long and sinewy, but because of his mild manner we had

They were gathering behind me now, I could feel their pres­ence and their hot, bitter breath.

There was a calm in the wind and the bright sunlight made everything stark and harsh.

The two lines stretched from the steps of the church out to the street The girls line was neat; they looked like angels in
their starched white dresses, each pair of hands holding a white prayer book and a rosary.

"It's blood now," Abel whispered when the priest raised the chalice with the wine, and his thin voice mixed mysteri­ously into the ringing altar bell.

I caught a glimpse of the small, white wafer, the risen Christ, and then I closed my eyes and felt the host placed on my tongue.

The mass was ending, the fleeting mystery was already vanish­ing.

I urgently asked Lloyd and clutched his arm.