When We Were Saints

by Han Nolan

  Archie nodded, following her. "The crying Virgin."

  "No, not yet; later in the day, after the crowds leave. It's better if we can see it alone."

  Archie frowned but continued to follow Clare. He knew she was right about waiting, but he didn't feel he could stand it. They entered a room filled with students. A guide was lecturing to them about the enormous tapestries that hung on the walls. She pointed to one in which a man with a crown sat beside a shield with a two-headed beast on it and said, "This one is believed to be Julius Caesar and as you can see..." The guide recognized Clare and stopped midsentence to wave. All the students turned around to look at them, and Archie blushed. Clare blew her a kiss and waved back, then pulled Archie into the next room.

  "We can talk to her later" Clare said. "When the students are gone. Nancy will be moving them into this room next, and I want to show it to you myself."

  They had entered the room through a stone entryway carved with two unicorns set into an archway at the top. Inside the room were more tapestries, huge woven pieces that hung from the walls, and in all but one of the seven of them there was a unicorn.

  "These tell the story of the hunt of the unicorn," Clare said, gesturing to the tapestries. "There are still so many mysteries about them. Scholars have studied them and written about them, but no one has solved all of the mysteries."

  Archie looked around at the tapestries. They showed in rich, colorful detail hunters with spears and their hunting dogs, wild animals, flowers and trees of every kind, castles and fountains, and always the unicorn. They fascinated Archie. He had never imagined there could be works of art woven like rugs. He had trouble enough with his simple comics and drawings.

  Clare came up behind him. "Some people believe all of these tapestries tell one story, the story of the hunt and capture of the unicorn. Then others believe, like my aunt did, these are three different sets of tapestries. One set illustrates the story of the hunt of the unicorn, where the unicorn represents a lover" Clare pointed to two narrower tapestries that hung together one of which showed a hunter blowing his horn and the other a woman in a deep-red dress with a captured and bleeding unicorn. "And another set, these two fragments here, these they believe tell a different story, in which a maiden is used like bait to capture the unicorn." Clare led Archie closer to a tapestry in which a unicorn is stabbed and then draped over a horse and carried to a castle, where the lord and lady are waiting for it. "Then the third set shows the unicorn as Christ, and see here, in this one, the unicorn has a wreath of thorns around its neck, the way Jesus had around his head when he died.

  "Some people read these tapestries like a book, beginning with the one called The Start of the Hunt and going around the room, and others read it starting with the one there, where the unicorn is dipping his horn into the fountain. That's supposed to represent Christ purifying the water, or the sins of man."

  Archie drew in his breath. He had never seen art up close before. He had seen it only in books, unless he counted his own drawings. He hadn't realized how much more thrilling it would be to see original art. He had felt such excitement when he looked through the few art books he owned and at the books in the library. He recalled the painting of Mary and Jesus, with the angels all in fantastic blue and gold, in the book about saints, and how excited he had been by that. But he realized the feeling he had there in the Cloisters, the thrill, was ten times greater; So many thoughts raced through his mind at once. He had thoughts about the grandness of the tapestries, huge illustrations woven from simple colored threads. That alone amazed him. Then there were the rich colors and all the tiny details, like the thousands of flowers woven into their backgrounds, and there was the beautiful, mysterious unicorn hunted and stabbed and at last captured. The story touched Archie. He looked at the tapestry of the lone unicorn held captive, surrounded by a fence barely big enough to hold him, and he felt a lump form in his throat. It amazed him that something created five hundred years before could touch him so deeply.

  Clare was still pointing out the symbolism in the tapestries, and Archie shook his head in wonder. "How did people ever figure all that stuff out?"

  "Reading and studying the history and symbolism from back then, back in the Middle Ages, and knowing the story of Christ," Clare said. "There are all kinds of symbols and secrets in these. See the backward-looking A and E held together by a ribbon?"

  "Yeah, they're everywhere," Archie said, noting the one in the tree above the captured unicorn.

