by Victor Hugo
CHAPTER III.
MOTHER INNOCENT.
About a quarter of an hour passed ere the prioress came in again andsat down on her chair. The two speakers appeared preoccupied. We willdo our best to record their conversation accurately.
"Father Fauvent?"
"Reverend Mother?"
"Do you know the chapel?"
"I have a little cage in it where I hear Mass and the offices."
"And have you gone into the choir for your work?"
"Two or three times."
"A stone will have to be lifted."
"What stone?"
"The one at the side of the altar."
"The stone that closes the vault?"
"Yes."
"That is a job where two men would be useful."
"Mother Ascension, who is as strong as a man, will help you."
"A woman is never a man."
"We have only a woman to help you, and everybody does the best.Although Dom Mabillon gives four hundred and seventeen epistles ofSaint Bernard, and Merlonus Horstius only gives three hundred andsixty-seven, I do not despise Merlonus Horstius."
"Nor I."
"The merit is to work according to your strength. A convent is not awork-yard."
"And a woman is not a man. My brother is a strong fellow!"
"And then, you will have a crowbar."
"It is the only sort of key that fits such locks."
"There is a ring in the stone."
"I will put the crowbar through it."
"And the stone works on hinges."
"All right, Reverend Mother, I will open the vault."
"And the four chanting mothers will help you."
"And when the vault is open?"
"You must shut it again."
"Is that all?"
"No."
"Give me your orders, most Reverend Mother."
"Fauvent, we place confidence in you."
"I am here to do everything."
"And to hold your tongue about everything."
"Yes, Reverend Mother."
"When the vault is opened--"
"I will shut it again."
"But, first--"
"What, Reverend Mother?"
"You must let down something into it."
There was a silence; and the prioress, after a pout of the lower lip,which looked like hesitation, continued,--
"Father Fauvent!"
"Reverend Mother?"
"You are aware that a mother died this morning."
"No."
"Did you not hear the bell?"
"Nothing can be heard at the end of the garden."
"Really now?"
"I can hardly distinguish my own ring."
"She died at daybreak."
"And besides, this morning the wind did not blow in my direction."
"It is Mother Crucifixion, a blessed saint."
The prioress was silent, moved her lips for a moment, as if in mentalprayer, and went on,--
"Three years ago, through merely seeing Mother Crucifixion pray, aJansenist, Madame de Béthune, became orthodox."
"Oh, yes, I hear the passing bell now, Reverend Mother."
"The mothers have carried her into the dead-room adjoining the church."
"I know."
"No other man but you can or ought to enter that room, so keep carefulwatch. It would be a fine thing to see another man enter the chamber ofthe dead."
"More often."
"Eh?"
"More often."
"What do you mean?"
"I say more often."
"More often than what?"
"Reverend Mother, I did not say 'more often than what,' but 'moreoften.'"
"I do not understand you; why do you say 'more often'?"
"To say the same as yourself, Reverend Mother."
"But I did not say 'more often.'"
"You did not say it, but I said it to say the same as you."
At this moment nine o'clock struck.
"At nine in the morning and every hour be the most Holy Sacrament ofthe altar blessed and adored!" said the prioress.
"Amen," said Fauchelevent.
The hour struck opportunely, for it cut short the "more often." It isprobable that without it the prioress and Fauchelevent would neverhave got out of this tangle. Fauchelevent wiped his forehead; and theprioress gave another internal murmur, and then raised her voice.
"In her life-time Mother Crucifixion performed conversions, after herdeath she will perform miracles."
"She will do them," Fauchelevent said, determined not to give groundagain.
"Father Fauvent, the community was blessed in Mother Crucifixion. Ofcourse it is not granted to every one to die, like Cardinal de Bérulle,while reading the Holy Mass, and exhale his soul to God while utteringthe words, _Hanc igitur oblationem._ But though she did not attain suchhappiness, Mother Crucifixion had a very blessed death. She retainedher senses up to the last moment; she spoke to us, and then conversedwith the angels. She gave us her last commands; if you had more faith,and if you had been in her cell, she would have cured your leg bytouching it. She smiled, and we all felt that she was living again inGod,--there was Paradise in such a death."
Fauchelevent fancied that it was the end of a prayer; "Amen," he said.
