‘Yes. Even such a thing as that.’
‘She seems to know only what a wolf knows.’
‘But knowledge of God is the precise difference between a human being and an animal.’
‘So in the mountains, in the dark cave, in the bitter snows, with no tenderness but that of a wolf for a whelp and not a word spoken to her, you say that child knew God?’
‘If she could speak and answer questioning, she would tell you that she did. That she knew of an immanence all around her, sustaining all things, though she knew it nameless.’
‘Could she be taught to speak, I wonder?’ Severo was thinking aloud, but Beneditx at once said, his face lit with eagerness, ‘It would have to be in seclusion; her teachers would have to vow to make no mention of God and to refrain from teaching religion. Then when she spoke it would prove beyond doubt what has often been in dispute. Nobody has been able to make trial of this before; it would involve a deliberate cruelty to a human child. But this child having been raised apart from all society by accident . . .’
‘There is no such thing as an accident, Brother,’ said Severo gently. ‘Not even falling in the sea.’
‘An accident as far as human purpose is concerned. The cruelty is that of the wild beast which stole the child. But out of it good may come; we may find proof absolute that every soul knows God. Who is to say whether perhaps in the providence of God this is the reason why he allowed such a thing to happen to the child? And I have no doubt that the proof would force you to do what I see that you are reluctant to do, and condemn the atheist.’
Severo considered his friend’s words. It seemed to him that Beneditx’s mind had not wholly caught up with his body – that he was still engrossed in his books and had not recovered the knack of attending to the material world. That would be why Palinor seemed to him less of a conundrum than he seemed to Severo, why Beneditx could encompass him so easily in a statement of principle.
‘Beneditx, are you not struck by his courage?’ Severo asked. ‘When it would be so easy simply to lie, and evince opinions which would lead us to free him? When you come to think of it, a man who believes in God might expect punishment for lying about his inner state of mind; God knows the secrets of all hearts. But one who does not believe in God should feel free to lie with impunity and say anything we want to hear. He told the adjudicators that such a lie would demean him. Are you not impressed?’
‘Like you, I cannot see why he should be honest. And it does him credit, I admit.’
‘And Beneditx, should we not be able to convince him by argument?’
Beneditx said, ‘It is difficult to proceed against the errors of one single individual. Firstly, because the remarks of individual sacrilegious men are not so well known to us that we may use what they say as the basis for proceeding to a refutation of their errors. The fathers of the church refuted the errors of the gentiles when they had lived amongst gentiles and knew well what positions such men were inclined to take. Whereas we know nothing of Aclar.’
‘He is willing enough to tell us about it. What you need to know about the beliefs of Aclar in order to refute them can be obtained from him by question.’
‘Well. But further, Severo, remember that this man does not agree with us in accepting the authority of any scripture by which he might be convinced of his error. Against Jews we can argue by means of the Old Testament, and against heretics by means of the New, but against this man . . .’
‘We must therefore have recourse to natural reason, to which all men are forced to give their assent. Did you not teach, Beneditx, that although some truths about God exceed all the ability of human reason, others, like the fact of his existence, can be reached by it?’
‘Yes. All the doctors hold that the existence of God lies within the scope of proof.’
‘Then this is what I shall do,’ said Severo. The power that he held was like a sword, seldom taken from the wall, but always wielded in earnest. He had considered carefully, he had listened to the scholarly advice of his mentor and friend. But decision fell to him, and now he had decided. ‘I will see if the wolf-child can be taught to speak and discover to us if she knows of God without instruction. And I will detain the atheist to await the outcome. But it will take some time and may not be possible at all. Therefore, meanwhile, you will argue with Palinor and by the light of reason prove God to him. He has a soul worth saving. Save him for me, Beneditx.’