  "No one knows what they mean. They're someone's initials, but they don't know whose."

  "They look like mirror images," Archie said. "So maybe the initials are E. A. and not A. £."

  "Who knows?" Clare said. She pointed at the Unicorn in Captivity tapestry Archie had been studying. "All those thousands of flowers in the background are flowers that really existed back then. They're symbolic, and the trees are, too. The pomegranate is supposed to symbolize Christ and immortality, and that Madonna lily there was a symbol of purity but also has to do with being faithful in marriage. There are lots of these flowers that mean both something having to do with Christ and having to do with love and marriage. That's why some scholars think that these tapestries were originally gifts to a bride and groom, and the A and E tied together symbolize their union.

  "You could spend forever in here studying all the different meanings and secrets of these tapestries, but to me they're special because they tell the story of Christ's Passion and they remind me of my own life." Clare turned to Archie. "I brought you in this room first, Francis, so that I could tell you this."

  Archie studied Clare's face. Her usual cheerfulness had been replaced with a solemn expression, and it worried him. What was she saying?

  "This is my life, Francis." Clare spread her arms out to indicate the tapestries. "I have been hunted and captured so many times."

  The students and the guide from the other room entered the unicorn room, and Clare pulled Archie off to the side. He felt glad to hear the normal murmurings of the students and the perky voice of the guide.

  "Ever since the first time I came here with my aunt, I knew that this was where I belonged," Clare said. "I knew I would have to come back. I tried, several times. I ran away from home, over and over but the police always caught me and brought me back, and every time they did, my life became smaller and smaller My mother fenced me in just like the unicorn."

  "So that's why you don't like the police?" Archie asked.

  Clare nodded. "I never could get very far until I was much older but still, I never made it all the way up here to New York. My mother thought I was heading for my father's house whenever I ran away. My father thought so, too. If they had ever figured out where I had really been heading, they never would have let me spend all those summers here with my aunt. I was very careful not to tell them about the Cloisters or how I felt about Aunt Clare, or my mother wouldn't have let me return."

  Clare stepped closer in toward Archie, and he stepped back. It made him uncomfortable for her to be so close; he needed space to think about what she was telling him, but Clare moved into his space again. "I belong here, Francis," she said, her voice a whisper. "I'm never returning."

  "What do you mean?" Archie said, feeling even more uncomfortable. "You're not going home? You have to. We have to. My grandmama is there."

  Clare shook her head. "I won't ever return. My mother put me on the psychiatric ward of a hospital twice because of the visions I had at home. I told her I could see the Virgin Mary standing in the center of our table—floating, really—and my mother thought I was crazy. But it was true; I did see the Virgin. Once I realized that my mother wasn't seeing her too, I stopped telling her about the visions. I didn't tell anyone. She still thinks I'm crazy, though, and way too religious and melodramatic. That's why she watches me so closely. That's why she keeps coming up to see me at my father's house. She's spying on us. She says my father is under my spell, as if I'm a witch or something. Don't you think it's a sad state of af
fairs when you're thought of as crazy for loving God?"

  Archie didn't know what to think. All her talk about being crazy upset him. He had trusted her He had followed her because he believed in her. She always sounded so sure about everything when she spoke, he thought. She had such faith. God spoke to her all the time. She knew the way, the path to sainthood. He had been counting on her. He didn't want to hear about her trying time after time to run away to the Cloisters. A new uneasiness crept over him. Had she just used him and his grandfather's truck to get to New York? Weren't they there to get closer to God, to become true saints? He glanced over at the Unicorn in Captivity tapestry again, and again he felt the lump in his throat. He thought of Clare trapped and wounded like the unicorn and felt sorry for her. He looked back at her and saw that she wore the same loving expression she always had for him, and he felt a little better.

  Clare took his hand and continued, "My mother doesn't like me living with my father"

  "But it's your mama who's let you go live with him, isn't it?"