"Father Fauvent, what the dead wish must be carried out."
The prioress told a few beads. Fauchelevent held his tongue; then thelady continued,--
"I have consulted on this point several ecclesiastics, who labor in ourLord, who turn their attention to the exercise of clerical life, andreap an admirable harvest."
"Reverend Mother, the knell is heard better here than in the garden."
"Moreover, she is more than a dead woman, she is a saint."
"Like yourself, Reverend Mother."
"She slept in her coffin for more than twenty years, by expresspermission of our Holy Father Pius VII."
"The same who crowned the Emp--Bonaparte."
For a clever man like Fauchelevent the recollection was ill-timed.Luckily the prioress, who was deep in thought, did not hear him, andwent on,--
"Father Fauvent?"
"Reverend Mother?"
"Saint Diodorus, Archbishop of Cappadocia, requested that only oneword should be inscribed on his tombstone, _Acarus_, which means aworm, and it was done. Is that true?"
"Yes, Reverend Mother."
"The blessed Mezzocanes, Abbot of Aquila, wished to be buried under agallows, and it was done."
"That is true."
"Saint Terentius, Bishop of Oporto, at the mouth of the Tiber onthe sea, ordered that there should be engraved on his tombstone thesymbol which was placed on the grave of parricides, in the hope thatpassers-by would spit on his tomb; and it was done, for the dead oughtto be obeyed."
"So be it."
"The body of Bernard Guidonis, who was born in France, near RocheAbeille, was, as he ordered, and in defiance of the King of Castile,conveyed to the Church of the Dominicans of Limoges, although BernardGuidonis was Bishop of Tuy in Spain. Can you say the contrary?"
"Certainly not, Reverend Mother."
"The fact is attested by Plantavit de la Fosse."
A few beads were told in silence, and then the prioress resumed,--
"Father Fauvent, Mother Crucifixion will be buried in the coffin inwhich she has slept for twenty years."
"That is but fair."
"It is a continuation of sleep."
"Then I shall have to nail her up in that coffin?"
"Yes."
"And we shall not employ the undertaker's coffin?"
"Exactly."
"I am at the orders of the most Reverend Community."
"The four singing mothers will help you."
"To nail up the coffin? I do not want them."
"No, to let it down."
"Where?"
"Into the vault."
"What vault?"
"Under the altar."
Fauchelevent s
tarted.
"The vault under the altar?"
"Yes."
"But--"
"You have an iron bar."
"Yes, still--"
"You will lift the stone by passing the bar through the ring."
"But--"
"We must obey the dead. It was the last wish of Mother Crucifixion tobe buried in the vault under the chapel altar, not to be placed inprofane soil, and to remain when dead at the place where she had prayedwhen alive. She asked this of us, indeed, ordered it."
"But it is forbidden."
"Forbidden by man, ordered by God."
"Suppose it oozed out?"
"We have confidence in you."
"Oh! I am a stone of your wall."
"The Chapter is assembled; the vocal mothers, whom I have justconsulted once again, and who are deliberating, have decided thatMother Crucifixion should be interred according to her wish, under ouraltar. Only think. Father Fauvent, if miracles were to take place here!What a glory in God for the community! Miracles issue from tombs."
"But, Reverend Mother, supposing the Sanitary Commissioner--"
"Saint Benedict II., in a matter of burial, resisted ConstantinePogonatus."
"Still the Inspector--"
"Chonodemairus, one of the seven German kings who entered Gaul duringthe empire of Constantius, expressly recognized the right of monks tobe buried in religion, that is to say, beneath the altar."
"But the Inspector of the Prefecture--"
"The world is as nothing in presence of the cross. Martin, eleventhgeneral of the Carthusians, gave his order this device, _Stat crux damvolvitur orbis._"
"Amen!" Fauchelevent said, who imperturbably got out of the scrape inthat way whenever he heard Latin.
