The Sparrow

So he was glad of the respite and felt it a gift and thanked God for it. Marc and Sofia slept a great deal. D.W. did as well. A

George was subdued. His anodyne was to work on representing the lander fuel formula graphically, in anticipation of finding someone who might be willing and able to help them once they made contact with the city people. He was feeling worse than he let on, but George had A

Jimmy, of all of them, seemed the most serene, and it was plain why this should be so. He was unobtrusively attentive, alert to Sofia's needs as she recovered but to Marc's as well, Emilio noted. There was an appealing off-handedness and good humor to his courtship, for that was clearly what it was becoming. What Jimmy had said and done since Sofia's return was so well controlled, so generous and full of respect, that Emilio was sure it would be recognized and valued. And the love that underpi

It came to him then that there might be a child, human children on Rakhat. And that, Emilio thought, would be good. For Sofia and Jimmy. For all of them.

And so, in the quiet days that followed the crash, Emilio Sandoz turned inward for a time and probed the sense of mourning that had come over him, tried to understand why he felt so strongly that something inside him was dying.

Like all of them, he'd been badly rocked by the notion that they might never see Earth again. But as the shock wore off, so did the numbing sense of loss. Jimmy was right. Things could have been much worse; they had what they needed. They might yet get back to the Stella Maris, and if they didn't, there was still the real possibility of long-term survival here. Not just survival but a good life, full of learning, full of love, Emilio thought, and took a step closer to the death he felt inside himself.

He had, in the months since arriving on Rakhat, experienced a vast ocean of love and had been content to drift on it, not distinguishing degrees of intensity or relative depths of feeling. That he took pleasure in Sofia's company was undeniable, but it was hardly new. He had been, always, scrupulous in his behavior and even in his thoughts. He had concealed his own feelings and mastered them, and mastered them once more when he recognized that she'd fallen in love with him. They had shared work and humor and comradeship, and they had also shared self-restraint. And this increased his regard for Sofia, made it that much harder not to love her as George loved A

Unbidden, the thought came. Rabbis marry. Ministers marry. And he told himself that, yes, if he were a rabbi or a minister, he would love her as a whole man and thank God for her every day. And if he were an Aztec, he thought ruthlessly, he'd cut the hearts from the living breasts of his enemies and offer blood to the sun. And if he were Tibetan, he'd spin prayer wheels. But he was none of those things. He was a Jesuit, and his path was different.

What was dying, he recognized in those quiet hours, was the possibility of himself as a husband and a father. More: as Sofia's husband and the father of her children. He had not truly understood that he'd kept part of his soul open to that possibility until he'd seen Sofia in Jimmy Qui

This was, he thought, the first time that celibacy would truly rob him of something. Before, he was aware of the clarity, the singleness of purpose, the concentration of energy, the gifts bestowed by the discipline. Now, he was aware in some much deeper way, not of sexual famine, which was familiar, but of the loss of human intimacy, the sacrifice of human closeness. He felt with an almost physical pain what it would mean to renounce his last opportunity to love Sofia, what it would mean to free her to love Jimmy, who would surely cherish her as dearly as Emilio might have himself. For he was honest with himself: before Sofia turned to another, she would look to him for some sign. If he made any move to encourage her love of him, he had to be prepared to meet it wholly. He knew D.W. and Marc would accept it, that George and A

So here it was. A time to ratify or to repudiate a vow made in youth and ignorance, to be lived out in maturity and in full understanding. A time to weigh the extraordinary and spiritual and fathomless beauty that God had shown him against the ordinary and worldly and incalculable sweetness of human love and family. A moment to consider if he would trade everything he had hoped for and had been given as a priest for everything he yearned for and desired as a man.

He did not flinch from the knife. He cut the thread cleanly, a priest in perpetuity. God had been generous with him. He could not stint in return. It did not occur to him to wonder then if Sofia Mendes had been as much a gift from God as all the rest of the love he'd been offered, or if he had been God's gift to her. Two thousand years of theology spoke, five hundred years of Jesuit tradition spoke, his own life to that moment spoke.

God was silent on the matter.

Later that day, Sofia met his eyes as he watched her accept a cup of coffee and a sandwich from Jimmy, who made a comic display of his knightly service. Emilio saw Sofia read him and then look to Jim: already a dear friend, steady and good and strong and patient. He saw her pause and consider, and he felt at that moment like a woman giving a child to adoptive parents—certain it was the right thing, best for the beloved child, good for all. But the grief was real.

Having made his decision, he bided his time, waiting for the right moment for his next move. It came during the quiet of midmorning a week or so later when Marc and Sofia, bruises fading to yellow and green, were moving with notably less lamentation, D.W.'s color was better and George had pulled out of his gloom. Everyone seemed rested.

"I have been considering my present situation," Emilio Sandoz a

"Bacalaitos fritos," Jimmy said. Emilio moaned in agreement.

"Beignets with powdered sugar," Marc said wistfully.

"French fries," George sighed.

"Cheese puffs," A

"Chicken-fried steak," D.W. said. And added, "Hell. Steak, period."

Sofia stood, creaking a little, and started toward the terrace.

"Mendes, where you goin'?" D.W. called.

"To the grocery store."

D.W. looked at Sofia as though she'd just revealed a second head. But A

Sandoz clapped once, delighted to be understood, and at that the men jumped up to join A