Pastoral

by André Alexis

Days after her aunt questioned her about Robbie and Jane, Elizabeth went out for a long walk, taking with her the prayer book that had belonged to her parents. The book was small. As a young girl, she imagined the prayer book had been made just for her. It had been slightly larger than her palm when she was eight years old, and thick as three of her small fingers. It was bound in black leather with, embedded in its cover, a single white pearl that had, somehow and for years, resisted her efforts to dislodge it. The edges of the book’s pages had been gilded and, inside, it contained hundreds of prayers, prayers for every imaginable circumstance, including one that was to be said on being captured by cannibals and another to be said before eating food ‘of dubious provenance.’ Not that she had ever used it for its prayers. She was not devout. Her aunt and uncle were the devoted ones. From the age at which she had first been made aware of the idea, ‘God’ had seemed to Elizabeth a shaky proposition. It didn’t help, of course, that if He existed He had murdered her parents. But, really, there was no deep calculation, no rancour or bitterness involved. She simply was not convinced or was not yet convinced of God’s existence. The prayer book was a thing she held because her parents had touched it.

  The sun was out and doing its best to dry the ground. The clouds were thick and white, like gouts of clotted cream in a wide blue bowl. The earth smelled of her uncle’s sod and of cow manure from the next farm over, Mr. Rubie’s, from which, if the air was right, you would occasionally hear the faintest lowing, a sound that always surprised her, as Rubie’s farm was acres away.

  For the first while, Elizabeth thought of nothing in particular. Walking was a way to stanch thought. But she was in love and that meant, for her, that Robbie was at the tip of most of the strands within her. This was a pleasant thing. She could be with him in an instant, and the image she held of him was almost as vivid as Robbie himself. Of course, there was a difference between the man within her and the one who walked about or drove around in his father’s truck. The real Robert Myers was, naturally, more desirable. His eyes were always bluer than she remembered, his lashes longer. And, of course, there were aspects of him that paled in her imagination, however she tried to keep them: the light hair below his stomach, the way his back narrowed to a groove above his buttocks. These things never failed to fascinate her, because she perpetually rediscovered them.

  The Robbie within her had his charms too, however. He was made up of words, of impressions. He was a bright smile, an allusive thought, an attitude she found irresistible. At times, she was at odds with herself, missing the one while with the other, wishing he were physically gone when he was there or there when he was gone. Usually, this fracas between her Robbies lasted only a moment. But now that they were to be married, there seemed to be more serious skirmishes. Who was Robbie, really? How could she know? Was he the man with whom she wished to be married ’til death? Each of these questions was a cloud above the road to church. And now, so was the question of Jane Richardson. Where did Jane fit in all this? She had been Robbie’s girlfriend ages ago, in grades 9 and 10. She no longer figured in his life, did she?

  Elizabeth came to the trees at the edge of her uncle’s property. Instead of turning back, she climbed over the wire fence and went into the woods. The woods were cool, as always. The tightly grouped trees were a canopy, keeping the sunlight out, preserving the last granules of frost through which the ferns and fiddleheads pushed up and unfurled. There were paths that meandered confusedly about the woods, paths made, some of them, by her younger self. Or so she liked to imagine because when she’d been a girl bent on mastering the woods, she used to stamp her feet as she walked, creating faint trails that led nowhere, trails that came to sudden stops at the foot of this spruce or that white pine. She herself was well beyond needing the trails for guidance. She could have made her way through the woods with her eyes closed, reaching the destination of her choice (the highway, Fox’s farm, the quarry, ‘Regina’) in no time.

  Elizabeth chose to walk toward Regina and it was at Regina that she first saw Father Pennant, the priest who, it seemed, would preside at her wedding.