9
In some ways, it seemed to Severo, Jaime resembled the great and learned Beneditx. Both saw with the eye of faith. One saw innate knowledge of God, and the other saw a human soul in a creature degraded to the likeness of a wolf. Jaime had saved the snow-child twice – once from death at the moment of capture, and again from death by starvation in unkind hands. No-one could doubt his faith, or his charity. But the third virtue also was needed for life in this world, and perhaps the third virtue, hope, was the most fragile. It was baptism Jaime had sought for the child; and since Beneditx seemed to think that baptism did not affect the question of knowledge one way or the other, Severo could see no reason to disappoint him. The child was already a crushing burden on the young man’s green, untempered, and uneducated spirit.
Towards sunset, therefore, Severo took Rafal with him and went to the mason’s yard. Jaime was there, keeping his watch, sitting on a barrel and cutting a whistle from a length of wood. As she usually was at dusk, the snow-child was awake, snuffling and running in her cage, pawing at the ground with her hands as though she might have been seeking to dig herself out.
‘Have you thought of a name for her?’ Severo asked. ‘We are going to baptize her.’
‘Now, Holiness?’
‘Now.’
‘Holiness, I do not think we can take her to the font in the baptistry. She will resist, howl, foul the floors . . .’
‘No need, Jaime. Baptism is as valid under the open skies as under the grandest roof. Indeed, what church is roofed as splendidly as the open air by the setting sun? All we need is a little water. Can you bring her to me?’
Jaime opened the cage door cautiously and drew it shut behind him. The child backed away to the far corner, snarling, a soft and warning sound. The bared teeth caught the low rays of the sun behind Severo, showing yellowish between her rolled-back lips, and her eyes returned an alien reflected glare. Jaime was talking to her, saying, ‘Come, little one . . . no harm, little one . . .’ She sprang at him at the same moment as he sprang at her. She knocked him flying, and they rolled over and over in the dust. Jaime’s arms were clasped round her belly, but her arms were free. They heard him cry in agony as she mauled him, clawing at his face, sinking her teeth in the thick of his arm.
‘In the name of Christ . . . can we help?’ cried Severo to Rafal.
Rafal picked up a balk of timber and entered the cage. Waiting for his moment, he struck the child with it. She released her grip on Jaime and turned on Rafal, snarling round his ankles, but the swinging folds of his soutane were all she got a grip on with her snapping teeth. Jaime got up and, picking up a piece of canvas, threw it over the child. ‘Get some rope,’ he said in a shaking voice. Severo ran to bring it, to pass it into the cage. The two men struggled together to tie the child firmly into the bundle, only her head emerging. The bundle heaved and fought in their arms. They could not hold her.
‘Put her down,’ said Severo. They put her on one of the blocks of stone, like Isaac on the altar.
‘You are hurt, Jaime,’ said Severo. ‘I am sorry; I did not realize . . .’
‘I will manage, Holiness. I will get bandages when the thing is done . . .’
‘Her name, then?’ But Jaime, blood flowing from wounds in his face, his sleeve soaking darkly, swayed on his feet and did not answer.
‘A black and bitter name!’ said Rafal.
‘Amara, then,’ said Severo. ‘In Latin, “bitter”,’ he explained to Jaime.
And as he poured the water over the filthy forehead of the creature, looking down he saw its e
yes rolling in its head, and the features twisted into an expression of blind terror, as though the devil himself were within the child, and facing the presence of God.
‘I baptize you,’ he said, ‘Amara . . .’ He would have added, ‘And God have mercy on you!’ but he stopped himself just in time; for was it not to be forbidden to mention God to her?
Because Jaime was bleeding, they dumped Amara back in her cage and left her tied up, and Rafal took him in haste to the infirmary. Jaime did not sleep in the yard that night, but in Severo’s cell, Severo’s bed, while Severo, returning late from penitential prayer, stretched out on the floor instead of waking the boy.
In the morning he sent Jaime away. ‘You have done well in this, Jaime, my brother,’ he said. ‘You have known in your heart what wiser men should have known, and I commend you. I am making a gift to you; I am giving you gold enough to buy three fields or so. Make the most of it; I will not be sympathetic if you return to me asking for more.’
‘But Holiness, what will become of her?’
