Authors: Enrique Laso
Padre Salas (7 page)
Padre Rincón approached his teacher, and placed a hand on his shoulder. He was much younger, and even he was now exhausted: he could not even imagine how Padre Salas must be feeling.
“Shall we rest?”
“No, we should continue... The demon is growing increasingly weak, and we can’t allow him to draw a single breath.”
“We’ve barely slept in the last 48 hours.”
Padre Rincon’s voice became mixed in with the cries of the little girls, who were next to them. They were cries that sounded
too human
, very far removed from the guttural shrieks they had been accustomed to.
“Did you hear that?” asked Padre Salas, excited.
“Yes, it seems as if they’re suffering again.”
“No, no, it’s a sign! Those cries were from the girls; they didn’t belong to the beast. Quickly, get the Holy Water, right now!”
Padre Rincón went running to the office, and returned a moment later with a bottle of Holy Water. Padre Salas, on his part, held in his hands the crucifix that had been presiding over the warehouse.
“What do I do?”
“Sprinkle the girls’ bodies with the Holy Water.”
Padre Rincón obeyed. Whilst the holy water fell onto the straitjackets, a dense, greyish fog came out through the mouths, ears, and noses of the girls. Cries, screams and moans mixed together, as if a great multitude had congregated within the body of each one of the children. Padre Salas gripped tightly onto the crucifix, and began to exclaim, in an imperative voice:
“I exorcise you, Beelzebub, trickster of mankind! Leave the bodies of these girls, manifestations of God! Leave them, for God made them holy temples! Leave, Beelzebub, in the name of God! Leave, Beelzebub, by the faith and the prayer of the Church, by the sign of the Holy Cross, by our Lord Jesus Christ!”
Padre Rincón joined Padre Salas, holding the crucifix high in his hands. The family members, in terror, were squeezed together into one corner of the room, watching the terrible spectacle, powerless. One by one, the girls, with unusual strength, began tearing at the straitjackets and the ropes still tied around their legs. The cries and howls mixed in with the priests commanding voices, who repeated the litany tirelessly, again and again.
Suddenly, all was quiet. All of them plunged into absolute silence, waiting. With a gesture, Padre Salas calmed and restrained Padre Rincón, as he had made to go towards the girls, who appeared to be lying lifelessly on the mats. Then, the nine girls turned in unison, face up, and opened their eyes, completely awake. Some seconds later, thousands of black flies began to break free from their mouths, escaping from the warehouse through an open window, and a crack in the front door. The buzzing of the insects’ wings was deafening, and provoked a panic. Ten minutes passed before the girls stopped releasing flies from their mouths, and at that moment they appeared to awaken from an incredibly long sleep, and burst into tears. It was a clean and pitiful cry of human beings. Everyone present understood that the nightmare had ended, and that Magdalena, Camila, Zoé, Ximena, Natalia, Adelina, Vanessa, Gabriela and Daniela were back.
“Is it over?” asked Padre Rincón, stunned.
“Yes, my son, it’s over. It’s all finished,” replied Padre Salas, with tears in his eyes.
Padre Rincón could not contain himself, and went to hug the little ones, and their parents. They were all crying and giving thanks to God. Everybody felt that this was the happiest day of their lives.
Padre Salas returned to the little warehouse office, and allowed himself to sink heavily into a chair. He was afraid, and gripping onto the Saint Benedict medal, he said the Lord’s Prayer. It was in that moment that he understood that the Spanish journalist had played a crucial role in the miracle, by destroying the cursed pyramid, and would have surely paid a heavy price for his audacity. That gesture of infinite generosity, for which he was not prepared, had, at least, been key in the salvation of the nine innocent souls.
XIX. Metropolitan Cathedral, Mexico City
The right hand man of the Prime Archbishop of Mexico approached Padre Salas, walking calmly, but mournfully.
“Have you really decided to leave?”
“There’s no other option.”
“I believe there’s always another option. We weren’t mistaken in thinking of you, when I visited you at your little church in Coyoacán.”
Padre Salas could not avoid remembering his parish with resignation, as he would never be returning to them.
“This time, I need to hide much further away.”
“Where are you going to go?”
“I don’t think I’ll tell you, and you don’t want me to lie to you.”
“Of course I don’t. But think about all the good you could keep doing here, in your own country, in Mexico. Evil never rests.”
“Believe me, I know.”
The Archbishop’s right-hand man held out a copy of
Las Noticias
from the previous day.
“Have you read this article yet?”
“No, to be honest.”
“I didn’t think so. Keep it, it’s interesting; although there’s a lot of artistic licence in the last bit.”
“I’m not interested. A man has been condemned for all eternity by his own imprudence, by my blunder and, finally, by his immeasurable generosity. That is the only true thing.”
“If, in the end, you decide to change your mind, we’ll be waiting.”
“I doubt I will change my mind.”
The right hand of the Prime Archbishop of Mexico embraced Padre Salas, for a few seconds, as if through such an unusual and close gesture, he would be able to achieve what he had not been able to through words.
“We’re going to miss you. Myself, and many other people in need.”
“I’m in no condition to help anybody. I’ve made myself a danger, and I hope to liberate myself from the evil that stalks me. Only God and prayer can save my soul now.”
Padre Salas did not say any more. He left the cathedral, and the Plaza de la Constitución, reflecting on where his next destination would be. No sooner had he stepped onto the street, he came across a swarm of black flies, thronged around some object on the ground. The priest knew that this was no coincidence, and that these insects were a message sent directly to him from Hell. Fortunately, Zócalo was a bustling hive of vehicles and people at this time, and that calmed him. He had not been transparent with the Archbishop’s right hand man, and had not told him that he was fleeing Mexico for one sound reason: Beelzebub was coming back, lying in wait for him, and Baal was circling in some strange way throughout his insides. Now, whenever he looked at himself in the mirror, he no longer saw his own face: he saw the deformed head of a large insect, with white-hot pupils. It was such a horrifying scene, that he was rendered both paralysed and subjugated at the same time. He gripped tightly onto the Saint Benedict medal, which he had in his pocket, and picked up his pace. He had already decided on the destination for his retreat to prayer and devotion to God: he would escape to Spain, to Madrid. Perhaps there, the
Lord of the Flies
would forget about an insignificant priest who had dared to challenge him, and who had also triumphed on several occasions. Perhaps in the capital of the
motherland
he would find the ideal pardon, even from the demon itself, for his repeated acts of defiance.
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