  Clare nodded. "I kept running away. A friend of my mother's advised her to go ahead and let me live with my father thinking that maybe I'd wake up and discover how good I had it at home with her and then I'd come running back. So my mother let me go, but she couldn't stop trying to control me. She would call me every day to make sure I had taken those terrible pills the hospital had given me. Then, when that wasn't enough to reassure her she came to town and stayed at the inn, so she could spy on me. She'd come to the house without letting us know she was coming, looking for signs—like crucifixes and bibles and candles. She watched me eat, to make sure I ate enough, and spied on me when I left for school in the mornings. I would see her car parked near the school entrance, and I knew she was watching to see what I was wearing every day. The other night she found my sanctuary, my attic room. She wants to put me away again. So you see, I have to stay here. Here is where God means for me to live. My mother was keeping me from the Lord. Nothing should keep us from God, Francis."

  Archie stood with his mouth open. He didn't know what to think. No matter how concerned his grandmother had been about his behavior over the years, she had never spied on him, but then he didn't claim to see the Virgin Mary hovering over the kitchen table, either Archie heard the guide discussing the Unicorn in Captivity tapestry and again thought of what Clare had said. Maybe it was right for her to escape her mother's clutches, but how was she planning to live? How would they both live?

  "Poor Clare," he finally said. "I'm sorry about everything, really, but we've got to go on back home. How would you live up here? You've got no money and no other clothes, nothing." Then, thinking about money, he wondered if Clare had brought only enough to get them to New York but not enough for them to return home. He felt panicked at the thought. "What had he gotten himself into? He realized he wanted to go home. He needed to be there, not in New York, not this way. "This whole thing feels wrong to me, Clare," he said. "I think we should go back home tomorrow. We can go and face your mama together We'll be a united front, with God by our side. I mean, Clare, this is great—the museum is great—but it's not right."

  "What I'm telling you, Francis, is that it's right for me. I belong here. I belong in the Middle Ages. I am a child of the twelfth century, not the twenty-first. If I return, my mother will put me back in the hospital, and I can never let that happen." Clare shook her head and blinked several times, as though blinking back tears, then added, "I will never never go back to that hospital."

  "You won't have to," Archie said, placing his hand on Clare's shoulder to calm her down. "I'll be with you. I'll help you. I'll make sure she doesn't put you in the hospital, and so will your daddy, but listen, Clare, we've got to go back. See, I should have told you sooner but this whole saint thing hasn't been working for me lately." Archie swallowed, expecting Clare to object, but she just stood, waiting for him to continue.

  "I—I'm not Francis; I'm Archibald, and I don't feel God's presence in me anymore. All I feel is a dark, evil presence, if I feel anything at all. Most of the time I just feel empty. I'm not like you. I'm not good like you. I don't have what it takes."

  Clare touched Archie's face. "You have been called, Francis. You're just being tested. Don't turn away from God."

  "Clare, it's no good," Archie said, much louder than he'd meant. The students turned to look at them.

  "Let's go outside," Clare said, taking his hand and waving again to Nancy. She led him to a courtyard with grass and flowers and a marble fountain that reminded Archie of the one in the unicorn tapestry. They sat down on the pink-marble wall between some pillars and talked.

  "Francis," Clare said smiling, her eyes sparkling in the sunlight, "you're still learning. God has so much to show you; don't give up. You're just being tested to strengthen your faith."

  "But you've never been tested like this. You said so yourself. God has always been present."

  "I have been tested in other ways. My mother has been a test. The psych unit has been a test. There are always tests. Even here there will be tests for me. Our faith is tested daily. It was tested in the woods that day you decided to rescue me, and even yesterday when we arrived and needed food and a place to stay. Every day I have to renew my faith and give my life to God and serve God by loving others. That is my calling, and it's your calling, too. It's everyone's calling, really."

  "Then why won't you go back home?" Archie asked, feeling the roughness of the wall with his hands. "Isn't that a test? Don't you need to learn how to live with your mother?"

  "No. God has shown me that here is where I belong. I know this more than anything."

