The Wounds of God

by Penelope Wilcock

  ‘Couldn’t he do something else—work in the garden or something instead?’

  ‘Yes, he could—now he could. There were reasons for keeping him to the kitchen at one time. He helps in the infirmary and he helps Brother Mark with his bees, but he likes to work with Brother Andrew. They have a good understanding. Brother Cormac had no family of his own, and Brother Andrew has come to be like a father to him; answered a need in him somehow. There was no love lost between them in the early days, though. Two of a kind, they are. A bit too much alike for comfort sometimes.’

  ‘Brother Cormac’s good to my children. He took them to see the bats in the church tower today, and he says he’ll take them to see the young lambs tomorrow when he can escape from the kitchen in the afternoon.’

  ‘Maundy Thursday, yes, the brothers are fasting before the evening Mass. He’ll maybe find some free time. He needs some. He’s been carrying most of Brother Andrew’s work lately. Brother Andrew is feeling his age. He’s been tired, very tired and a bit breathless of late. He has a look sometimes as though he’s in pain, but he’ll not admit to it. Brother Cormac has been doing all he can to spare him in the kitchen.’

  ‘Oh, then…’ Melissa looked concerned. ‘Should he be spending this time with my children? I don’t want them to be a burden.’

  ‘No, no.’ Peregrine shook his head. ‘Brother Cormac delights in your children. They have extra help in the kitchen during the Easter feast. Brother Damian is there, and Brother Mark. Let it be.’

  In the morning, when her children went out to play, Melissa cautioned them, ‘Don’t go bothering Brother Cormac, now. This afternoon, he said. You must wait until then. Go for a walk down to the infirmary and say hello to Uncle Edward.’

  But Catherine stole away, and appeared at Cormac’s side in the kitchen, where she stood in solemn silence as she watched him gutting fish for the midday meal.

  ‘Is that a fish?’ she asked at last.

  ‘It is,’ he replied shortly. He hated the job and it put him out of sorts to do it. He cut the head away deftly with the sharp knife, and slit the belly, flicking out the spilling mess of guts with the knife point.

  ‘Oh, Cormac,’ said Catherine in a shocked voice, ‘you’ve cut off its face.’

  Cormac closed his eyes and swallowed hard. He felt distinctly queasy. ‘Catherine!’ Anne’s voice called from the doorway. ‘Catherine! Mother says you’re not to bother Cormac in the morning. You’ve got to stay with us.’

  ‘But Cormac is cutting the fishes’ tummies open and throwing their insides away,’ protested Catherine. ‘I want to stay and watch.’

  Cormac put down the knife and wiped his hands. He picked Catherine up and carried her to the door. He deposited her firmly outside.

  ‘You do as your mother says,’ he said, and closed the door behind her.

  ‘You didn’t do anything naughty, did you, Catherine?’ asked Anne, anxiously. ‘He looked a bit cross.’ But Catherine was already running along the cloister, heading for the infirmary.

  Brother Cormac returned grimly to his task, stuffed the fish carcasses with herbs and butter and left them packed in neat lines in a covered dish ready to be baked.

  Brother Andrew called him from the other side of the room: ‘Brother Cormac! It’s time you did those fish. You’ve not got all the morning.’ He sounded tired and irritable.

  ‘But I…’ began Cormac.

  ‘“But” nothing, Brother. There’s bread to be baked for tomorrow and they need a hand in the guest house kitchen, so will you set about it and get them done.’

  ‘But, Brother…’

  ‘Brother Cormac, it needs doing!’ Andrew shouted at him. Cormac’s black brows were gathering in a frown and his blue eyes were as cold as frost.

  ‘Come on, Brother Cormac!’ roared Andrew.

  ‘I have done the fish,’ Cormac said from between clenched teeth with slow and deliberate fury, glowering at the old man.

  Brother Andrew clicked his tongue in exasperation. ‘Then why the devil didn’t you say so?’ he snapped.

