The Clowns of God

by Morris West

  “I’m very glad to have met you,” said Jean Marie Barette. “And very proud to have your cosmos cup. Would you accept a gift from me?”

  “What sort of gift?” The old wary look was back.

  He hastened to dispel her fears. “The Verlaine I found today. There is a line in it that might have been written about you. It’s in the poet’s own handwriting.” He took the small volume from his pocket and read her the quatrain pasted inside the jacket… “‘Votre âme est un paysage choisi.…’” He asked very humbly, “Will you accept it please?”

  “If you’ll dedicate it for me.”

  “What sort of dedication?”

  “Oh, the usual. Just a little word and your autograph.”

  He thought about it for a moment and then wrote:

  FOR JUDITH, WHO SHOWED ME THE UNIVERSE IN A WINE CUP.

  Jean Marie Barette,

  lately Pope Gregory XVII

  The girl stared, unbelieving, at the classic script. She looked up, searching for mockery in his smiling face. She said tremulously:

  “I don’t understand—I…”

  “I don’t understand either,” said Jean Marie Barette. “But I think you have just given me a lesson in faith.”

  “I don’t know what you mean,” said the small, twisted girl.

  “It means that what I was trying to tell the world from Vatican Hill, you have accomplished from a mansard in Paris. Let me try to explain.…”

  … And when he had finished telling her the whole long story, she stretched out an emaciated hand, rough from the etcher’s tools, and laid it over his. She said with an urchin grin:

  “I hope I can tell it to the girls the way you’ve explained it to me. It would help if I could. Every so often they get fed up, because our little family seems so pointless and disorganized. I keep saying that there’s one good thing about hitting rock bottom. The only place to go is up!” Her smile faded and she added gravely, “You’re down there now; so you know. Would you like to come home to dinner?”

  “Thank you; but no!” He was careful not to disappoint. “You see, Judith my love, you don’t need me. Your own hearts have taught you better than I ever could. Already you have Christ in the midst of you.”

  The evening traffic was murderous; but he rode back to the Hostellerie on a white cloud of serenity. Today, if ever in his life, he had seen how the Spirit pre-empted all the plans of high men. This tiny group of women, maimed and threatened, had made themselves a family. They had asked no patent, no rescript. They had love to share and they shared it. They needed to think; they thought. They found an impulse to pray; they prayed. They found themselves a teacher in a workers’ bar; and girls in trouble came to them, because they felt the warmth of the hearth fire.

  The group might not be stable. It had no guarantees of continuity. There was no constitution, no sanction to give it legal identity. But what matter? It was like the campfire in the desert, lit at nightfall, quenched at dawn; but while it lasted it was a testimony to human sojourn to the God who visited man in his dreams. Once again the voice of Carl Mendelius wove itself into his reverie:

  “… The Kingdom of God is a dwelling place for men. What else can it signify but a condition in which human existence is not only tolerable but joyful—because it is open to infinity.…”

  How better could one express the phenomenon of a small, twisted girl who engraved the cosmos on a wine glass and made a family for hurt women under the rooftops of Paris?

  When he arrived at the Hostellerie his first act was to telephone Tübingen. Lotte was at the hospital but Johann was at home. He had good news.

  “Father’s condition is stable. The infection is under control.… We’re still not sure about his sight; but at least we know he’ll survive. Oh, another piece of news! The valley’s ours. The contracts were signed today. I’m going down next week to talk to surveyors and architects and engineers. And I’ve been deferred from military service on compassionate grounds! How are things with you, Uncle Jean?”

  “Good, very good! Will you give a message to your father? Write it down like a good fellow.”

  “Go ahead.”

  “Tell him from me: ‘Today I was again given a sign. It came from a woman who showed me the cosmos in a wine glass.’ Repeat that please.”

  “Today you were again given a sign. It came from a woman who showed you the cosmos in a wine glass.”