  "But you can't live at the Cloisters. It's a museum, not a real cloister:"

  "I will live in the tower. I have to. I have to live here."

  "'The tower'? See, that sounds crazy, Clare, because you can't. Not really."

  Clare stood up and faced Archie. "I will live here. God has shown me that this is what I must do. My life, my mission, is here, and so is yours. You must stay here, too, Francis. You must live here with me."

  Chapter 26

  CLARE ADVISED ARCHIE THAT they should pray about their situation, and she led him to the Fuentidueña Chapel, a room with a large wooden crucifix hanging above the altar and a fresco of the Virgin and child surrounded by angels high up in the domed ceiling. There was no place to sit, so they stood, staring up at the crucifix and praying, while people moved in and out of the room.

  Archie knew that had he been up on his mountain, back where he'd first felt such a strong sense of God's presence, he would be able to stay still and pray for hours without thought of food or sleep and without tiring. This time was different, though. He felt stirred by the art and the architecture of the room, but Clare's story had upset him and he felt confused, too. He tried praying to God and asking for help. He told God he wanted to go home and said that he was afraid for Clare. He felt ashamed of himself for doubting her and therefore doubting God, but he had the feeling that Clare almost believed she was the real Saint Clare, who had lived back during the Middle Ages. He worried that maybe she was a little crazy. He tried to erase the thought and to remember his own experiences with God. His grandmother must have thought he was crazy, talking to trees and stones and rejecting meat, and in a way he felt like he was, but it seemed right and good, and it really didn't matter if he was crazy or not—what mattered was God.

  What had happened? How long would this test, as Clare called it, last? How was he supposed to pass it? What was he supposed to do? Pray and keep on praying? Have faith, like Clare? He wanted to have her kind of faith and devotion, but it had become so hard. Before when he'd prayed he never seemed to get hungry or tired, but there in New York he was both most of the time. The days of fasting and going without sleep had caught up with him. He even thought of eating a thick, juicy hamburger; for a moment he was tempted by the thought, but then he felt the old familiar pressure in his stomach and the desire disappeared.

  What was it God
or his grandfather wanted of him? He just wanted to be left alone. His life had been so much simpler before his grandfather died and he met Clare. Now everything seemed hard and confusing. He wanted to go home. He didn't want to live in some great stone tower and wander starving through the rooms of the Cloisters every day, like a ghost haunting the place. No, he wanted to go home. If they had no money for gas, he would hitchhike home. Whatever it took to get there, he was leaving.

  Archie looked at Clare standing beside him and staring up at Jesus on the cross, her eyes full of adoration, just like figures in some of the paintings he had seen in the book about saints back at the library. She really is a saint, he thought. He felt sorry that he would be letting her down, but he knew that at least for the time being his life and his mission were not there in New York.

  Archie's feet hurt from his standing so long beneath the crucifix. He wanted to sit down and he wanted to eat something. He tapped Clare's shoulder. "I'm ready to leave," he said.

  Clare turned to face him. "But we've only just begun to pray, Francis. You must pray and pray. That is the only way back to God. Have faith that God is with you even if you can't feel God's presence."

  "I'm sorry, but I'm hungry. I'm just so hungry. I want to leave."

  "But you've hardly seen anything."

  Archie thought of the Virgin that Clare had seen crying. He wanted to see that. Maybe seeing her would change everything. Maybe that's all he needed. If he could believe and have faith in a statue crying real tears, then maybe all was not lost. He told Clare that.

  "We must see that later when fewer people are around. It's the only way," Clare said.

  Archie sighed and gave in. He told Clare he would wait for her out in the garden, and he left her standing beneath the crucifix. He waited in the garden a long time. He thought about going in search of the crying Virgin on his own, but he didn't think he'd know her if he saw her and he didn't want to hurt Clare. So he waited, sitting on the marble wall and trying again and again to pray, repeating the words "Be still and know that I am God." He leaned sideways against a pillar and closed his eyes. Soon he fell asleep with the prayer on his lips.