‘You are still troubled by that, after what she did to you last night?’
‘But Holiness, she does not know what she is doing . . . and . . .’
‘And?’
‘I so pity her.’
‘Listen, Jaime. On your obedience to our Holy Mother the Church; on your obedience to me, your prince and your cardinal; on your hope of heaven and fear of hell, I command you to go your way and think of her no more.’
‘I will obey you if I can,’ said the boy, dejectedly. ‘But I don’t know if I can help thinking of her. Since the moment that we found her . . .’
‘You must treat such thoughts like thoughts of lust, or impulses of anger; avoid them if you can, confess them as sins if you cannot.’
‘Yes, Holiness. But . . . what will you do with her?’
‘Did you not hear what I commanded you? Go!’
10
The nuns of Sant Clara were thrown into extreme panic by the announcement of an unexpected visit from the cardinal. The messenger said he was already on the road and would be with them by nightfall. Armed with dusters and beeswax, the sisterhood attacked the fabric of the building, rubbing woodwork into fragrant gloss, washing floors, burnishing the silver on the chapel altar, emptying vases and cutting fresh flowers from the gardens, crushing lavender between muslins to hang in the guest-house, hoeing the weeds mercilessly in the garden in the cloister courtyard, dragging the plough and harrow into a tidy corner of the farm – one task no sooner accomplished than someone thought of another. One would have thought it probable that the cardinal in Ciudad had heard rumours of slack housekeeping at Sant Clara, and had come looking for a mote of dust to reproach them with. If he came looking for uncleanness, however, as the abbess well knew, it would be of a less literal sort. She summoned Sor Agnete to her office after the Angelus, and closed the door.
‘Tell me I am right, Sister. We could not have given scandal of any kind? None of the sisterhood has committed a crime?’
‘Likely to have reached the ears of the cardinal?’ said Sor Agnete. ‘Certainly not, Mother. By the grace of God this is an orderly and a peaceful house. The worst a sister might have done is fall asleep during late office, or forget to milk a goat.’
The abbess nodded.
‘We are all well known to each other,’ Sor Agnete added, ‘except the new novice. And she is harmless.’
‘Yes, yes. Then it is not scandal that brings him.’
‘What put such a thing into your head?’ said Sor Agnete. ‘He is in need of a little peace and quiet, and some of Sor Coloma’s pasque-bread, more likely!’
Josefa, meanwhile, was working hard, and in a daze, for the crisis had engulfed the place when she had barely learned her way around it. She had swept the yard, washed the flagstones of the kitchen floor with milk – an instruction she had accepted with astonishment, till she saw with pleasure the sheen the milk gave to the stones as they dried – helped with weeding for some hours, and then climbed down the steep path to the shore to gather a basket of mussels for the cardinal’s supper. The sun beat remorselessly on the path as she climbed back with her heavy basket, striking off the rocks on either side, getting under the brim of her hat. Her novice’s habit, of heavy dark broadcloth, was suffocatingly hot, and when she regained the kitchen and put her burden on the kitchen table, she was flushed scarlet and sweating freely. Sor Coloma, the cook, looked up and saw.
‘My poor child, sit down at once, and let me bring you a sup of water,’ she said. Josefa sat down gratefully on a stool. The glass of water Sor Coloma set in front of her was cloudy – a fresh lemon had been squeezed into it.
‘We are working you as hard as ever that stepmother of yours worked you, without a doubt,’ said Sor Coloma, chopping onions on a board and weeping freely.
‘Oh, but it’s different, Sister!’ said Josefa at once.
‘How is that?’
‘I don’t mind working where everyone works.’
‘Do you think you will like it here?’ Sor Coloma asked her.
‘Yes. Everyone is kind to me here. It is like having my mother back, many times over.’
‘Ah, well, it’s just as well,’ the sister said. ‘You live your life out here, either way, and it’s hard on us all when someone hates it. Can you open mussels?’
