The Madonna on the Moon

by Rolf Bauerdick

  Kathalina didn’t hesitate. She dug the Holy Bible out of the corner and handed it to Ilja. He leafed through it awhile, then he read without stumbling, “Lord, have mercy on my son: for he is lunatic, and sore vexed: for ofttimes he falleth into the fire, and oft into the water. And I brought him to thy disciples, and they could not cure him. Then Jesus answered and said, O faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you? How long shall I suffer you? Bring him hither to me. And Jesus rebuked the devil; and he departed out of him: and the child was cured from that very hour. Then came the disciples to Jesus apart, and said, Why could not we cast him out? And Jesus said unto them, Because of your unbelief: for verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you.”

  In the following days it often happened that even I wanted to read the Bible, but Ilja always said, “Me first.” Reading the word of God became his new obsession. It burned almost as strongly as his yearning to redeem his friend at last from his night of silence.

  The key to that feat was provided by an event on April 12 of the year 1961, only ten days after the Feast of the Resurrection. My mother had turned on the TV early in the midday break prescribed for family-run concessions. Just like every Wednesday, the state television network in the capital was broadcasting the half-hour show The Homemaker: Simple Meals in a Jiffy! In the studio kitchen the head chef of the Athenee Palace Hotel would demonstrate how to conjure up delicious and economical meals from just a few ingredients with a modicum of culinary skill. Kathalina liked the show less because she was trying to put some variety into her cuisine than because she liked the chef, who made her laugh. He had a strange brand of humor and way of expressing himself. Every so often he would put his little finger into the pot, lick it off with closed eyes, and groan in pretended perplexity, “There’s still still still something missing.” Of course, he would suddenly discover the missing ingredient on the kitchen table and exclaim with contrived astonishment, “It’s here here here after all!”

  While Mother laughed at the chef, Grandfather sat on the bench next to the potbellied stove, groaning. He’d begun reading the Old Testament, had finished the books of Moses, and moved on through Joshua, Samuel, and the books of Kings to First Chronicles. When at last in the sixth chapter, after endless genealogies listing when who begat whom with whom, he got hung up at the sons of Manasseh and became so furious he hurled the sacred book across the room.

  “Who in God’s name came up with all this boring shit? Who can keep it all straight?”

  Kathalina turned away from her TV chef only long enough to remark casually, “When Pater Johannes preached, he always made the Bible interesting. Why not read what his patron saint put down on paper back then?”

  Grandfather followed her advice, retrieved the Bible, and turned to the last book of the New Testament, the Revelation of Saint John the Divine. For some unfathomable reason that Dimitru would later call intuition, he didn’t begin to read the Apocalypse at the first chapter but at chapter 12. At the precise moment that Grandfather realized what was written there in the first two verses, the midday break ended.

  As I was turning the sign on the door to OPEN, Ilja jumped up as if stung by a thousand wasps and staggered around in euphoric intoxication. He rejoiced and raised his fists in triumph as if he had won a hard-fought battle. At first I thought the lunatic madness had seized Grandfather again. Just as when he’d been fascinated by the black bar on the television screen, Granddad shouted again and again, “That’s it. That’s it,” his index finger playing a staccato rhythm on Revelation, chapter 12. “The proof! That’s the proof!”

  “Shush! Quiet, dammit!” Kathalina turned up the TV.

  “We interrupt our popular program Simple Meals in a Jiffy! for an important announcement. Following the successful flight of the Sputnik in 1957, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics has reached another milestone in the history of mankind. Air Force Major Yury Alekseyevich Gagarin has today become the first human being to fly into outer space. Today, April twelfth, 1961, the cosmonaut spent one hundred eight minutes in weightlessness aboard the spaceship Vostok 1. In the meantime, Gagarin has returned safely to earth. We congratulate our Soviet friends on this epoch-making accomplishment and announce the broadcast of a special program at eight fifteen this evening: Yury Gagarin—Man Conquers Space.”

