The Wounds of God

by Penelope Wilcock

  ‘Ah Brother, there you are.’ Brother Paulinus came hobbling up the path, elderly and arthritic, a small, tough, sinewy man, whose brown eyes were bright in his weathered face. A gnome. No, a robin, thought Tom.

  ‘Brother, we’ve a party of guests in the guest house, and that means horses! Would you take the handcart down to the stables and see what they’ve got for us, please? I want some muck for my vegetables before Brother Fidelis has it all for his roses. Bring it down this way when you return and I’ll show you where to make the new heap. There’s a good lad.’

  Five minutes later, Brother Tom stood in the stable doorway entranced by the sight of the loveliest girl he’d ever seen crooning a song to her lame horse, stroking its ears, playing with its mane.

  ‘By all that’s holy,’ he breathed, ‘I never thought I’d wish I was a horse’

  ‘Oh! Brother, you made me jump!’ Linnet looked at him. ‘What did you say?’

  Tom shook his head and smiled at her. ‘Saying my prayers,’ he said. There was a pause and Linnet shyly dropped her gaze.

  ‘My horse is lame,’ she said. ‘She caught her foot in a rabbit hole on the moor. It hurts her, I think.’

  ‘Let me have a look,’ said Tom. ‘I used to care for the horses on the farm where I was brought up. Oh, yes, they’ve poulticed it and bound it right. Not too bad a sprain, I should think, but it’s swollen and I expect it…’ he looked up at her, ‘… aches.’

  He released the horse’s leg. ‘Have you come from far?’

  ‘We were returning to Chester. We’ve been visiting with my auntie. It’s a shame Blanchefleur went lame, but I’m glad we came here. Everyone’s been so kind and friendly. Mother says I’ll have to ride pillion with Father and leave Blanchefleur here if she’s not fit to ride in a day or two. Uncle would come for her, and keep her till he comes down our way. What do you think?’

  ‘Two days?’ said Tom. ‘Two days? I should ask your mother to make it three. We might well have got somewhere by then. Two days seems a very short time.’

  He looked at her over the mare’s back, his fingers absently fondling the coarse hair of her mane, when Linnet’s hand caressing the beast’s neck touched his hand. The contact went through Tom’s whole body like an electric shock. They both withdrew their hands. Linnet blushed, and Tom stepped backwards.

  ‘I should go,’ he said. ‘I should go. I ought to be doing my work.’

  ‘Where do you work?’ Linnet enquired with a smile, dimpling her cheeks enchantingly, looking up at him through the sweep of black lashes that fringed her dewy-bright eyes.

  Tom stared at her. ‘I work…’ he said slowly, ‘in the vege table garden.’ Inside his heart was saying, Yes, oh yes, come and find me. I cannot come to you, come and find me. Forgive me, God, I haven’t promised for life. Not yet. No, but I’ve taken my first vows. I shouldn’t be doing this. Forgive me, my God. Oh, but you’re beautiful.

  ‘Brother Thomas!’ Brother Paulinus’ voice was calling from the stable-yard. ‘Brother Thomas! Have you not got that muck loaded yet?’

  ‘Coming!’ Tom called over his shoulder. He looked back at Linnet. He tried to smile, but couldn’t. ‘Goodbye,’ he whispered. ‘Three days. If you can. For the mare.’

  ‘Goodbye, Brother Thomas,’ she smiled.

  And he was gone.

  Two weeks later, Father Matthew came in great agitation to the abbot’s house.

  ‘Father, Brother Thomas has gone.’

  ‘Gone? Where?’

  ‘Left us. He was not at Matins, nor Lauds, nor first Mass. His bed was not slept in. He has gone. Nobody knows where he is.’

  ‘Where is Brother Francis?’

  ‘Brother Francis? In the scriptorium, I think. Brother Mark wouldn’t keep him with the bees once he could have Brother Denis back.’

  ‘Send him to me.’

  ‘Father, I’ve asked all the novices; none of them have any idea—’

  ‘Send him to me.’

  When Francis stood before him, Father Peregrine asked him bluntly. ‘What’s happened?’

  ‘Father, I can’t be sure,’ said Francis cautiously, but the fierce hawk’s gaze gripped him.

  ‘Don’t give me that. You know him like your own self, Brother,’ said Peregrine. ‘What’s happened?’