But just then Sor Agnete appeared in the kitchen. ‘Oh, there you are,’ she said to Josefa. ‘Now, I’ve a job for you. You are to go to the top of the orange orchard, and sit under the tree. You can find a shaded spot. Take your prayer book with you; no need to be idle. From there you can see the road coming down to us. When you see someone coming, come back here in haste, and tell me.’
Off went Josefa, to spend the next hour deliciously, sitting on the damp grass in the shade of the orange tree, crushing leaves between her fingers for the oily fragrance, and looking at the soaring mountains above her and the pretty little cupola of her new home below her, against the hazy dazzle of the sea. She tried hard not to fall asleep, and almost succeeded. The clatter of horses’ hooves on the stony path and the drift of voices woke her; so that the first sight of Sant Clara afforded to Severo and Rafal and their servants included a glimpse of an ungainly nun, her habit hoisted almost to her knees, running pell-mell through the orange grove and across the farmyard.
‘We are announced, I think,’ said Severo, laughing. ‘I did not know a nun could run – If I had thought about it, I would have supposed their vows had hobbled them!’
Under the archway of the abbey gate, the abbess waited for them. She stood erect, with the aid of her sticks. Coming from the blazing sunlight of the road, Severo did not at first see her standing black-garbed in the shadows. He reined in his horse and dismounted to find her standing at his side.
‘If I kneel to you, Holiness, I shall never get up,’ she said. ‘Welcome.’
‘We can dispense with bodily ceremony,’ he said. ‘My blessing upon this holy house.’
She glanced at his companion; at the two servants and the horses. A very large basket was slung between two mares. She clapped her hands, and lay sisters came to help unburden the horses and lead them to the stables. ‘Put the basket in the shade, and do not open it,’ said Severo, going gratefully to the room in the guest-house that had been made ready for him with such agitation.
Later, washed and rested, he walked in the garden, overlooking the sea, and wondered exactly how to explain the trial to the abbess. There was not much time; the child would need food and water, the basket would have to be opened at dusk.
It was possible for Severo, of course, simply to command the abbess. She owed him an absolute obedience on which he could rely. But so to command someone older than himself, older in the service of God, and in a matter of such delicacy, was not his way. The thing seemed to require both tact and gentleness.
Since the woman could no longer stand or walk without pain, Severo summoned her to the garden of the guest-house, and commanded her to sit on the bench prov
ided for him. He told her that he had come to lay an arduous task upon her and her nuns, and that the task involved teaching a most difficult and pitiful child. He told her everything he knew about the child, and she listened in silence.
Then she said, ‘Permit me to say, Holiness, that the teaching of children in solitude is not the best way. In playing with other children, every child is happiest. The company of other children is the best teacher of such simple things as walking and talking. Most humbly I suggest, Holiness, that the foundling hospital at Santanya would serve better.’
‘I have three reasons for not accepting that advice,’ said Severo. ‘First I am concerned to protect the child from the curiosity of the people. It is not fitting that she should be a subject of vulgar gawping. Santanya is too much visited. Nothing discreet could go forward there for long. The seclusion here . . .’
‘Yes,’ she said.
‘Then, the savagery she learned from the wolf, her foster-mother, would make her very dangerous to other children. She can inflict deep wounds – she has done so. To lay such risks on those who have devoted themselves to lives of self-sacrifice is one thing; to ask it of abandoned orphans with none to speak for them . . .’
‘We will accept the risk,’ she said, serenely, ‘and offer our wounds to our Lord Jesus in mitigation of the sins of the world.’
‘My last reason is the overriding one. You must prepare yourself to find it harsh. I want to be sure – absolutely – that those who have taught the child will have done so without ever mentioning to her, in any way, the fact of God. I shall require an oath from everyone in your community that they will never reveal their knowledge to the child, but keep it from her wholly and entirely secret. This I could not ask of half the population of Santanya. I need the dedication and self-discipline to be found here, at Sant Clara.’
The abbess was silent for a long while. Then she said, ‘Holiness, may I ask you why you require such a thing?’
Knowledge of Angels Page 8