  Cormac looked as though he was about to boil over. The kitchen staff kept their heads bent to their work. Neither Brother Andrew nor Brother Cormac was the most patient of men, and minor confrontations were a common occurrence. For a moment the two of them glared at each other, then, ‘Whatever ails you today?’ said Cormac more gently. ‘You’re like a bear with a sore head. I’ve done the fish. Shall I make a start on the bread or go over to the guest house?’

  ‘I—oh!’ Brother Andrew clutched at the table where he stood, gasping with sudden pain. The colour drained from his face and beads of sweat stood out on his brow.

  Cormac was across the room to him in an instant and Brother Andrew turned to him and gripped his arms convulsively, bent over in pain.

  ‘Get Brother John,’ said Cormac to Brother Damian, who left at a run. ‘Where does it hurt you?’ he asked Brother Andrew, looking anxiously at the old man’s face as he tried to stand erect. It was deathly pale, the lips blue and set in a tight line of pain.

  ‘It—ah!’ Andrew gasped and clung to him. ‘Like a great hand squeezing my ribs. Like… bands of iron. Ah! It’s not been this bad before.’

  ‘Lie down,’ said Cormac. ‘Here, on the floor. Come, rest your head on my lap, so. There now. Brother John will be with us from the infirmary.’ The old man could not keep still, but writhed in his pain. His hand gripped Cormac’s knee fiercely, and he pressed his face into his thigh. Brother Cormac could feel the agonised contortion of it, and the old man’s trembling passed through into his own body. Oh John, hurry, he thought, desperately. Oh Jesu, mercy.

  Brother Andrew drew up his knees in pain and groaned. Sweat was pouring from him. Brother Mark bent over them offering a cold, damp cloth. Cormac took it without looking up, and tenderly wiped the old man’s head and neck and as much of his face as he could get to.

  Brother John came hurrying through the door and knelt beside them. ‘All right, we’ll carry him to the infirmary. Two of you men here, make a chair for him with your hands. We’ll carry him so.’

  ‘I’ll come with you,’ said Cormac.

  ‘You… will… not…’ gasped Brother Andrew, fighting for breath. ‘You’ll get… the meal… to the table—and Brother—don’t… burn… the bread.’ Then he screwed up his eyes and clamped his mouth shut as another wave of pain engulfed him. He looked very old and shrunken and frail as they carried him out of the door. Brother Cormac watched them go, his face almost as white as Andrew’s, but as the door closed behind them, he turned resolutely to his work.

  ‘Put the fish in to bake, Brother Damian. John, fill the pitchers with ale. Water it, but not so much as yesterday; they were grumbling. Brother Mark, take the bread from its proving and knead it again. Luke, Simon, go down to the guest house and see what you can do.’

  He himself continued the preparation of a green salad that Brother Andrew had begun, his face taut with anxiety, his hands trembling. Brother Damian came up quietly behind him and put an arm around his shoulders. Cormac shook him off irritably.

  ‘Come on, Brother. Have you done that fish? Good. Watch the pot of beans on the fire. They’re nearly done. They mustn’t overcook or they’ll go to a mush. Drat, there’s the Office bell. You go, both of you. I can finish off here. Is the bread ready for its second proving? Thank you. Cover it with a cloth before you go. No, set it to rise there, near the fire. Yes, yes. Go now, then.’

  When the Office was over, Cormac listened to the soft slapping of the brothers’ sandalled feet coming along the cloister, and the indefinable whisper of their robes as they passed the open door, the splash of water in the lavatorium as they washed their hands. Oh, hurry, he pleaded silently, please hurry. But they filtered through into the refectory with their usual dignified calm.

  Brother Cormac made the kitchen tidy, and saw the meal to the table. He did not join the brethren to eat, but restlessly paced the kitchen floor, listening to the drone of the reader’s voice and
the subdued background sound of the meal: pottery on wood, metal on pot. Then pot on pot and metal on metal as the servers stacked the bowls and collected the spoons and knives. Cormac served the kitcheners, the reader and the servers with their meal as they came through into the kitchen from the refectory, and then he left them to it and ran to the infirmary. In the ante-room he found Father Peregrine sitting with Catherine playing at his feet. Anne sat beside him, very quiet, her eyes gravely fixed on Brother Cormac as he hastened through the door and stopped, looking helplessly to Father Peregrine for reassurance.