  “If ever you get a message that purports to come from me, it must carry that identification.”

  “Understood! What are your movements, Uncle Jean?”

  “I don’t know—but they may be hurried. Remember what I told you. Get your family out of Tübingen as soon as you can. My love to you all!”

  “And ours to you. What’s the weather like in Paris?”

  “Threatening.”

  “Same here. We disbanded our club as you suggested.”

  “And got rid of the equipment?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good! I’ll be in touch whenever I can. Remember me kindly to Professor Meissner. Auf wiedersehen.”

  He had hardly set down the receiver when Pierre Duhamel came to deliver his new passport, and a new identity card, inscribed to J. M. Grégoire, pasteur en retraite. He described to Jean Marie their uses and limitations.

  “… Everything is authentic, since you once bore the name Gregory. You are a minister of religion. You are pensioned off. The numbers on the documents belong to a series used for special categories of government agents—so no French immigration officer will want to ask questions. Foreign consulates will not raise too many problems about granting a visa to a retired clergyman travelling for his health.… However, try not to lose the documents, try not to get into trouble and have them impounded. That could be embarrassing to me Apropos of which, my dear Monseigneur, you opened your mouth very wide with the bankers this morning. The lines were buzzing as soon as they got back to their offices.… Once again you are named as a dangerous gadfly.”

  “And you, my dear Pierre, are you of the same mind about me?”

  Duhamel ignored the question. He said simply:

  “My wife sends you her thanks. She is in remission again and more comfortable than she has been for a long time. The curious thing is that even though she appeared to be unconscious, she remembers your visit and describes what you did, most vividly, as a ‘caress of life.’ Under other circumstances I could be very jealous of you.”

  Jean Marie ignored the tiny barb. “I bought a small gift for you both.”

  “There was no need.” Duhamel was touched. “We are already in your debt.”

  Jean Marie handed him the cardboard box and made a smiling apology. “I wasn’t able to have it gift-wrapped. You can open it if you want.”

  Duhamel snapped the string, opened the box and took out the goblet. He examined it with the care of a connoisseur.

  “This is lovely. Where did you find it?”

  Jean Marie recounted his meeting with Judith, the maimed one, in the Place du Tertre. He gave him the paper which explained the symbolism of the design, and told of the curious little community of women.

  Pierre Duhamel listened in silence and made only a single terse comment: “You’re working very hard to convert me.”

  “On the contrary,” said Jean Marie firmly. “I’m called to give witness, to offer the gifts of faith and hope and loving. What you do with them is your most private affair.…” His tone changed to one of pleading and desperate persuasion. “Pierre, my friend, you’ve helped me. I want to help you. What your wife called the caress of life is something very real. I felt it today when this girl, who looks like a caricature of womanhood, laid her hand on mine and invited me into her special world.… This great stoic courage of yours is so—so barren, so desperately sad!”

  “I’m in a sad business,” said Pierre Duhamel with arctic humour. “I’m a funeral director, preparing the obsequies of civilization. That demands a certain grand style Which reminds me… Tomorrow I shall be
asked to sign a document requiring Grade A surveillance of a certain Jean Marie Barette.”

  “Classified as what?”

  “Anti-government agitator.”

  “And you will sign it?”

  “Of course. But I’ll hold it up for a few hours so that you can make suitable arrangements.”

  “I’ll leave here tomorrow morning.”

  “Before you go”—Duhamel handed him a slip of paper—“call this number. Petrov wants to talk to you.”

  “About what?”

  “Bread, politics—and a few fantasies of his own.”

  “When we met in Rome I liked him. Can I still trust him?”

  “Not as far as you can trust me. But you’ll find him much more agreeable.…” For the first time he relaxed. He held the cosmos cup in his hands and turned it round and round, studying all the details of the etching. Finally he said, “We will drink from it, Paulette and I. We’ll think of you and the little bossue on the Place du Tertre.… Who knows? It’s good enough theatre to suspend our disbelief.… But, you understand, this is the bad time—the day of the black battalions. If you fall into their hands, I can’t help you at all.”

