The Fancy Dancer

room was not luxurious, but it was big and comfortable, with leather chairs and filing cabinets and framed prints of Raphael madonnas on the walls. He peered at me over his bifocals.
    “Well?” he said.
    I tried to look as though the evening had been as dull and predictable as a low mass.
    “It broke the ice, and I’m pretty hopeful. I’d like to get him to go back to school too. Once he gets himself straightened out, it’ll be the logical thing for him.”
    “So far so good,” said Father Vance. “Off to bed with you now.”
    In the dark of my bedroom, I lay on my hard single 66
    bed in my bine pajamas, arms behind my head, and stared up at the ceiling. The whiskey was wearing off, and I couldn’t sleep. Outside the open window, the breeze rustled in the dripping lilac leaves.
    My bedroom was another afterthought—it was next to the kitchen, and had once been a live-in room. Mrs. Bircher’s home was three blocks away, so she didn’t need it. The old potbellied stove still stood by the wall, and the floor was covered with worn ancient red linoleum. I had covered it with some rag rugs to take away its chill.
    There was a small closet for my clothes and books, a table and chair for reading, a wastebasket, and a little portable Sony color TV my folks had given me. On the wall there was a crucifix, and a framed reproduction of Van Eyck’s St. Cecilia playing the organ, which my mother had given me. On the other side of the narrow bed, the old lace curtains moved gently at the window.
    The image of Vidal returned to haunt me in that room, with more force than ever before. I began to feel it not just in my mind, but in my bones. He was defending himself from the faith that I represented with the following weapons: an imbecile wife, a baby not his, a motorcycle, a whiskey bottle, and a poster of a fancy dancer. And he said he was happy.
    My job as a priest would be to convince him that he was unhappy. Did I have the right to do that? I was hungry to see him again. But our friendship would have to seem as respectable as possible to my pastor.
    Sleep was impossible, so I finally reached out and turned on the little TV and watched the “Late Late Show” for a while. The volume had to stay down, or Father Vance would complain. The movie was Paths of Glory with Kirk Douglas. But even the carnage in the trenches didn’t seem too real to me.
    One of the best-kept secrets of the Catholic priesthood is the number of priests who watch the late movie when they’ve got something on their mind.
    When Vidal came for counseling the next Monday, I still hadn’t heard from Meg about whether she’d go to the home in Helena, and I was a little worried.
    Vidal had the flu. I was impressed by the stubbornness and sincerity that impelled him out of bed and up to St. Mary’s. He sat hunched with aches and chills in the schoolroom chair.
    ‘You must really have a lot on your mind,” I said, fishing a bottle of aspirin out of my desk drawer.
    “I do,” he said. His eyes were dull with fever.
    Going back to the kitchen, I got a glass of water for him.
    He tried to kid me. “Will you play the organ at my funeral, Father?”
    “Get out of here and go home to bed,” I told him. “Call me when you’re better and we’ll make another appointment.”
    It was just as well he went, because the materials hadn’t come yet that Father Matt was sending me in the mail. The very next morning after that strange evening at Vidal’s house, I had called him frantically in Helena with my SOS. To deal with Vidal, I felt I had to know a lot more.
    “Homosexuals are the toughest cases,” Father Matt had said over the phone. “YouVe got to have a heap of patience and compassion to bring them around. And firmness. You have to be firm with them. But don’t expect results overnight. Frankly, just between you and me, the success rate is pretty low. The only ones I’ve had luck with were priests who could be motivated to protect their ministry.”
    “Priests?” I had said.
    “Good Lord, Tom, are you that naive? We have priests who drink and chase women and even a few who use dope. Why shouldn’t we have priests who are homosexuals?”
    “I just never thought about it,” I said.
    “Well, I have a couple of things here that I can put in the mail to you. Then the next time you come to Helena, we can talk about it in detail. Oh, and Tom?” “Yes, Father?”
    “Pray for him. Pray hard.”
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    On Tuesday morning, when I dropped