All day long Antiochus’s mother had been speculating as to what could
be the object of the priest’s visit, for which her boy had prepared
her, but she took good care not to betray by her manner that she was
expecting him. Perhaps he intended making a few remarks on the subject
of usury, and certain other trades which she practised; or because she
was in the habit of lending out—for purely medical purposes, but always
for a small fee—certain very ancient relics which she had inherited
from her husband’s family. Or perhaps he wanted to borrow money, either
for himself or some one else. Whatever it might prove to be, as soon
as the last customer had departed she went to the door and stood there
with her hands in her pockets, heavy with copper coins, looking out to
see whether Antiochus at least were not in sight.
Then immediately she pretended to be busied with shutting the door,
and in fact she did shut the lower half, bending down to fasten the
bolt. She was active in her movements, although tall and stout; but,
contrary to the other women of the place, she had a small head, which
only looked large because of the great mass of black plaits that
encircled it.
As the priest approached she drew herself up and bade him good evening
with much dignity, though her black eyes looked straight into his with
an ardent, languorous gaze. Then she invited him to take a seat in the
room behind the wineshop, and Antiochus’s wistful eyes begged her to
press the invitation. But the priest said good-humouredly:
“No, let us stay here,” and he sat down at one of the long,
wine-stained tables that furnished the little tavern, whilst Antiochus,
resigned to the inevitable, stood beside him, casting anxious glances
round, however, to see if everything was in order and fearful lest any
belated customer should come in to disturb the conference.
Nobody came and everything was in order. The big petroleum lamp threw
an immense shadow of his mother on the wall behind the little bar,
covered with shelves filled with bottles of red, yellow and green
liqueurs, the light falling crudely on the small black casks ranged
along the opposite side of the shop. There was no other furniture
except the long table at which sat the priest, and another smaller one,
and over the door hung a bunch of broom which served the double purpose
of informing passers-by that this was the door of a wineshop and of
attracting flies away from the glasses.
Antiochus had been waiting for this moment during the whole of the
day, with the feeling that some mystery would then be revealed. He was
afraid of some intruder coming in, or that his mother would not behave
as she should. He would have liked her to be more humble, more docile
in the presence of the priest; but instead of that she had taken her
seat again behind the bar, and sat there as composedly as a queen on
her throne. She did not even appear to realize that the man seated
at the tavern table like an ordinary customer was a saint who worked
miracles, and she was not even grateful for the large quantity of wine
which he had been the indirect means of her selling that day!
At last, however, Paul opened the conversation.
“I should have liked to see your husband as well,” he began, resting
his elbows on the table and placing his finger-tips together, “but
Antiochus tells me that he will not be back until Sunday week.”
The woman merely nodded in assent.
“Yes, on Sunday week, but I can go and fetch him, if you like,” broke
in Antiochus, with an eagerness of which neither of the others took the
least notice.
“It is about the boy,” continued Paul. “The time has come when you
must really consider in earnest what you are going to do with him. He
is growing big now and you must either teach him a trade or, if you
want to make a priest of him, you must think very seriously of the
responsibility you are undertaking.”
Antiochus opened his lips, but as his mother began to speak he listened
to her silently, though with a shade of disapproval on his anxious
young face.
The woman seized the occasion, as she always did, to sound the praises
of her husband, also to excuse herself for having married a man much
older than herself:
“My Martin, as your Reverence knows, is the most conscientious man in
the world; he is a good husband and a good father and a better workman
than anyone else. Who is there in the whole village who works as hard
as he does? Tell me that, your Reverence, you who know what sort of a
character the village has got through the idleness of its inhabitants!
I say, then, that if Antiochus wants to choose a trade, he has only to
follow his father’s; that is the best trade for him. The boy is free
to do as he likes, and even if he wants to do nothing (I don’t say
it for vanity), he will be able to live without turning thief, thank
God! But if he wants a trade different from his father’s, then he must
choose for himself. If he wants to be a charcoal-burner, let him be a
charcoal-burner; if he wants to be a carpenter, let him be a carpenter;
if he wants to be a labourer, let him be a labourer.”
“I want to be a priest!” said the boy with quivering lips and eager
eyes.
“Very well then, be a priest,” replied his mother.
And thus his fate was decided.
Paul let his hands fall upon the table and gazed slowly round him.
Quite suddenly he felt it was ridiculous that he should thus interest
himself in other people’s business. How could he possibly solve the
problem of the future for Antiochus when he could not succeed in
solving it for himself? The boy stood before him in ardent expectation,
like a piece of red-hot iron awaiting the stroke of the hammer to mould
it into shape, and every word had the power to either make or mar him.
Paul’s gaze rested on him with something akin to envy, and in the
depths of his conscience he applauded the mother’s action in leaving
her son free to follow his own instincts.
“Instinct never leads us wrong,” he said aloud, following his own train
of thought. “But now, Antiochus, tell me in your mother’s presence the
reason why you wish to be a priest. Being a priest is not a trade, you
know; it is not like being a charcoal-burner or a carpenter. You think
now that it is a very easy, comfortable kind of life, but later on you
will find that it is very difficult. The joys and pleasures allowed to
all other men are forbidden to us, and if we truly desire to serve the
Lord our life is one continuous sacrifice.”
“I know that,” replied the boy very simply. “I desire to serve the
Lord.”
