He lifted the Bushnells and focused. The water was astonishingly clear — he could even see His submerged ears, the anchor chains spilling from their interiors like silver pus. Twenty-four hours earlier, Rafferty had taken an exploration party over in the Juan Fernandez. After sailing into the placid cove bounded by the lee biceps and the corresponding bosom, they’d managed to lash an inflatable wharf in place, using armpit hairs as bollards, then rappel up the great cliff of flesh. Hiking across the chest, walking around on the sternum, the chief mate and his team had heard nothing they could honestly call heartbeats. Anthony hadn’t expected they would. And yet he remained cautiously optimistic: cardiovascular stasis wasn’t the same thing as brain death. Who could deny that a neuron or two might be perking away under that fifteen-foot-thick skull?

The captain changed channels, broadcasting to the men by the windlasses. “Ready on the afterdeck?”

The assistant engineers plucked the walkie-talkies from their belts. “Port windlass ready,” said Lou Chickering in his actor’s baritone.

“Starboard windlass ready,” said Bud Ramsey.

“Release devil’s claws,” said Anthony.

Both engineers sprang into action.

“Port claw released.”

“Starboard claw released.”

“Engage wildcats,” the captain ordered.

“Port cat in.”

“Starboard in.”

“Kill brakes.”

“Port brake gone.”

“Starboard gone.”

Anthony raised his forearm to his mouth and gave dear Lorelei a kiss. “Okay, boys — let’s reel Him in.”

“Port motor on,” said Chickering.

“Starboard on,” said Ramsey.

Spewing black smoke, belching hot steam, the wildcats began to turn, raveling up the great steel chains. One by one, the links rose out of the sea, dripping foam and spitting spray. They slithered through the chocks, arched over the devil’s claws, and dropped into the whelps like skee-balls scoring points.

“I need lead lengths, gentlemen. Call ’em out.”

“Two thousand yards on the port chain,” said Chickering.

“Two thousand on the starboard,” said Ramsey.

“Marbles, let’s get under way! Forty rpm’s, if you please!”

“Aye! Forty!”

“Fifteen hundred on the port chain!”

“Fifteen hundred on the starboard!”

Anthony and the chief mate had been up all night poring over Rafferty’s U.S. Navy Salvor’s Handbook. With a tow this prodigious, a gap of more than eleven hundred yards would render the Val unsteerable. But a short leash, under nine hundred yards, could mean trouble too: if she suddenly slowed for any reason — a snapped shaft, a blown boiler — the cargo would plow into her stern through sheer momentum.

“Fifty rpm’s!” Anthony ordered.

“Fifty!” said Rafferty.

“Speed?”

“Six knots!”

“Steady, Weisinger!” Anthony told the quartermaster.

“Steady!” the AB echoed.

The chains kept coming, over the windlasses and through the hatches, filling the cavernous steel lockers like performing cobras returning to their wicker baskets after a hard day’s work.

“One thousand yards on the port chain!”

“One thousand on the starboard!”

“Speed?”

“Seven knots!”

“Brakes!” screamed Anthony into the walkie-talkie.

“Port brake on!”

“Starboard on!”

“Sixty rpm’s!”

Sixty!

Both windlasses stopped instantly, screeching and smoking as they showered the afterdeck with bright orange sparks.

“Disengage wildcats!”

“Port cat gone!”

“Starboard gone!”

“Hook claws!”

“Port claw hooked!”

“Starboard hooked!”

Something was wrong. The carcass’s speed had doubled, eight knots at least. Briefly Anthony imagined some supernatural jolt galvanizing the divine nervous system, though the real explanation, he suspected, lay in a sudden conjunction of the Guinea Current and the Southeast Trades. He lowered the binoculars. The Corpus Dei surged forward, crushingly, inexorably, spindrift flying from its crown as it bore down on the tanker like some primordial torpedo.

The prudent tactic was obvious: unlock the cats, free the chains, hard right rudder, full speed ahead.

But Anthony hadn’t been hired to play it safe. He’d been hired to bring God north, and while he didn’t relish the thought of presiding over the Valparaíso’s second collision in two years, either this damn rig worked or it didn’t. “Marbles, eighty rpm’s!”

“Eighty?”

“Eighty!”

“Eighty!” said the mate.

“Speed?”

“Nine knots!”

Nine, good: faster, surely, than the oncoming corpse. He studied the chains. No slack! No slack, and the ship was moving! “Quartermaster, ten degrees left rudder!” Lifting the binoculars, laughing into the wind, the captain studied His vast shining brow. “Course three-five-zero!”

“Three-five-zero!” said Weisinger.

Anthony pivoted toward the bow. “All engines ahead full!” he shouted to Rafferty, and they were off — off like some grandiose water-skiing act, off like some demented rendition of Achilles dragging Hector around the walls of Troy, off like some absurdist advertisement for Boys Town, USA, the angelic youngster bearing his crippled brother on his back (He ain’t heavy, Father, He’s my Creator) — off, towing Jehovah.

Part Two

TEETH

AS THE BURDENED Valparaíso crawled north through the Gulf of Guinea, Cassie Fowler realized that her desire to see their cargo destroyed was more complicated than she’d initially supposed. Yes, this body threatened to further empower the patriarchy. Yes, it was a terrible blow to reason. But something else was going on, something a bit more personal. If her dear Oliver could actually bring off such a spectacular feat, successfully applying his brains and wealth toward God’s obliteration, he would emerge in her eyes as a hero, second only to Charles Darwin. She might even, after all these years, acquiesce to Oliver’s longstanding proposal of marriage.

On July 14, at 0900, Cassie went to the radio shack and made her pitch to Lianne “Sparks” Bliss. They must send Oliver a secret fax. Immediate and total sabotage was required. The future of feminism hung in the balance.

Not that she didn’t love Oliver as he was: a sweet man, a committed atheist, and probably the best president the Central Park West Enlightenment League had ever had — yet also, Cassie felt, a castaway like herself, shipwrecked on the shores of his own essential uselessness, not just a Sunday painter but a Sunday human being. How better for a person to acquire some self-respect than to save Western Civilization from a return to misogynist theocracy?

“The future of feminism?” said Lianne, nervously fingering her crystal pendant. “Are you serious?”

“Deadly,” said Cassie.

“Yeah? Well, nobody except Father Thomas is allowed to contact the outside world. Captain’s orders.”

“Lianne, this damn body is exactly what the patriarchy has been waiting for — evidence that the world was created by the male chauvinist bully of the Old Testament.”

“Okay, but even if we did send a message, would your skeptic friends believe you?”

“Of course my skeptic friends wouldn’t believe me. They’re skeptics. They’d have to fly over, take pictures, argue among themselves…”

“Forget it, sweetie. I could get booted out of the Merchant Marine for something like this.”

“The future of feminism, Lianne…”

“I said forget it.”

The next morning, Cassie tried again.

“Century after century of phallocratic oppression, and finally women are gaining some ground. And now — bang — it’s back to square one.”

“Aren’t you overreacting a bit? We’re gonna bury the thing, not put it on fucking Oprah.”

“Yeah, but what’s to prevent somebody from happening on the tomb in a year or two and spilling the beans?”