Any audience suffices for a person who has been a long time silent. Onthe day when Gymnastoras, the rhetorician, left prison, with a greatmany dilemmas and syllogisms inside him, he stopped before the firsttree he came to, harangued it, and made mighty efforts to convinceit. The prioress, whose tongue was usually stopped by the dam ofsilence, and whose reservoir was over-full, rose and exclaimed with theloquacity of a raised sluice,--
"I have on my right hand Benedict, and on my left Bernard. Who isBernard? The first abbot of Clairvaux. Fontaines in Burgundy is ablessed spot for having witnessed his birth. His father's name wasTécelin, his mother's Alèthe; he began with Citeaux to end withClairvaux; he was ordained abbot by William de Champeaux, Bishop ofChâlons sur Saône; he had seven hundred novices, and founded onehundred and sixty monasteries; he over-threw Abeilard at the Council ofSens in 1140, and Pierre de Bruys and Henry his disciple, as well as anerrant sect called the Apostolicals; he confounded Arnold of Brescia,crushed the monk Raoul, the Jew-killer, led the Council of Reims in1148, condemned Gilbert de la Porée, Bishop of Poitiers, and Éon del'Étoile, settled the disputes of the princes, enlightened King Louisthe young, advised Pope Eugene III., regulated the temple, preachedthe Crusade, and performed two hundred and fifty miracles in his life,and as many as thirty-seven in one day. Who is Benedict? He is thepatriarch of Monte Cassino; he is the second founder of the claustralHoliness, the Basil of the West. His order has produced fourteen popes,two hundred cardinals, fifty patriarchs, one thousand six hundredarchbishops, four thousand six hundred bishops, four emperors, twelveempresses, forty-six kings, forty-one queens, three thousand sixhundred canonized saints, and still exists after one thousand fourhundred years. On one side Saint Bernard, on the other the SanitaryInspector! On one side Saint Benedict, on the other the Inspector ofthe streets! What do we know about the State, the regulations, theadministration, and the public undertaker? Any witnesses would beindignant at the way in which we are treated; we have not even theright to give our dust to Christ! Your salubrity is a revolutionaryinvention. God subordinate to a Police Inspector, such is the age!Silence, Fauvent!"
Fauchelevent did not feel very comfortable under this douche, but theprioress continued,--
"The right of the monasteries to sepulture is indubitable, and itcan only be denied by fanatics and schismatics. We live in times ofterrible confusion; people do not know what they should, and know whatthey should not. Men are crass and impious; and there are people atthe present day who cannot distinguish between the most mighty SaintBernard and that Bernard called of the poor Catholics, a certainworthy ecclesiastic who lived in the thirteenth century. Others are soblasphemous as to compare the scaffold of Louis XVI. with the cross ofour Saviour. Louis XVI. was only a king. There are no just or unjustpersons left; the name of Voltaire is known and that of Cæsar de Busunknown,--but Cæsar de Bus is blessed, while Voltaire is condemned.The last archbishop, Cardinal de Périgord, did not even know thatCharles de Gondrin succeeded Bérullus, and François Bourgoin Gondrin,and Jean François Senault Bourgoin, and Father de Sainte Marthe JeanFrançois Senault. The name of Father Coton is known, not because he wasone of the three who urged the foundation of the Oratory, but becausehe supplied the Huguenot King Henri IV. with material for an oath.What makes people of the world like Saint Francis de Sales, is that hecheated at play. And then religion is attacked, and why? Because therehave been bad priests; because Sagittarius, Bishop of Gap, was brotherof Salonces, Bishop of Embrun, and both followed Mommolus. Of whatconsequence is all this? Does it prevent Martin of Tours from being asaint, and having given one half of his cloak to a poor man? The saintsare persecuted, and people close their eyes against the truth. They areaccustomed to the darkness, and the most ferocious beasts are blindbeasts. No one thinks of hell seriously; oh, the wicked people! 'Bythe king's order' means at the present day by order of the revolution.People forget what they owe, either to the living or the dead. We areforbidden to die in holiness; burial is a civil matter, and this ishorrible. Saint Leon II. wrote two letters expressly,--one to PeterNotarius, the other to the King of the Visigoths, to combat and reject,in questions that affect the dead, the authority of the exarchus andthe supremacy of the Emperor. Gauthier, Bishop of Châlons, opposedOtho, Duke of Burgundy, in this matter. The old magistrates coincided,and we formerly had a voice in the Chapter itself upon temporalaffairs. The Abbot of Citeaux, general of the order, was councillor byright of birth in the Parliament of Burgundy. We do what we like withour dead. Is not the body of Saint Benedict himself in France at theAbbey of Fleury, called Saint Benedict, in the Loire, although he diedat Monte Cassino in Italy, on Saturday, March 21, 543? All this isincontestable. I abhor the psallants, I hate the priors, I execrateheretics, but I should detest even worse any one who opposed my viewsin this matter. It is only necessary to read Arnoul Wion, GabrielBucelinus, Trithème, Maurolicus, and Dom Luc d'Achery."