  ‘Well, he said nothing to me, but… the guests who were here last week, with the lame horse… the young lady. I think he… well, he fell in love with her.’

  In the silence that followed, Francis shifted uneasily.

  ‘And how did he come to meet the young lady?’ Peregrine asked him quietly.

  ‘He met her in the stable, with the horse. Brother Paulinus sent him to the stable.’ There was another moment’s silence.

  ‘So why is that troubling you?’ asked Peregrine.

  Francis flushed. ‘I… I also told him about her. I told him her name. It was indiscreet of me, and foolish. I may already have sowed the seed in his mind. I never thought—I’m sorry.’

  The abbot nodded. ‘There are reasons for silence. Hardly ever has a man regretted his silence, but there are thousands who have regretted their words. Still, it can’t be helped. He said nothing to you, then, about going?’

  ‘Nothing, Father. I don’t think he meant to go. I think he just couldn’t bear it.’

  Peregrine sighed. ‘So be it. Thank you.’

  Later in the week. Brother Tom’s mother came up to the abbey from the nearby farm where his family lived, to return his black tunic, the habit of the order. He had called in to his family to beg some clothes and food, and to borrow some money and a horse. He would tell them nothing, but asked them to return his tunic to the abbey. She was sorry.

  The summer slipped away, and Tom did not return. Autumn came and went, its fogs and chills deepening into the harder cold of winter. November… December… and Tom had been gone four months. The brethren for the most part had ceased to wonder about him.

  December 10th, and a bitter cold night; the ringing of the night bell to wake the brothers for the midnight Office shattered the frozen, starry skies like splinters of ice.

  Abbot Peregrine’s eyes opened, and he lay for a moment in the warmth of his bed, gathering the courage to brave the frosty night. He lay there a moment too long, and his eyes began to drowse shut, his body longing with a deep, sensual craving to slide blissfully back into the depths of sleep. Sleep….

  He was pulled back to wakefulness by his personal attendant, bending over him, shaking his shoulder. Peregrine levered himself up on his elbow, and swung his legs out of bed. He fumbled to put his habit on, and after a moment said in exasperation, ‘I’m sorry, Brother, I need your help. My hands are as much use to me as lumps of wood in this cold.’

  The young brother helped him to put on his tunic and cowl over his under-shirt, buckled his belt for him, then knelt to fasten on his feet the night-boots of soft leather.

  Stiffly, Peregrine smiled his thanks, and he reached down for the wooden crutch which lay at the side of the bed. Together they went out into the cloister and along to the huge abbey church, floodlit by the silent white moon in the frozen sky.

  Father Chad joined Father Peregrine at the door of the choir, and they waited there in silence while the brothers shuffled past in file, led by Brother Stephen carrying the lantern. The last brother passed in before them and Brother Basil ceased tolling the bell. Then Father Chad and Father Peregrine followed into the choir and took their places. Abbot Peregrine gave the knock with his ring on the wood of his stall, and the community rose and began the triple-prayer and the psalms. The day had begun.

  The brothers appointed to read stumbled over the words, their lips stiff with cold as well as sleepiness. Brother Theodore, giving the candle into Brother Cormac’s hand as he came up to the lectern to read the fourth lesson, dripped hot tallow onto his thumb, and Brother Cormac swore, softly but audibly, causing Father Matthew to glance at him furiously. Brother Cormac was too sleepy to see or care. Father Peregrine watched his face
as he returned to his stall from the lectern. It was wooden with weariness and cold, the piercing blue eyes dull with sleep. Brother Stephen, walking the rounds of the brothers with the lantern, stopped by Brother Thaddeus, who had dozed off to sleep, held the lantern in front of his eyes and shook him awake. Thaddeus took the lantern from him, as the custom was, and took his turn to carry it, treading slowly round the choir, watching that the brothers kept awake.

  It was not easy, Peregrine reflected, that first year of monastic life. The young men came to the point of despair and defeat, not once, but many times, as they learned the endurance and humility that was required of them even when every nerve was at screaming pitch, suffering from cold and hunger and tiredness, from strict discipline and the rigours of penance and prayer. Not easy to turn their backs on despair and renew determination again and again, learning to continue in patience and peace, to offer all the trials up as a prayer. It never surprised him when a young man gave up on the life, came to the end of his stamina. But Brother Thomas… Brother Thomas had had a vocation, the abbot was sure of that. He wondered what had become of him.

