The Hour Before Dawn

by Penelope Wilcock

  “I guess this is part of why I never thought to invite Madeleine and my mother here before,” mused John. “Women and monastic communities of men can be a fair disastrous combination. We have enough trouble with Our Lady of Sorrows in the chapel. Women guests fall in love with the monks, or the monks fall in love with them, and either way there’s trouble.”

  “Give me credit for a little discretion, Father John!”

  “On the basis of what? If it’s plain to me you’re getting closer to Madeleine than you should be, do you think it won’t be noticeable to anyone else?”

  “Madeleine won’t see,” said William quietly.

  “Won’t she? What makes you think so?”

  “Because… because of the way my head thinks,” William answered him slowly.

  “Whatever’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Whatever emotions I might feel, however deep or strong they may be, there is always a dispassionate watcher in my head, evaluating, noticing, commenting. I never lose myself totally to anything. It can be quite wearisome sometimes—an endless internal critique of all I say and do. And I know—oh, now I’m going to have to be honest with you, and that isn’t easy to do either, so please don’t be angry with me—I know that Madeline will never see that I… what I feel.

  “I know she will not see because at the level of my being that feels—my emotional self, my heart—I myself cannot properly see what she feels about me. On that level of my being, unless I could… oh, unless I could hold her in my arms and have her as my own—which, don’t you worry, I’m not even dreaming of… well, that is to say, yes, I am dreaming of it, but I have no intention of doing any such thing. But unless I could do that, my heart would never really know for sure what she feels about me, because I want it so much I can’t believe it could be true.

  “That’s my heart. But my head, watching and commenting, deduces dispassionately that one of two things must be true. Either she does not care for me as I do for her—or else she does.

  “And my head knows that a woman who has not long since been raped, not once but repeatedly, is bound to feel nervous around men. If she had even a whiff of a notion of what I feel for her and did not reciprocate it, then she would find it threatening to be with me by herself.

  “On the other hand, if she is drawn to me as I am to her, I know that—just like me—without the confirmation, the assurance that comes with the embrace of love, she would never quite let herself believe that I care for her because she too much wants it to be true.

  “So since she is not nervous in my company and finds me not the slightest bit threatening, I have deduced that what I feel for her is indeed reciprocated, but it is channelled into friendly banter, where I think it’s safe.”

  John was listening to this analysis with a certain expression of amazement.

  “Safe? God save and help us! You think what you have just told me represents anything that could be called safe? William, you have been the superior of a community! Put yourself in my shoes! If you had just had this conversation, would you be blithely describing such a relationship as safe?”

  The faintest smile moved William’s mouth. “I think you have never grasped quite what our community was like, Father John. What the men did with each other, and what they did with the maids, never interested me. I focused my attention on what they did with the money. In fact, I have wondered if there was something of retribution for this in the attack Oswald suffered. I meant it when I told you he was no angel. So long as they kept themselves on the right side of the undergarments of the aristocracy, I didn’t intervene overmuch or attempt to curtail the activities of the men of my house.”

  John had no answer for this. “Oh, dear.” William sighed. “You look appalled.”

  “Yes, I think I am. So living a double life is something you’re used to?”

  “No. Not personally. At least not in this respect. I think I’ve said to you before, I do not—normally—like closeness. I do not attach. Human relationship feels somewhat imprisoning to me. I have not been pure, sexually, but I have been solitary.”

  Their eyes met. “Thank God you are honest at least,” said John, “but, William, this with Madeleine has got to stop—not slow down or rein in a little: stop.”

  William’s face betrayed no emotion beyond the flicker of his eyes John had come to recognize as the sign that all was far from well.

  “That will be hard on her,” he replied softly after thinking on John’s words for a short while. “She is very vulnerable. She has no friends here.”

  “Exactly. She is completely vulnerable. And she never will make friends if this continues; all she will make is scandal, because what I have seen, others will see too. The way you look at her, the way you make her laugh, the way she is so free in how she speaks to you and you to her… there is no distance, there is no caution. Are you telling me you cannot see this?”

  Reluctantly William shook his head. “I can see it perfectly well,” he admitted, “but I’d been telling myself it would be all right—I could manage it with grace, let it run its course and die, so neither Madeleine nor anyone else would ever know.”

  “Monastic celibacy is such a balancing act,” said John more gently. “It’s nigh impossible to keep your heart open and humanly tender, but still keep a guard on your relationships with others so that warmth does not slide into an exclusive intimacy of one kind or another. For apart from this disastrous friendship with Madeleine, you are too close to me as well, in some ways. Too familiar.”

  As he said that, it was as though a painful remoteness closed around William, who leaned forward on his stool, his elbows on his knees, the lower part of his face resting on his hands. He moved his head slightly, rubbing his mouth thoughtfully against his hand. Then he was just still. John realized that despite his perceptiveness and subtle intelligence, when it came to personal relationships, William was in effect still a novice. He had simply ignored that whole territory for most of his life. John felt the struggle and the sadness in his brother; the familiar healer’s stab of sharp compassion passed like a blade through his gut.