The prioress breathed, and then turned to Fauchelevent. "FatherFauvent, is it settled?"
"It is, Reverend Mother."
"Can we reckon on you?"
"I will obey."
"Very good."
"I am entirely devoted to the convent."
"You will close the coffin, and the sisters will carry it into thechapel. The office for the dead will be read, and then we shall returnto the cloisters. Between eleven and twelve you will come with youriron bar, and everything will be performed with the utmost secrecy;there will be no one in the chapel but the four singing mothers, MotherAscension, and yourself."
"And the sister who will be at the post?"
"She will not turn round."
"But she will hear."
"She will not listen. Moreover, what the convent knows the world isignorant of."
There was another pause, after which the prioress continued,--
"You will remove your bell, for it is unnecessary for the sister at thestake to notice your presence."
"Reverend Mother?"
"What is it, Father Fauvent?"
"Has the physician of the dead paid his visit?"
"He will do so at four o'clock to-day; the bell has been rung to givehim notice. But do you not hear any ringing?"
"I only pay attention to my own summons."
"Very good, Fat
her Fauvent."
"Reverend Mother, I shall require a lever at least six feet long."
"Where will you get it?"
"Where there are plenty of gratings there are plenty of iron bars. Ihave a pile of old iron at the end of the garden."
"About three quarters of an hour before midnight, do not forget."
"Reverend Mother?"
"What is it?"
"If you have other jobs like this, my brother is a strong fellow foryou,--a Turk."
"You will be as quick as possible."
"I cannot do things quickly, for I am infirm, and for that reasonrequire an assistant. I halt."
"Halting is not a crime, and may be a blessing. The Emperor Henry II.,who combated the Anti-pope Gregory, and re-established Benedict VIII.,has two surnames,--the saint and the cripple."
"Two excellent surtouts," muttered Fauchelevent, who really was ratherhard of hearing.
"Father Fauvent, now I think of it, take a whole hour, for it will notbe too much. Be at the High Altar with your crowbar at eleven o'clock,for the service begins at midnight, and all must be finished a goodquarter of an hour previously."
"I will do everything to prove my zeal to the community. I will nailup the coffin, and be in the chapel at eleven o'clock precisely; thesinging mothers and Mother Ascension will be there. Two men would bebetter; but no matter, I shall have my crowbar. We will open the vault,let down the coffin, and close it again. After that there will not be atrace, and the Government will have no suspicion. Reverend Mother, isall arranged thus?"
"No."
"What is there still?"
"There is the empty coffin."
This was a difficulty; Fauchelevent thought of and on it, and so didthe prioress.
"Father Fauvent, what must be done with the other coffin."
"It must be buried."
"Empty?"
Another silence. Fauchelevent made with his left hand that sort ofgesture which dismisses a disagreeable question.
"Reverend Mother, I will nail up the coffin and cover it with the pall."
"Yes; but the bearers, while placing it in the hearse and lowering itinto the grave, will soon perceive that there is nothing in it."
"Oh, the de--!" Fauchelevent exclaimed. The prioress began a cross, andlooked intently at the gardener; the _vil_ stuck in his throat, and hehastily improvised an expedient to cause the oath to be forgotten.
"Reverend Mother, I will put earth in the coffin, which will producethe effect of a body."
"You are right, for earth is the same as a human being. So you willmanage the empty coffin?"
"I take it on myself."
The face of the prioress, which had hitherto been troubled and clouded,now grew serene. She made the sign of a superior dismissing aninferior, and Fauchelevent walked toward the door. As he was going out,the prioress gently raised her voice.
"Father Fauvent, I am satisfied with you; to-morrow, after theinterment, bring me your brother, and tell him to bring me hisdaughter."