  Matins ended, and the brothers had ten minutes to stretch their legs in the cloister if they wished, while the bell tolled for Lauds. The abbot crossed the choir to where Brother Andrew remained in his stall, telling his beads as he waited for the Office to begin.

  Peregrine bent down to speak quietly in his ear. ‘Brother, will you serve the brethren a bowl of hot gruel each with their bread, when they break their fast? It is so bitter cold. Some of these men look in need of a little comfort. You may be excused from Prime to prepare it.’

  ‘Aye, Father, it’ll be no trouble,’ the old Scotsman replied, and the abbot returned to his stall as the brothers came back in silence to their places, the cowled figures slipping like shadows among shadows in the dim and uncertain light of the candles and the lantern.

  When Lauds was over, the community went back to bed for the few hours left until daybreak and the Office of Prime.

  ‘It’s insane,’ grumbled Brother Cormac to Brother Francis, breaking the rule of silence as they crossed the cloister to wash themselves and comb their hair after Prime. ‘It’s barbaric. Is heaven offended if a man has a good night’s sleep before he prays? There’s not an inch of my flesh that doesn’t groan in protest when that infernal bell breaks in on my sleep. It’s no help to go creeping back after Lauds and shiver till morning either. It…’

  ‘Brother Cormac,’ Father Matthew’s whisper reproved him, ‘you have no leave for conversation.’

  Cormac knelt before his novice master, saying more irritably than penitently, ‘I humbly confess my fault of talking when I should be in silence, and I ask forgiveness, Father, of God and of you.’

  He rose to his feet as Father Matthew blessed him. The novice master continued on his way across the cloister.

  ‘The whole place should be towed out to sea and sunk,’ muttered Brother Cormac in Brother Francis’ ear. ‘The only one of us who had any wits was Brother Thomas.’

  Francis smiled at him and nodded; there was nothing to do with Cormac but humour him first thing on a winter’s morning. Francis wondered about Tom. He missed him. He was never mentioned. They never mentioned anyone who left; but Francis had never ceased to pray for him.

  Father Peregrine also had continued to pray for Brother Tom. His thoughts were on him that evening as he sat in his house after Vespers, peering over his work in the candlelight, huddled in his cloak. The room was barely warmed by the meagre fire that glowed in the hearth.

  He looked up and called out ‘Benedicite!’ in response to the hesitant knock at his door; and Tom came in, and stood before him. His body was tense and his face grey with cold and weariness. There was a shadow in his eyes that was new.

  The abbot looked at him, and observed the pinched look that came from cold and tiredness. He also read and understood the shadow in Tom’s eyes. Disillusionment. Heartache. Sorrow. He’d seen it often enough in this room.

  He met Tom’s gaze steadily, and in the quietness between them a little of the tension eased out of the young man.

  Tom bit his lip. He stepped forward, and his hands gripped the edge of the great oak table. ‘Can I come home?’ he asked huskily, into the silence.

  ‘Sit down,’ said Peregrine, ‘and tell me about it. I’ve waited for you long enough.’

  Outside, the first drifting feathers of snow began to fall. Tom sat down wearily on the stool by the abbot’s table. He had a long ride behind him, and a fair walk up from his parents’ farm, whence he had come on foot after he had returned their horse.

  ‘I’ve broken my vows,’ he said sadly.

  ‘Did you find your Linnet?’

  Tom nodded. ‘Linnet, little bird; yes I found her. It was a long ride and then a long search, but I found her.’ He sat with his head bowed, utterly dejected, until the room seemed to fill with his hopelessness.

  ‘Would she not have you?’ Peregrine asked him gently, at last.

  ‘Oh, yes. Yes. She… I think she loved me. Her family made me welcome. I was with them for two months. Yes, she would have had me.’ His words came slowly, and so quietly, Peregrine had to strain to hear him.

  ‘It was like a dream. It was a dream. Linnet, little bird. Such brightness… such sweetness. And she would have had me.’

  ‘Then…?’ Father Peregrine was puzzled. Tom raised his head and looked at him out of his despair.

  ‘I promised,’ he said. ‘The brethren and the Lord Jesus, and you. I had made my first vows. Father, I am a monk. How could I stand before God and vow myself Linnet’s man, when I am already vowed to holy poverty, holy obedience… holy chastity? I mustn’t… mustn’t break my promise.’