  “What does your President think of all this?”

  “Our President? For God’s sake! He’s the same as every other president, prime minister, party leader, duce or caudillo. He’s got the flag tattooed on his back and the party manifesto on his chest. If you ask him why we have to go to war, he’ll tell you that war is a cyclic phenomenon, or you can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs or—God rot him in hell—war is the archetypal orgasm: agony, ecstasy, and the long, long quiet afterwards. I’ve often wondered why I shouldn’t kill him before I kill myself.…”

  “Why do you stay then?”

  “Because if I weren’t there, who else would get you your passport—and who else would tell what goes on in the madhouse? I must go now! Make sure you’ve gone too, before midday tomorrow!”

  Jean Marie Barette reached out and clamped firm hands on Duhamel’s broad shoulders. “At least, my friend, give me time to thank you.”

  “Don’t thank me,” said Pierre Duhamel. “Just pray for me. I’m not sure how much more I can take!”

  When he had gone, Jean Marie dialled the number for Sergei Petrov. A woman’s voice answered, in French. A moment later Petrov was on the line.

  “Who is this?”

  “Duhamel gave me a message to call you.”

  “Oh, yes! Thank you for being so prompt. We should meet and talk. We have interests in common.”

  “I believe we may have. Where do you suggest we meet? I may be under surveillance. Does that bother you?”

  “Not greatly.” The news did not seem to surprise him too much. “So, let me think! Tomorrow at eleven, does that suit you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then let’s meet at the Hotel Meurice, Room five eighty. Come straight up. I’ll be waiting for you.”

  “I have all that. Until tomorrow then.”

  But over the rest of tomorrow and all the days afterward there was still a very large question mark. Before the surveillance began, he had to find himself a bolt-hole, a place where he could sleep secure, from which he could communicate and travel quickly. Alain could help; but that relationship was already uneasy, and Odette was no model of discretion. He was still ruminating over the problem when the telephone rang. Mme. Saracini was on the line. She was cheerful and abrupt.

  “I told you I wanted to talk to you again. When and where can we meet?”

  Jean Marie hesitated for a moment and then told her, “I’ve been informed by a reliable source that as of tomorrow I shall be under Grade A surveillance as an anti-government agitator.”

  “That’s madness!”

  “It is, however, a fact. So I need a secure place to stay for a while. Can you help me?”

  The answer came back without a second’s hesitation. “Of course! How soon could you be ready to move?”

  “In ten minutes.”

  “It will take me forty-five minutes to get to you. Pack your bag. Pay the bill. Be waiting at the front entrance.”

  Before he had time to thank her, she had rung off. He packed his few belongings, explained to the patronne that a sudden change in his personal situation dictated his brusque departure, paid his account, then sat down to read his breviary until Mme. Saracini arrived. He felt very calm, very trustful. Step by step he was being led to the proving ground. By a curious trick of association—Saracini, Malavolti, Benincasa, we Sienese—he was reminded of the words which the twenty-five-year-old Catherine had written to Gregory XI at Avignon: “It is no longer time to sleep, because Time never sleeps, but passes like the wind.… In order to reconstruct the whole, it is necessary to destroy the old, right down to the foundations.…”

  The woman who picked him up at the entrance to the Hostellerie looked ten years younger than Mme. Saracini, president of the Banco Ambrogiano all’ Estero. She wore slacks and a silk blouse and a head scarf, and drove a convertible, custom-built by the most famous Italian designer. She locked his suitcase into the trunk and whisked him away with a scream of tires, before any curious guest had time to notice the car or its owner. Once on the road, however, she drove with studious care and a sharp eye for police traps, while she instructed him briskly in her plans.