  William sat up straight to look at him. “It is Christ who has done this,” he said. “He broke me open. He has made me vulnerable. It is too painful, John, and I’m not used to it. What can I do? What will be my refuge now? Without you, without Madeleine—” He shook his head, the words tailing into silence again.

  “Do you want an answer to that?” John asked gently.

  “Yes, I do!” In a sudden, convulsive movement William clutched both hands to his own belly, as if it hurt him badly. “Ah! It feels so… ah!”

  John waited, watching the agonized restlessness as William tried to become reconciled to this new perspective.

  “I was supposed to do this years ago, wasn’t I? Not in middle life. This belongs to the novitiate! Well, I feel suitably foolish and embarrassed. I might have hoped by midlife I should have found the dignity of some stability—which I had before Christ broke me open.”

  “A hard shell is not the same thing as dignity,” John said quietly. “The only constructive way to deal with this is simply to take the love and share it out. Notice it, feel it, and give it away. The love that wants to pour out to Madeleine—and, God bless you, to me—give some to Ambrose, give some to Tom, to Germanus, to Francis, to Father Chad.”

  At that William suddenly laughed. “I was doing all right until you mentioned Father Chad! Lord, have mercy! Does anyone love Chad?”

  “If they don’t,” replied his abbot, “isn’t it time somebody did?”

  “Leave that one alone for a minute,” said William. “This is difficult enough. Please don’t bring Father Chad into the mix. Can I be clear about something? Are you asking me not to see Madeleine? To avoid her?”

  “I am.”

  “Won’t that hurt her? Won’t she feel snubbed and rejected?”

  “Yes.”

  William looked at him, bewildered.

  “If she does,” said his abbot ge
ntly, “she will conclude she was mistaken—that you were only being kind, to help her settle in, and we will be able to retrieve a more appropriate balance of relationship. She will be glad she made no real indiscretion and hope you did not see how she felt for you. She will look for friends among the villagers who come to her for help. She will find the community is her friend and will watch over her and not let her be lonely. You must do this, for I tell you, William, you are playing with fire. Let things, as they are, go one step further and you will have her in your arms; then she will end up having to be placed in a women’s community, while you look for employment with a merchant of some kind in York. Such emotions are too powerful, too elemental, to both contain and feed at the same time. You will soon be subsisting from day to day on the minutes you can snatch with her. Oh God, help us—you already are, aren’t you? I can see it in your face!”

  John watched the struggle inside his friend, understood the wrenching depth of the sacrifice he needed to make. It happened to so many men, and it never was easy.

  In the end, “I will do this,” said William simply. “I will give up both of you. I have made particular friendships, and it is not my right to do so. But… look, I’m speaking to you now as my abbot: I want you to know—for no one else will know it, I shall not let them see—for the rest of my life, I shall keep John and I shall keep Madeleine in a shining memory of summer in my heart. I can let the relationships go, the day-to-day delight of friendship that has so sweetened my life, because I want to stay here. But before God, I cannot let her go—or you go—from my heart. You will be sewn into the beating of my heart with invisible thread, both of you. I promise you though, I swear it, nobody will see. I have lied all my life. I can lie about this. Will that do? Ah, merciful Jesu, Father! Don’t look at me like that! Will you have me in tears? I can do no more!”

  “William, let it settle. I am still here, and yes, there are bonds between us that shall not be forgotten or denied. Madeleine is here. And because of your initiative she is safe and not shut inside a convent where she does not belong. Being in love—it subsides; no, trust me, it does! You will not always feel as wretched as you are feeling this minute. And you will always be the man who helped her live again. She knows you are a monk. She will understand. She might feel hurt at first when you do not come to her, but that of itself will create a cooling space most necessary. Brother, our Father Peregrine said to Brother Thomas one time that love has no defenses, that you only know it’s love when it hurts. I think about that sometimes. If we make the choice to stay alive—vital and tender and open—we’ve chosen something that is precious and therefore costly. If I’ve understood it rightly, what Christ asks of us is to accept the pain of being open. That’s the picture of the cross—the pain of being open.”

  William nodded. “And this is you, my lord abbot, hammering the nails in?”

  John swallowed. “I think it probably is,” he said.

  “It’s a rhythm, isn’t it?” said William slowly. “Crucifixion… burial… resurrection… ascension. You think you’re through, you rejoice that it’s done, and then before you know it, it starts again with a fresh crucifixion. Oh holy Jesus, I don’t know that I have the strength for this.”

  “It is painful, but it doesn’t rot you from the inside, like living for yourself and for material things and being shut away. It asks a great deal, but your brothers understand. Brother Tom, for instance—he has been in love. He was out of the community for quite some time, but he came back; he chose what he really wanted. Take the treasure that is in you and give it to the people who don’t have any—Father Chad, Father Gilbert, the novices who are so unsure of themselves and desperate for affirmation, the merchants and traders who notice how coming here makes them feel.”

  William took these ideas in, considering what had been said to him, his face thoughtful. Then he seemed to come to a resolution; and when he spoke, his voice sounded wooden—the flat tone of resignation. “I’m taking up your time.”

  “If you love me, pray for me; and I will pray for you,” said John gently, “for I love you too.”