  ‘Did you tell Linnet this?’

  Tom nodded miserably.

  ‘And you really want to come back to us? Is it that you feel constrained by your vows or is it a thing of your heart?’

  ‘Father, this is my home. This is my life. There is nowhere else for me. This is where my peace is. Will you have me back?’

  Peregrine considered the young man before him. ‘It is a grave thing you have done,’ he said at length. ‘The brethren will need some convincing. For myself….’ His grey eyes searched Tom’s. ‘God knows, we all stumble, we all fall. One thing I must ask, take it not amiss. Linnet: you are sure you have not left her with child?’

  Tom shook his head. ‘No. I did not—we did not—no. She could not be with child.’

  Father Peregrine weighed it in his mind one more moment, then stooped down and gathered up his wooden crutch. ‘Come to the kitchen, then,’ he said as he pushed back his chair and stood up. ‘You look hungry and bone-weary. Eat well, and sleep here in my house tonight. Tomorrow you must begin again, asking to be admitted here. I cannot promise the brothers will have you back, but I will do what I can. If they will receive you, it hardly needs me to tell you there would be room for no more such mistakes. Come now, eat heartily and sleep well. We will see what tomorrow brings.’

  The ritual of begging admittance to the abbey was almost, but not quite, a formality. The aspirant had to stand outside the great gates of the abbey and beat on them with his fist. The man in question would, of course, have been to see the abbot long before, and be expected in the community. The form was that the abbot and his prior would open the gate to him, with the question, ‘What do you ask of us?’ The man at the gate would then ask, according to the custom of the abbey, ‘I beg you for the love of God to admit me to this house, that I may do penance, amend my life and serve God faithfully until death,’ and the abbot would welcome him in. There were occasions though—and this was one of them—when the community had reason to be unsure of the man begging admittance at the gate. They then tested the sincerity of his intentions by the simple but surprisingly effective method of keeping him waiting.

  The morning after his arrival back at the abbey, Tom was still sleeping off the exhaustion that followed weeks of troubled nights and conflict
ing emotions, while Father Peregrine was addressing the community Chapter meeting.

  ‘Brother Thomas has returned to us,’ he said, and took note of the guarded expressions, the slightly pursed lips of some men, the surprise and interest of others.

  ‘I cannot, under the circumstances, take it upon myself to admit him here again without the goodwill of the community. I have talked with him, and I will vouch for him that he comes with a pure intention, burdened with no mortal sin. He is wiser by his experience, and truly sorry for his conduct. In my judgement, his return to us is the action of a man submitting to a true call of God. Brothers, I beseech you; be merciful. Think on your own weakness, and be not over-hasty to condemn. You have today and tomorrow and the next day to pray and consider. The day after that I will take counsel of you and we will come to a decision. I ask only this: that you seek God’s wisdom and you search your own heart; but let no man presume to discuss the matter with his brother except at the Chapter meeting today or tomorrow morning. Has any of you a question to ask?’

  ‘I have.’ Old Brother Prudentius rose to his feet. ‘It is true, is it not, that Brother Thomas left because of a woman?’ A slight murmur rippled through the community. Peregrine, sitting imperturbably in the great abbatial chair, listened to it. Embarrassment, he detected, and disapproval. He inclined his head slightly in assent, but said nothing.

  ‘Four months is a long time,’ continued Brother Prudentius. ‘Why has he come back? Has she jilted him? Is he weary of her? Why the change of heart after so long?’

  ‘It is a long time, Brother, I agree. No, she did not abandon him, nor did he weary of her. He came back because of his promises to Almighty God. He would not make a marriage vow, having once vowed himself to serve God as a monk, in his first vows here.’

  ‘But Father, surely he has broken his vows?’

  Father Peregrine took a deep breath and let it go in a sigh. He looked down for a moment, then lifted his gaze to meet Brother Prudentius’ eyes.

  ‘And which of us has never done so? Is there a man here among us who can boast perfect poverty, perfect chastity, perfect obedience? God have mercy on me, I make no such claim. But I have promised and therefore persevere. His was the weakness of youth and vitality. Our weakness as his pastors was that of negligence. We failed him no less than he failed us. He offers us the grace of trying again. Most good shepherds seek their lost sheep. We are lucky. Ours has returned of its own accord.’