Continued from Episode 7 – HERE
The door swung shut behind us with a click that sounded like a trap snapping on a rat that thought it was in charge.
The conference room reeked of pumpkin spice coffee and betrayal. Bishop F. Atticus McButterpants perched at the round table, cheeks pink from whatever catered buffet he’d demolished, his face caught between boredom and the creeping suspicion that the collection plate had a hole in it.
Clerics and lay “facilitators” tilted their heads toward the simpering priest. Hugalot froze like a French mime in mid-gesture.
Patsy Meeks loomed behind the bishop. When her eyes locked on us, they went flat and bright, like a serpent sizing up a couple of careless field mice.
The bishop perked up. “Father Tommy! What…um…what are you doing here? It’s wonderful to see you, but…I never thought…”.
Tommy stepped closer. Hugalot shrank back like a … French mime.
“You never thought I’d come to a meeting like this? You’re right, Your Excellency,” Tommy said, voice steady. “Under normal circumstances, I wouldn’t be caught dead…”—he shot a cold glance at Hugalot — “…except to end the monstrous betrayal of your good-natured desire to make everyone happy.”
“Father. Detective.” Meeks’s smile was all laminate and lemon. “We weren’t expecting you.”
Tommy’s cassock whispered like a warning as he stepped to the projection system. The bishop’s bleary eyes landed on me like I was a package dropped at the wrong door.
“Tracer Bullet? Tommy? What is this? Why is the legendary private eye with you?” He tried to straighten up. “You’d better explain right now.”
Tommy held up the USB drive, letting the overhead lights glint off the plastic. Then he slotted it into the port, and the projector whirred to life.
“Your Excellency,” he said, voice pitched just loud enough, “we have reason to believe this listening circle is more of a pressure chamber. You’ve been fed false information. They even sent letters in your name to the Nuncio.”
At the word Nuncio, the bishop’s color drained as fast as the coffers in the diocese’s quarterly reports.
Meeks folded her arms, voice dripping acid. “We were clarifying the bishop’s pastoral instincts for him.”
Tommy began scrolling images across the screen—memos, doctored letters, emails with timestamps that told the real story.
“This one,” I said, tapping a line with the laser pointer, “quotes you endorsing ‘the absolute retirement’ of the Traditional Latin Mass, ripping out altar rails, forbidding Latin and ad orientem worship, Roman vestments, kneeling for Communion, reception on the tongue. You even suggest bullying little girls for wearing a chapel veil like their mothers.”
In the silence there was an audible gasp from the bishop. “I NEVER….
Fr. Tommy continued like he was reading last rites, voice low and unhurried, “… all for the sake of unity and congruence with Vatican II.”
As the priest concluded I added, “We know you didn’t do these things, Bishop. They did, in your name. They diced and spliced your words counting on the fact that you didn’t know what you didn’t know.”
The bishop’s mouth worked silently. “I…I never wanted to eliminate anything. I mean, I’m not into that stuff… but… but…I just asked for feedback. Dialogue!”
Meeks stepped forward, voice sharpened to a scalpel. “With respect, Bishop, people are tired of kneeling and Latin. They want something expressive. Something that breathes.”
I flicked to another slide.
“Bishop, we have proof Ms. Meeks and C.I.L.I. fabricated opposition to the TLM and pre-drafted statements claiming your support. They built a false consensus to manipulate your decisions. They lied to the Nuncio about you. Here’s the proof.”
I pulled the USB drive and slid it across the table to the Bishop’s pudgy hand, his ring in the florescent light looking like a gold-plated manhole cover waiting for some poor sap to fall through. He hesitated, index hovering over the plastic as if it might bite. Maybe it would. In this town, secrets had sharper teeth than truth ever did.
The bishop sagged back, all pretense evaporating. “This stops. Tonight. Meeks, you’re relieved of any liturgical duties. The Council is suspended pending canonical review.”
“I’ll inform the Nuncio myself,” Tommy said.
Meeks wheeled toward us, eyes bright with murderous calculation.
Then a bark echoed in the hall through the door. Not a normal bark. More like the sound a drywall sheet might make if it was being exorcised.
Fr. Tommy fixed his eyes on Patsy Meeks.
“That’d be Chester,” he said.
TO BE CONTINUED….
ANNOUNCER (rich world-weary baritone):
Meanwhile, white to move and mate in 5. Can you find it? 