  On this, his third afternoon in Barrow, Father Pennant was on his own. Lowther Williams had gone to Wyoming to deliver a supply of unconsecrated hosts to the church there. Before going, Lowther had recommended that Father Pennant visit ‘Regina,’ Barrow’s third mystery. Regina, source of the Thames River, was discovered in 1905 by an Englishman named John Atkinson. Regina was a vein of glass-clear fresh water that sprang from the ground, ran for six feet and returned underground. The water was cold enough to rattle teeth, in summer or winter. It ran in a narrow, stony depression that tapered at its ends so that, if your imagination was so inclined, the source of the Thames resembled a vulva, which is why Atkinson, attempting wit, named it ‘Regina’ to rhyme with ‘vagina.’ The name stuck, but it was now more often called ‘the Queen’ by the people of Lambton County, and it had become a kind of shrine where pregnant women – farm girls, mostly – went to pray for healthy children.

  Father Pennant was unprepared for Regina’s beauty. The water ran so fast and constant, it was as if it did not run at all. Regina was like a solid section of crystal. Father Pennant kneeled to touch it and was surprised when his fingers parted the cold water.

  It was like this that Elizabeth saw Father Pennant for the first time, coming upon him as he withdrew his fingers from the water. Startled, she apologized.

  – Oh, not at all, said Father Pennant, rising. I was just admiring the Queen. Lowther told me how lovely it is, but it’s really something, especially here in the middle of nowhere.

  – Yes, answered Elizabeth. Are you Father Pennant?

  – Yes, I am. And you are?

  – Elizabeth Denny. You met my aunt the other day. Anne Young?

  – So I did. I remember. She seems like a nice woman.

  They shook hands and then the two of them began walking toward the highway. Beneath the shade of the trees, neither could see the other properly, but when they came to the edge of the woods the sun was still shining and each saw the other as if for the first time. Father Pennant saw a striking young woman with light brown hair, a narrow nose, a gap between her front teeth. She was dressed in slightly baggy blue jeans, and a man’s work shirt beneath which she wore a pullover with three buttons (unbuttoned) at the neck. She wore wire-rimmed glasses that distracted, somewhat, from her eyes: hazel, expressive and beautiful. As they walked and spoke, he found himself happy in her company.

  Elizabeth, for her part, did not take Father Pennant quite so deeply in. He was taller than she was and his hands were large, almost ungainly, like the paws of a young dog. Much more than that she did not register. He wore the uniform of the priest: black suit with a white clerical collar. Nondescript. Still, she was not uncomfortable in his presence.

  They walked in the direction of town. Elizabeth would have to turn back long before they reached Barrow some seven kilometres away, but she was happy to converse, and their talk turned quickly from the general to the specific. That is, they began to talk about marriage, Elizabeth’s wedding, its arrangements, the changes marriage would bring to her life, the love she felt for her fiancé.

  – Have you ever been in love? she asked.

  – Yes, answered Father Pennant. I know people don’t think priests live full lives, but yes, I’ve been in love.

  – Did you … ? Have you … ? You know … If you don’t mind me asking?

  – I don’t mind, but let me keep that to myself until we know each other better. It’s very personal for me. But I have been in love and I do know what it’s like to want someone.

  (Father Pennant knew very well what it was like to want someone. He remembered the taste of salt, the smell of a room in Italy, the touch of a hand on his back. And at the memory, the hair on the back of his head tingled as if he had been caressed.)

  – Why did you become a priest, then, Father? I’m sorry if …

  – No, don’t apologize. I became a priest because I t
hought it was my calling. It’s the way I wanted to be in this world. I believe in God and I think, as a priest, I can do good.

  The occasional car or truck passed as they walked along the side of the road. The air smelled of the woods (a slightly fungal exhalation) mingled with the smell of the dirt road, the smell of weeds, the smell of spring.

  – People tend to focus on our vow of chastity, Father Pennant continued. And I understand, because it’s an unusual choice. But it isn’t as if I have had an unfortunate accident. I’ve chosen the life I lead. I’ve had to learn the discipline. And I think it’s made me more sensitive to the things I’ve given up. But even if I’ve given up physical love, I haven’t given up on love itself. That would be perverse. I believe love is the most powerful thing in our lives. An earthly miracle. It’s what makes marriage so precious.

  – You were in love, Father, but you weren’t married. Why should marriage matter, if love is such a miracle?

  – Marriage is a way of saying love exists, saying it aloud, a way of sharing the thing inside you with your community. It’s an act of generosity made by two people. Maybe in the past it was about other things, but times have changed.