  ‘Is he—?’

  ‘They could not save him,’ said Peregrine gently. ‘He was gone by the time they got him to bed.’

  ‘No…’ whispered Cormac. ‘For God’s sake, no. Where is he?’

  ‘Just through there.’ Father Peregrine watched him stumble through the door. The room Cormac entered was airy and chill, filled with the cold light of spring. It was utterly silent except for the faint squeaking and tapping of leaves outside crowding against one of the windows. There was no one there but the motionless form on the bed, laid out straight in his habit and sandals. His hair was combed, and his rosary placed among the fingers of his hands folded on his breast. Cormac looked at Brother Andrew’s body, white and frozen in the absolute stillness of death; at the toes like carvings and the sculpted silence of his hands, his jaw, his nose. He stood by the bed in the pale spring light and looked down at the deserted house, empty dwelling, that had been his friend. He lifted his hand and caressed the cold forehead and bony cheek.

  ‘We served the meal on time,’ he whispered. He took one last long look, stooped and pressed his warm lips to the cold, still brow, his eyes closed. Then he turned away and left the room and closed the door behind him.

  ‘Come and sit down.’ Father Peregrine’s voice penetrated the daze of shock, and Cormac sat on the bench beside him, his elbows resting on his knees, his hands clasped together, seeing nothing.

  ‘I wish I’d been with him,’ he said at last, tonelessly.

  Catherine looked up from her game on the floor. ‘Cormac, why are you crying?’ she asked curiously. ‘Is it because of Brother Andrew?’

  ‘I’m not crying,’ said Cormac dully, without looking at her.

  ‘Shush, Catherine,’ said Anne, but Catherine was not to be put off. ‘You are,’ she insisted. ‘Your nose is running and your eyes are full of tears, like Nicholas’ when he’s trying not to cry. There’s a tear running down your face now. I can see it.’

  Peregrine stretched out his hand and laid it on Cormac’s hands which gripped together till the knuckles were white. Cormac groaned and his head went down on the abbot’s hand. Anne darted to his side and spread herself over his shoulders like a bird. Catherine got to her feet and crept close to Peregrine, frightened by the sight of adult grief. ‘Is Cormac’s heart breaking?’ she asked in an awed voice.

  Peregrine nodded. ‘Yes, Catherine,’ he said quietly, ‘his heart is breaking. It will take a long time to heal. Go and find your mother now, children. Tell her what has happened. There, Annie, your love has done him good, but let him be now. Go and find Mother.’

  They buried Brother Andrew’s body on Easter Eve in the morning, pushing the bier slowly up the winding path under the dripping beech trees to the brothers’ burial ground in the wood; a sober and silent procession of cowled black figures shrouded in the grey morning mist. At the graveside, Cormac stood and watched as they shovelled in the wet earth, his face pale and remote in the shadow of his cowl.

  He went about the duties of the day in silence. The kitchen was enclosed in a pall of silence. The absence of Brother Andrew’s sarcastic Scots rasp was as vivid among the men there as if they could hear him still.

  At midnight the brethren gathered in the choir for the Easter vigil; the moment of solemn joy and mystery when death is turned back, and the victory of the grave disintegrates in its own ashes, for Christ, Morning Star, is risen. The massive church was filled with pilgrims, the rustling dark alive with the excitement of their expectation. The Easter fire was set alight in the dark ness, and the Paschal candle lit from it, the light illuminating the watch of the night, the ranks of brothers in the choir, the crowd of men and women and children in the nave.

  Silent and numb, Cormac stood in his stall, grief welling up in him until he could no longer contain it. Tears ran unchecked down his cheeks as he stood watching Father Chad help Father Peregrine to take the great Paschal candle into his scarred and twisted hands. Father Chad stepped back and the abbot lifted up the candle.

  ‘Lumen Christi,’ his firm voice sang out the triumphant chant, and ‘Deo gratias!’ came the thunder of response from all around the church. The light of Christ: thanks be to God. There was, obscurely, hope in the candle held aloft in those maimed hands, the light of Christ.