  William nodded and got to his feet. “I’d best go and get the cords and the salt sorted out,” he said.

  John also stood, and they crossed the room to the door that led out to the cloister. William hesitated then and looked at his abbot. “She’s… she’s scared of big spiders,” he said.

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake!” John stared at him in exasperation. “You are not to go near her! Anyway, I know about the spiders. She’s my sister. But she’s forty-three; that’s grownup enough to come to terms with spiders.”

  William opened the door, but with his hand on the latch he looked back. “May I just—”

  “Absolutely not,” said John. “Leave her alone. Get on with the work you are supposed to be doing.”

  Nothing in his abbot’s demeanour let William know that it broke John’s heart to see the look on his friend’s face as he nodded one more time and turned to go.

  As the days expanded into high summer, England stood green beneath her canopy of trees. In Madeleine’s garden, the sound of contented hens against the drowsy hum of bees told the season, with the fragrance of the flowers.

  A steady trickle of visitors began to find their way to Peartree Cottage as word quickly reached the village that she was a wisewoman skilled in herbal lore and practice, and an experienced midwife too. One or two women in the village were with child, and the walk up to the abbey was steep but not very far. Brother Michael respected Madeleine’s knowledge and experience, and working alongside him she was able to contribute much of value to the medical help St Alcuin’s could offer the folk round about. Under the shelter of the abbey’s good name and intrinsic holiness, Madeleine found herself able to interact freely and with confidence; she started to make friends. John came when he could spare an hour to spend in her company and invited her often to eat at his table and meet those who came and went.

  Oswald learned the way to her house and frequently went to see her. Brother Michael visited from time to time to seek her advice.

  The brothers saw that she lacked nothing. She had the eggs from her hens and the herbs from her garden, and Brother Ambrose brought her flour and oil, candles and spices, needles and thread, a spindle for the wool she collected from the hedgerows, and everything she needed.

  She loved her cottage and lived contentedly there, but she commented with elaborate carelessness to her brother one June day, “It’s odd, I never see William anymore.”

  “No? He says he’s found you a goat. He was asking after you.”

  “A goat? Oh, God bless him!” Madeleine exclaimed, delighted. “I miss him though,” she persisted tentatively.

  “Yes, I understand. We keep him busy with his cellarer’s duties, Madeleine. When we travelled together to Chesterfield, I think they felt his absence more sorely here than mine! His responsibilities are both broad and detailed; they leave him little leisure. No doubt your paths will cross from time to time.”

  Familiar with the nuances of John’s voice, Madeleine knew she was hearing something that rang not quite true. She looked at him, puzzled. Very straight, he met her eyes. “Leave it, please, sister,” he said. And then she understood.

  In the checker each day, William worked diligently alongside Brother Ambrose. “I don’t know how we ever got on without him,” that brother remarked to his abbot one evening in late June as he fell into step with him on the way to Vespers. “For a week or two after you came back from Chesterfield, I hardly saw him, and I thought he was going to turn out to have been another nine days’ wonder like Brother Bernard was when Father Peregrine tried him on the job—such promise but coming to nothing in the end. It takes stamina to keep at the cellarer’s duties. Still, I expect Father William was busy helping Father Oswald find his way about that week or two, poor soul.”

  “I expect that must have been it,” his abbot replied. “I’m pleased to hear he’s settled back in again now.”

&
nbsp; As June turned into July, John asked William to bring the last month’s accounts to the abbot’s lodge to be approved and signed.

  Finding his abbot seated at his great oak table, William handed him the bundle of prepared accounts. They had seen little of each other in the weeks since William had undertaken to sever all communication with Madeleine and to allow greater space between himself and his abbot. They saw each other in the daily round of worship, of course, and their paths crossed often enough as they each went about their business in the abbey. But the intimacy that had grown between them had been left on ice.

  As William came into the room now, John appraised him carefully: the narrow, sallow, mobile face, with the silver hair and eyes the indeterminate cold colour of the ocean—eyes whose colour it was hard to remember and, like the sea, showing only the shifting surface, all manner of life without explanation continuing unobserved underneath. William’s manner was pleasant and courteous. He gave no signal of special relationship; nothing in his glance or his demeanour suggested intimacy or friendship beyond their formal relationship in community. This man was hard to read.

  Abbot John went through the accounts while William stood quietly waiting. He checked everything carefully, signing his name to each section and to all the letters ready for sending.

  “Well?” As he pushed the bulky pile of parchments, duly examined and authorized, across the table, he looked into his friend’s eyes with gentle concern. He probed with healer’s sight, gazing directly into William’s eyes, searching his soul, and saw… nothing. William’s soul was not available for inspection. “Your head’s in good form. How’s your heart?”

  Relaxing his guard somewhat, William shook his head, looking all of his fifty years. “I don’t know that you should ask or that I should tell you,” he said at last. He glanced at John and away again. “Sometimes when I have lain awake in the hot dark these summer nights, I have pressed my mouth to my own hand, pretending it was her I kissed. Sometimes as I could not sleep, I have wrapped my own arms around myself, pretending she held me close. I will spare you the graphic details of anything else I may have done. But I promise you I have never gone near her—not once, Father.”