  All of which was fine and true or fine and not true, as far as Elizabeth was concerned. Either way. She had no problem with love or marriage. Her problem, insofar as it was a problem, was with doubt and apprehension – not big feelings, small ones, but just as distracting. She would not be completely at ease until she knew what her doubts meant or how she was to take them. But she was grateful for Father Pennant’s advice.

  When it came time for them to part, she for home and he for town, Elizabeth thanked the priest and shook his hand again before heading off. Father Pennant smiled and said

  – See you soon

  before turning his attention to the walk home.

  In the distance, the sun was setting. A pink tinge grew slowly more scarlet on one side of the clouds and evening insinuated itself from above, turning the upper arch of sky indigo.

  II

  MAY

  Father Pennant’s move to the country – away from civilization – was not without its inconveniences. The rectory’s wiring was ancient and unpredictable. Though the freezer and stove were reliable, the lights in the house sometimes cut out without warning and returned just as unexpectedly. It would have been too expensive to have the rectory rewired, so they learned to deal with the fickle lights. Father Pennant now understood his predecessor’s thing for candles. He made use of the many Father Fowler had collected. Every room in the house had its own brass candle holder and he grew accustomed to reading by candlelight, to sepia darkness punctured by candle flame.

  The town took to its new priest without difficulty. Most of the Catholics in Barrow thought him likeable and sympathetic. The rest of the town treated him with the deference due a priest. So, it was not long before he felt welcome. Of course, the hallmark of welcome is being let in on gossip and, as is the case in any small town, there were innumerable rumours circulating, rumours about his parishioners and stories about people he did not know at all. The gossip Father Pennant heard most often concerned Lowther. No one said anything terrible about the man, not directly, but a number of people felt they had to warn Father Pennant about Lowther’s ‘lack of discretion.’ In other words, Lowther was considered a snoop, a tattletale and a man to be avoided.

  As it happened, the person who most insisted on Lowther’s bad character was the first to die under Father Pennant’s rectorship: Tomasine Humble. Tomasine was no more specific about Lowther’s sins than anyone else, but she seemed to take personal offence at Lowther’s personality. So, hers were the bitterest condemnations. Mind you, Tomasine had never been known for the good she had to say about others. She was not, herself, fondly remembered, and there were few people at her funeral, when it came. Five, to be exact. Her light, narrow coffin was as simple as could be without being a pine box. It stood in the centre aisle of the church, unencumbered save for, atop the coffin, a framed black-and-white picture of Tomasine Humble as a young woman. Neither beautiful nor homely, the younger Tomasine was merely the beginning of a long distortion whose end was the bent and unhappy old woman Father Pennant had met on his first day as St. Mary’s rector.

  Tomasine’s funeral took place of an afternoon. Light came through the stained-glass portraits of Zenobius and Zeno. The church smelled of the floral perfume one of the mourners wore. Mass was said into the silence of late afternoon in a small town, most of whose inhabitants worked elsewhere. When the service was over, Father Pennant walked from the church with three old women, one of whom matter-of-factly said

  – Poor Tomasine. She had a soft spot for priests, you know.

  – I thought we were a disappointment to her, said Father Pennant.

  – Oh, not at all, said the old woman. Father Fowler was the only man she ever loved. Do you know what ‘carrying a torch’ means, young man? Well, she carried a torch for that man, poor dear.

  –Did Father Fowler know?

  – Of course he knew. He loved her too. He joined the priesthood after she married Bill Humble.

  – I don’t understand, said Father Pennant. Why did she marry Mr. Humble if she loved Father Fowler?

  – We’ll never know, said the old woman. They were quite strange, those two.

  Startled by sunlight as they left the church, the old woman gripped Father Pennant’s arm and went carefully down the steps, all thought of Tomasine and Father Fowler gone as she tried to keep herself from falling. Her companions held on to the railings and cautiously stepped down, as if stepping into uncertain waters.

  At the end of the day, after Tomasine had been buried, Father Pennant asked Lowther what he knew about Mrs. Humble and Father Fowler.

  – Nothing, answered Lowther.

  – Did they love each other?

