Whereabouts Unknown by Richard Probert

Author:Richard Probert
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Beaufort Books
Published: 2021-04-15T00:00:00+00:00

Jim

1974–1975

18

Anna’s parting words “I love you Jim Robertson, don’t you forget that” stuck with me the entire time I was away. There were lonely times to be sure. But it felt good to be back doing what I was meant to do.

It took two days driving the eight-hundred mile journey to Newark. I followed the directions I had written out earlier. I drove up Bloomfield Avenue, turned right onto Clifton, and parked in front of the Sacred Heart Cathedral. I’d been to lots of churches with Sal, but this one was different. It was magnificent—overwhelming, almost. Two-story, double-hung bronze doors welcomed visitors inside—or kept them out. Sal once said that carvings mean nothing until they’re in the place they were designed for. “You see a statue all done, sitting on the carving floor, and it’s one thing,” he’d said. “You set it up in the church or courtyard or whatever, and you got something else. If you do your job right, it becomes sacred.”

When I stepped through those big doors, Sal’s words came to life. Everywhere I looked there were carvings: saints, angels, shepherds, popes, stations of the cross, Mary, Joseph, Jesus, the Disciples, balustrades, flying buttresses, arcs, lintels…the quantity and variety of the pieces were staggering.

When I’d first seen the place from the outside, I’d thought it would be dark as midnight in there, but it was sparkling. Light shot in from big stained-glass windows, coloring the air in a manner I’d never experienced. Long, low oak pews stretched to the far walls to my right and left. By the time I reached the altar, I felt smaller than a scared private on his first day of boot camp. Exposed. As if I’d done something bad. I stopped at the altar rail and gazed up at the vaulted ceiling soaring roughly 200 feet above me. A massive crucifix hung directly over my head. I almost fell over backwards looking up at it.

“Excuse me. Excuse me, young man. May I help you?” The voice came from everywhere and nowhere. I turned nearly in a circle before I saw a tall man dressed in a black, floor-length robe. It was like he had come out of nowhere.

“I’m Jim Robertson. Here to work on the stone,” I blurted. “My bus is parked out front.”

“I’m sorry…bus?” said the priest.

“My work bus. I have my shop in it, and—”

“Your shop?”

I took a deep breath and started over. I explained that I’d been sent to repair a carving of John the Baptist that had been damaged.

“I’m supposed to see a Mr. Byers.”

“Oh…yes,” said the priest, a light finally dawning. “It’s in the baptistery. Superintendent Byers takes care of the edifice.” He swept his arm around his head. “Isn’t it grand?”

“It certainly is,” I said earnestly. “It must have taken quite a while to complete it.”

“Oh, it did, young man. We started it in 1898, but with the wars and all, work was halted and resumed numerous times. We didn’t hold our first service here until 1954.

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