  “… The safest place in Paris for you is my house-precisely because it is a house. There are no other tenants, no concierge and I can guarantee the loyalty of my domestic staff. I entertain a lot; so there’s a constant coming and going of people. Any visitors you have will pass unnoticed. You will have your own apartment—a bedroom, a study and a bathroom. It has a direct telephone line and its own private stairway to the garden. My staff are underemployed; so they can easily look after your needs.”

  “This is most generous of you, madame; but…”

  “There are no buts. If the arrangement doesn’t work, you leave. Simple. And would you please call me by my given name, Roberta!”

  Jean Marie smiled to himself in the darkness and said, “Then, Roberta, will you let me point out that there are certain risks in harbouring me.”

  “I’m happy to accept them. You see, I know you have a work to do. I want to be part of it. I can help more than you realize at this moment.”

  “Why do you want to help?”

  “That’s one question I’m not prepared to answer while I’m driving; but I will answer it, when I get you home.”

  “Try this one then. Do you think it’s good for your reputation to have a man in residence?”

  “I’ve had others, far more scandalous,” she told him bluntly. “It’s twenty years since my husband died. I didn’t live like a nun all that time.… But, things happened to make me change. My father went to prison. I went through a very bad patch with someone I loved very much and who one night went crazy in my arms and nearly killed me. Then there was you. When you were Pope, I felt the same way about you as my father used to feel about the good Pope John. You had style. You had compassion. You didn’t go round shouting discipline or damnation. Even when I was living pretty wildly I always felt there was a way back, as there was with my father when I’d been a naughty girl. Then, when you abdicated and I heard some of the inside story from your brother, Alain, I was furious. I thought they’d broken you; until your friend—what’s his name?—wrote that wonderful piece about you.”

  “Mendelius?”

  “That’s it!… And then somebody passed him a letter bomb! It was then that I began to see how things fitted together. I started to go to church again, read the Bible, pick up friends that I’d dropped in the wild days, because they seemed too earnest or stuffy.… But we’re off the track. First we install you in your apartment; then we feed you. Afterwards we talk about the future and what you need to do.”

  He was tempted to chide her, tell her that, while he needed help, he was not prepared to be managed. He thought better of it. He changed the subject.

  “I’ve been pr
ovided a second passport and an identity card in the name of Jean Marie Grégoire. It’s probably best if we use that name with your staff.”

  “I agree. There are three altogether: a man and wife and a daily maid. They’ve all been with me a long time.… We’re nearly home now. My place is just off the Quai d’Orsay.”

  Three minutes later she stopped in front of a porte-cochère closed by a steel gate, which opened to a radio signal. The garage was on the left of the entrance and an interior stairway led to the floors above. His suite was a pair of rooms, the one a large studio lined with books, the other a bed-sitting room with a bathroom between. Outside was a balcony from which he could look down on the central atrium, which had been converted into a rock garden with a fountain in the center.

  “It’s not quite the Vatican,” said Roberta Saracini. “But I hope you’ll be comfortable. Dinner in thirty minutes. I’ll send someone to fetch you.”

  She came in person, dressed in a house gown of some rich brocaded material, stiff as a benediction cape. She led him into the dining room, a small but beautifully proportioned room, with a coffered ceiling and refectory furniture of Spanish mahogany. The meal was simple but exquisitely cooked, a country pâté, a filet of sole, a mousse of blueberries. The wine, he told her, was much too good to waste on M. Grégoire, pasteur en retraite. To which she answered that the pastor was in retirement no longer and it was time to discuss what he wanted to do.

  “… I know what I must do: spread the word that the last days are upon us and that all men of goodwill must prepare for them. I know also what I must not do: make confusions or dissensions among honest believers, or undermine the principles of legitimate authority in the Christian community.… So, first question: how do I resolve the problem?”

  “It seems to me, you’ve already found the solution: a new identity. After all, it’s the message that’s important, not the man who proclaims it.”

  “Not quite. How does the messenger establish his authority?”