  – I really don’t think so, Father. In all the years I worked for him, I never heard Father Fowler mention her more than a handful of times.

  – Well, Tomasine’s friends were convinced …

  – I think Tomasine was convinced too. But she was an odd woman. No offence to the dead. She never had a kind word for Father Fowler.

  – You know, I’m not sure she had a kind word for you either.

  – Yes, I know. But she’s not alone there. Not many people trust me.

  – I’m very sorry to hear it.

  – No, no. They’re right. I haven’t always been the best of men.

  It wasn’t clear to Father Pennant what type of man Lowther wished to be or what type of man Lowther would have called ‘good.’ Lowther’s dislike for his own younger self seemed to be the point. He had been born in Petrolia in 1949, his parents’ only child. His father, a bitter and angry man, died when Lowther was twelve. After that, Lowther had become the man of the house, spoiled by a mother who doted on him. By the time he was fourteen, he was, he said, good for nothing. He lied, stole, drank and did things of which he was now deeply ashamed.

  He would almost certainly have lost his soul, but that he was intelligent and sensitive despite himself. The cruel things he did began to seem tiresome, mindless and insignificant. So, at twenty, he moved to Sarnia and, for no particular reason save that he saw a help-wanted ad in the Observer, found work as a private investigator. His work as an investigator was what earned him his bad reputation. He was good – that is, ruthless – at the work’s many stations: skip tracing, process serving, testing the fidelity of husbands and wives. For years, he did very well. He earned all the money he wanted until, one day, he abandoned that road as well. Why? There were, it seemed, a number of reasons. Among them was that Lowther could not be certain he was not adding to the misery of the world. He pitied the men and women who couldn’t pay for their cars or who lacked the discipline to be faithful to their spouses. They were, he thought, versions of himself. So, in a moment of contrition, he quit his job and deliberately chose to do the things that, at the time, appealed to him least. He moved to Barrow and began to
work for St. Mary’s. He taught himself to live on next to nothing, and he gave himself completely to menial work.

  The first years of his life in Barrow were almost unbearably tedious. He maintained the church’s Volkswagen and cooked for Father Fowler. He did the same things, day in and day out. He forced himself to do them without complaint, though the insignificance of his new life ate away at his self-esteem. He began to think that no man who respected himself would settle for the life he had chosen.

  And then the moment came without warning: he learned to surrender. It was early spring, a year before Father Pennant’s arrival. Lowther had walked out of town in the direction of the Queen. The sun was up. There was a cold wind. And he was at peace with himself. That’s all and that was it: nothing sacred, nothing grand or earth-shattering, nothing that could be shared or passed on. A cold wind. A blue sky. But from that day on, his tasks became fascinating to him. The way one washed or wiped dishes, the way one swept a floor or drove a car: all these duties seemed human and inexpressibly interesting. Less had finally led him to more.

  – You learned to live differently, said Father Pennant. You became a good man.

  – I learned to live differently, but I’m not a good man, answered Lowther.

  – What makes you say that? After everything you’ve told me, you seem like an exceptionally good man. Not many people change their lives the way you did.

  Lowther smiled noncommittally and said

  – We can talk about this later, if you’re still interested, Father. I really should practise now. Otherwise I won’t get my two hours in. Is that all right?

  – Yes, said Father Pennant. Of course. Sorry to keep you.

  Lowther went up to play the cello.

  It was difficult for Father Pennant to understand why Tomasine Humble had been so vicious about the man.

  Though it’s sad to admit, Tomasine Humble’s death was not significant in the way the death of a popular person is significant. Her funeral service was not a memorable occasion, save perhaps for the five old people who attended, for Father Pennant who presided and for the men who dug her grave. Then again, the least death has a weight or sensation to it. A community eddies, if only slightly, to fill a place that had been occupied, and it does so mournfully or happily or with indifference. In very little time, all those who had known her, however well, however vaguely, knew that Tomasine had died and that she had been buried. The circumstances surrounding her death were important to some – especially those her age who felt their own deaths were just around the corner – and insignificant to most. That she was dead was the meaningful thing, along with the fact she had left no heirs, no money, no property.