  Grandfather’s high spirits at his discovery in the Revelation of Saint John suddenly changed to pure horror. “Come with me,” he said, took his Bible, and ran to the rectory. Without knocking he stormed into the library where Dimitru was staring at an impenetrable pile of books with disheveled hair and bloodshot eyes. He’d lived in hermitlike silence for three years and five months without saying a word.

  “Here! Read this! Revelation of Saint John. Chapter twelve, verse one!”

  Dimitru obeyed like someone without the strength to contradict.

  “‘And there appeared a great wonder in heaven, a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars: And she being with child cried . . .’”

  Dimitru wept. He wept in the arms of his friend Ilja.

  “Papa Johannes knew it,” said Dimitru softly. “And now we know it, too. The woman clothed with the sun. If she has the moon under her feet, that means . . .”

  “. . . that she must be standing on the moon,” Ilja finished the sentence.

  “That’s it. That’s the proof. Now my heart is light. That’s why the Virgin of Eternal Consolation had to disappear.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “My dear friend Ilja, I rememorate the Madonna’s face exactly. The puny Baby Jesus! Oh, and those great big breasts of hers, but her delicate feet, too. Those feet! That’s it! The Madonna is standing on a crescent, a crescent moon! The tale about how Baia Luna came to be is a mistake. An error fatal everybody fell for. The crescent moon doesn’t stand for the victory of the Christians over the Mussulmen. It’s a symbol of Mary’s Assumption! That old sculptor knew that. You see? That’s why the Bolsheviks swiped the Virgin from the Mondberg. So their propaganda for converting mankind to atheism could run smoothly. There should be nothing left to remind us that the Mother of God is on the moon. Mary is the sovereign of the moon.”

  “Incredible,” said Ilja. “Why didn’t we think of this before?”

  “Because we hadn’t studied the Holy Scripture. It’s the source of all knowledge, the source Papa Baptiste always drank from. What more proof do we need than the word of God in person?”

  Grandfather shook his head. Dimitru looked toward the ceiling, illuminated to the furthest corner of his soul by the light of understanding. Then he threw his arms around Ilja, who returned his friend’s joyous, noisy kisses with equal delight.

  “I talked! I said something!” cried the Gypsy suddenly, realizing that his spell of silence was finally broken. In graceful, almost weightless hops he danced across the books that lay scattered on the floor. I interrupted.

  “Soon there will be more to say, Dimitru. The situation’s critical. Korolev’s project is entering its final phase. He’s not sending up dogs anymore. Gagarin was in space. They’re going to show the proof on TV soon.”

  “Well, what are we waiting for, then? Tempus fugus! We’re just wasting time here.” Dimitru locked the library and marched over to our house, arm in arm with Ilja. Kathalina was overjoyed when she heard “Greetings, my dear” coming from the Gypsy’s mouth, and I squeezed in a “You’re finally back among the living again!” amid the general rejoicing

  “Right”—Kathalina laughed, wrinkling her nose—“but before the living accept you there’s some urgent hygiene that needs attending to, Dimitru. You smell awful.” Mother turned on the boiler to heat water for the tub. Then she sent me to Hermann Schuster to announce Dimitru’s rebirth and ask if he could lend us some hand-me-down pants, a shirt, and a
jacket from the wardrobe of their oldest son Andreas. After his bath, she jockeyed Dimitru onto a chair on the porch, grabbed her scissors, and gave him a haircut amid howls of laughter from the village children.

  “But the beard stays!”

  When Kathalina joked that without a beard he’d be even more irresistible to the ladies, Dimitru replied, “Do you think the Children of Israel would have followed Moses through the Red Sea if he hadn’t had such a magnificent beard? Never! It was on account of his beard, not despite his beard, that the old guy never went to bed alone.”

  Grandfather chimed in with “Read your Bible, Kathalina, and you’ll see what a clan Moses begat.” It was obvious that Dimitru Carolea Gabor was his old self again and his friendship with Grandfather Ilja was as strong as ever.

  By seven o’clock, the best seats were taken in front of the television. By seven thirty the taproom was full to bursting. The sensational announcement promised for eight fifteen was preceded by a lengthy introduction. Even people who could see through its propagandistic purpose had to admit that it had been put together in a fiendishly clever way.