  Is this your healing? Cormac prayed silently in the bitterness of his soul. To waken my heart to love and friendship and then flood it with this pain? Is this your light, your gift, your way—this agony?

  He did not expect an answer. He was filled with the anger and desolation of his loss. He was unprepared for the word, whispered deep in his soul, from somewhere as far outside himself as the stars, yet as near as his own shuddering breath: ‘Yes.’

  Glossary of Terms

  Breviary – monastic prayer book

  Carthusians – contemplative order; silent hermits in community

  Cellarer – monk responsible for oversight of all provisions; a key role in the community

  Chapter – daily meeting governing practical matters, where a chapter of St Benedict’s Rule was read and expounded by the abbot

  Chapter House – meeting room for community affairs

  Choir – the part of the church where the community sits

  Cloister – covered way giving access to main buildings of monastery

  Cistercian – order of monks, reform of Benedictine tradition

  Crimplene – an easy-care synthetic fabric

  Dorter – dormitory

  Esquire – personal assistant to a man of high status

  Eucharist – the holy communion meal, the Lord’s Supper

  Hours – (as in a Book of Hours) the services of worship in the monastic day

  Lay – not ordained

  Liturgy – structured worship

  Office – the set worship taking place at regular intervals through the day

  Parlour – small room where conversation was allowed

  Physic garden – the medicinal herb patch beside the infirmary

  Porter – doorkeeper

  Postulant – new member not yet made a novice

  Precentor – worship facilitator

  Prior – in an abbey, the deputy leader; in a priory, the leader

  Rule – the Benedictine Rule: document guiding daily life, written by St Benedict

  Monastic Day

  There may be slight variations from place to place and at different times from the Dark Ages through the Middle Ages and onward – e.g. Vespers may be after supper rather than before. This gives a rough outline. Slight liberties are taken in my novels to allow human interactions to play out.

  Winter Schedule (from Michaelmas)

  2:30am Preparation for the nocturns of matins – psalms etc.

  3:00am Matins, with prayers for the royal family and for the dead

  5:00am Reading in preparation for

  6:00am Lauds at daybreak and Prime; wash and break fast (just bread and water, standing)

  8.30am Terce, Morrow Mass, Chapter

  12:00 noon Sext, Sung Mass, midday meal

  2.00pm None

  4:15pm Vespers, Supper, Collatio

  6:15pm Compline

  The Grand Silence begins

  Summer Schedule

  1:30am Preparation for the nocturns of matins – psalms etc.

  2:00am Matins

  3:30am Lauds at daybreak, wash and break fast

  6:00am Prime, Morrow Mass, Chapter


  8:00am Terce, Sung Mass

  11:30am Sext, midday meal

  2:30pm None

  5:30pm Vespers, Supper, Collatio

  8:00pm Compline

  The Grand Silence begins

  Liturgical Calendar

  I have included the main feasts and fasts in the cycle of the church’s year, plus one or two other dates that are mentioned (e.g. Michaelmas and Lady Day when rents were traditionally collected) in these stories.

  Advent – begins four Sundays before Christmas

  Christmas – December 25th

  Holy Innocents – December 28th

  Epiphany – January 6th

  Baptism of our Lord concludes Christmastide, Sunday after January 6th Candlemas – February 2 (Purification of Blessed Virgin Mary, Presentation of Christ in the temple)

  Lent – Ash Wednesday to Holy Thursday – start date varies with phases of moon

  Holy Week – last week of Lent and the Easter Triduum

  Lady Day – March 25th

  Easter Triduum (three days) of Good Friday, Holy Saturday, Easter Sunday

  Ascension – forty days after Easter

  Whitsun (Pentecost) – fifty days after Easter

  Trinity Sunday – Sunday after Pentecost

  Corpus Christi – Thursday after Trinity

  Sacred Heart of Jesus – Friday of the following week

  Feast of John the Baptist – June 24th

  Lammas (literally ‘loaf-mass’; grain harvest) – August 1st