  A slow, leaden funeral march introduced the report. By the end of three measures it gave you the foreboding sense that something truly important was about to be buried forever. On the darkened screen there suddenly appeared an oversize image of an American dollar bill. A solemn voice intoned, “This money wants to rule the world,” followed by a dramatically beating kettledrum and then a drumroll. “But who is behind the money?” At that question, the sorrowful music became even more sorrowful, and short film clips followed one another in seemingly random order: dark-skinned chauffeurs held limousine doors open for cigar-puffing capitalists, unemployed workers with hangdog expressions waited in line at locked factory gates. One was even barefoot. We gaped in amazement as a stout movie producer in knickers pinched a starlet with swelling breasts in the behind, followed by dozens of police nightsticks raining blows onto an unarmed black man. The high point of tastelessness was when a peroxided blond positioned herself on purpose over a ventilation grate and it blew her skirt up above her bottom so everyone could see her panties. Then came a smooth operator who beamed while being kissed by a pack of half-naked women wearing silly rabbit ears. All of a sudden the music got so loud and shrill that some people in the tavern held their ears. To wild guitar chords some crazy screamer jerked his hips back and forth. Then he yowled something unintelligible into the microphone while young girls screamed ecstatically and stretched out their arms, straining to get to the animalistic guy. Dimitru sat with one leg over the other, swinging his foot to the rhythm, but then the music stopped abruptly. We saw American students lounging on a university campus and chewing gum.

  “Are these young people supposed to inspire the human spirit and advance progress?” asked the voice of the announcer as whispering and then exclamations broke out in the tavern. A rocket stood on a launchpad, and someone began to count in English—five, four, three, two, one—and then some more words we didn’t understand. A gigantic ball of smoke and flames shrouded everything. A title appeared on the screen: “Launch of the Vanguard TV3 satellite, USA, December 6, 1957.” The rocket slowly lifted off, then it fell sideways and exploded. “America’s dream is a nightmare,” said the voice. Cut.

  Then came Tchaikovsky. The beaming Yury Alekseyevich Gagarin waved for the cameras. A lot of cameras. Then another picture of a rocket on a launching pad, tall as a castle tower. The name of the space capsule, Vostok, means “the East.” The name alone would annoy the Americans. Countdown in Russian, 9:05 a.m., Moscow time. Again, smoke and flames. Fantastic launch. A perfect dream of a vapor trail. Higher and higher. Gagarin’s voice: “Looking at the earth. Good view. Everything normal. Everything functioning excellently. Still flying. Mood optimistic. Everything running well. Machine working normally. Looking into space.”

  Cut and flashback. Scenes from his career: Gagarin, from a poor farmworker’s family, son of the people, diligent, ambitious, looking ahead. The pupil Gagarin, the student of mathematics, the party comrade. Gagarin the scholar, Marx and Lenin under his arm. The air force major, always the best, always with distinction, everything maximal. Cosmonaut, Hero of the USSR, first man in space, weightless, immortal. Enough Gagarin.

  Khrushchev appeared on the screen. Superior, self-assured, jovial. Waved a telegram from the American president. Kennedy sent congratulations, spoke of noble aspirations of mankind and even offered the Soviets his cooperation. Explore the heavens together? Khrushchev smiled and shook his head. Who wanted to make a deal with losers? The viewers already knew the Americans couldn’t cut it. Then Khrushchev shaking hands, patting backs. He took Gagarin’s hand, raised it into the air. “Well done, Yury!” Storm of flashbulbs. A historic event.

  Then the crucial question: “Tell me, Comrade Yury, did you see God up there in space?”

  “No,” Gagarin replied.

  “Good question from Nikita,” remarked Nico Brancusi.

  “Good answer by Yury,” added his older brother Liviu.

  Nobody from Baia Luna contradicted them. The special broadcast was over. Ilja turned off the TV. His guests went home as though nothing earthshaking had happened. Only Grandfather, Dimitru, and I remained in the tavern.

  “Don’t you agree it’s time for a little glass again after my epoch of abstinence?”

  I got up. But unlike past years when I served Dimitru as the taproom gofer, now I put the Gypsy’s bottle of zuika onto the table in my capacity as barkeeper. “On the house.”

  “Man, Pavel.” He looked up at me. “You’ve turned into a real man.”

  To my astonishment and Ilja’s, too, the Gypsy drank just one glass.

  “It’s not looking good for America,” said Grandfather. “Their rockets are no good. But I think Khrushchev made a mistake.”

  Dimitru nodded slowly. “Oh yes, my friend, that he did. A grande error fatal.”

  “If the Yanks are smart,” Grandfather continued, “they know by now why the Russians are sticking cosmonauts into rockets.”

  “But the Americans aren’t smart. They’re just lucky that Nikita is dumber than they are. He’s so stupid he broadcasts every fart of progress on his project to the whole world instead of waiting until the final blow can be struck. The Russkies aren’t on the moon yet. They haven’t got the Madonna yet. The question about God came too soon.”

  “Much too soon,” said Grandfather. “The Yanks already smell a rat. How many billions you think they’re going to fork over now to prove there’s a God in heaven after all? They’re not about to get caught with their pants down and then have to burn all their dollars.”

  “Absolutely exact,” Dimitru confirmed. “Khrushchev blabbed too soon. A cardinal sin. He fell into the trap of vanity. Superbia is well-known causaliter causalis as the essential source of human stupidity. I bet Korolev knows his president is pretty much of an idiot. But that’s politics: some people have the knowledge; others have the power. That’s what happens when proletarians instead of intellectuals rule the world.”

  Grandfather scratched his head. “To summarize: the pope’s dogma certifies that Mary the Mother of God was transported bodily to heaven. And she’s on the moon; God himself guarantees it in the Revelation he revealed to Saint John the Apostle. Now the decisive question is, What will the Bolsheviks do when they find the Madonna?”

  “That, Ilja, my friend, is the question of questions. And I can only think of one answer if I stick to the laws of logic.”

  “And that would be?”

  “The Soviets will reverse the Assumption. They’ll return the Madonna to earth.”

  “And then? They won’t do anything to her, will they? They wouldn’t kill her? Or would the Bolsheviks not even draw the line at killing the Mother of God?”

  “They wouldn’t kill her, for sure. Korolev’s no stupid Marxist; he’s a clever Nietzscheist, if you know what I mean.”

  Grandfather shook his head.
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br />   “Doesn’t matter. Listen: if they bring Jesus’s mother back to earth, then Korolev will draw the logical conclusion that God exists even if Gagarin didn’t see him out the window of his rocket. But if God exists, then Engineer Number One can forget his project to become God himself. And he will not touch a hair on the head of the Mother of God, much less have her snuffed out by the Securitate. ’Cause then he’d have to kiss good-bye to the eternal life Jesus promises after death. There’s no point at all for a Madonna killer to even think about detouring past God’s throne on Judgment Day. He can save himself the trouble and go straight to hell.”

  “Makes sense to me,” said Ilja. “But what does Number One do with Mary here on earth?”

  “He lets her go. With his good wishes. She’s free to run through the streets in broad daylight claiming to be the Mother of God. If she’s lucky, people will laugh at her. If she’s not, she’ll end up in one of those psychiatrical nuthouses for the rest of her days. And Korolev can claim he meant well and wash his hands in innocence like that Roman Pontius Pilate.”

  I yawned and remarked that it was well beyond official closing time. Dimitru handed me the opened bottle and asked me to put it away until tomorrow evening. Meanwhile, Grandfather fetched a glass of water to take his epilepsy tablets.

  Although I went up to my bedroom without having untangled the nonsense Dimitru and my grandfather had discussed, I did have an idea. The longer I thought about it, the more I saw a way I could put the wild notions of those two to my own uses.

  When Dimitru arrived at the tavern the following afternoon, ambitious to get going, I steered him and Grandfather into the kitchen and asked them to have a seat. Then I hung the CLOSED sign on the door, took out Dimitru’s bottle of zuika, and sat myself down at the kitchen table. I got right to the point.