He looked at his mother then, because he was a little ashamed of
betraying all his enthusiasm before her, but she sat behind the bar
as calmly and coldly as when she was merely serving customers. So
Antiochus went on:
“Both my father and mother are willing for me to become a priest; why
should they object? I am very careless sometimes, but that is because I
am still only a boy, and in future I mean to be much more serious and
attentive.”
“That is not the question, Antiochus; you are too serious and attentive
already!” said Paul. “At your age you should be heedless and merry.
Learn and prepare yourself for life, certainly, but be a boy too.”
“And am I not a boy?” protested Antiochus; “I do play, only you don’t
happen to see me just when I am playing! Besides, why should I play if
I don’t feel inclined? I have lots of amusements: I enjoy ringing the
church bells and I feel as if I was a bird up in the tower. And haven’t
I had an amusing time to-day? I enjoyed carrying the box and climbing
up ever so high amongst the rocks, and I got there before you, although
you were riding! I enjoyed coming home again... and to-day I enjoyed...
I was happy,” and the boy’s eyes sought the ground as he added, “when
you drove the devils out of the body of Nina Masia.”
“You believed in that?” asked the priest in a low voice, and
immediately he saw the boy’s eyes look upward, so glorious with the
light of faith and wonder that instinctively he lowered his own to hide
the dark shadow that rested on his soul.
“Only, when we are children we think in one way and everything looks
great and beautiful to us,” continued Paul, much disturbed, “but when
we are grown up things look different. One must reflect very carefully
before undertaking anything important so that one may not come to
repent afterwards.”
“I shall not repent, I’m sure,” said the boy with decision. “Have you
repented? No, and neither shall I repent.”
Paul lifted up his eyes: again he felt that he held in his hands the
soul of this child, to mould it like wax, and that a few careless
touches might deform it for ever. And again he feared and was silent.
All this time the woman behind the bar had listened quietly, but now
the priest’s words began to cause her a certain uneasiness. She opened
a drawer in front of her, wherein she kept her money, and the cornelian
rings and the brooches and mother-of-pearl ornaments pledged by the
village women in return for small loans; and evil thoughts flashed
through the darkest recesses of her mind, like those forlorn trinkets
at the bottom of her drawer.
“The priest is afraid that Antiochus will turn him out of his parish
some time or other,” she was thinking, “or else he is in need of money
and is working off his bad temper first. Now he’ll be asking for a
loan.”
She closed the drawer softly and resumed her tranquil demeanour. She
always sat there in silence and never took part in the discussions
between her customers, even though invited to give her opinion,
especially if they were playing cards. Thus she left her little
Antiochus to face his adversary by himself.
“How is it possible not to believe?” said the boy, between awe and
excitement. “Nina Masia was possessed, wasn’t she? Why, I myself felt
the devil inside her shaking her like a wolf in a cage. And it was
nothing but the words of the Gospel spoken by you that set her free!”
“That is true, the Word of God can achieve all things,” admitted the
priest. Then suddenly he rose from his seat.
Was he going? Antiochus gazed at him in consternation.
“Are you going?” he murmured.
Was this the famous visit? He ran to the bar and made a desperate
sign to his mother, who turned round and took down a bottle from the
shelves. She was disappointed too, for she had hoped for a chance
of lending money to the parish priest, even at a very low interest,
thereby in some way legitimizing her usury in the sight of God. But
instead of that, he had simply come to inform Antiochus that being a
priest was not the same thing as being a carpenter! However, she must
do him honour, in any case.
“But your Reverence is not going away like that! Accept something to
drink, at least; this wine is very old.”
Antiochus was already holding the tray with a glass goblet upon it.
“Then only a little,” said Paul.
Leaning across the bar, the woman poured out the wine, careful not
to spill a drop. Paul raised his glass, within which the ruby liquid
exhaled a perfume like a dusky rose, and after first making Antiochus
taste it, he put it to his own lips.
“Then let us drink to the future parish priest of Aar!” he said.
Antiochus was obliged to lean against the bar, for his knees gave way
under him; that was the happiest moment of his life. The woman had
turned round to replace the precious bottle on the shelf, and, absorbed
in his joy, the lad did not notice that the priest had gone deathly
pale and was staring out of the doorway as though he beheld a ghost.
A dark figure was running silently across the square, came to the
wineshop door, looked round the interior with wide-open black eyes, and
then entered, panting.
It was one of Agnes’s servants.
The priest instinctively withdrew to the far end of the tavern, trying
to hide himself, then came forward again on a sudden impulse. He felt
as if he were revolving round and round like a top, then pulled himself
together and remembered that he was not alone and must be careful not
to excite remark. So he stood still. But he had no desire to hear what
the servant was telling the woman, listening eagerly behind the bar,
his only desire was flight and safety; his heart had stopped beating,
and all the blood in his body had rushed to his head and was roaring in
his ears. Nevertheless the servant’s words penetrated to the utmost
depths of his soul.
“She fell down,” said the girl breathlessly, “and the blood poured from
her nose in a stream, such a stream that we thought she had broken
something inside her head! And she’s bleeding still! Give me the keys
of St. Mary of Egypt, for that is the only thing that can stop it.”
Antiochus, who stood listening with the tray and glass still in his
hands, ran to fetch the keys of an old church, now demolished, which
keys when actually laid on the shoulders of anyone suffering from
hæmorrhage of the nose did to some extent arrest the flow of blood.
“All this is just pretence,” thought Paul, “there is no truth whatever
in the tale. She sent her servant to spy on me and endeavour to lure me
to her house, and they are probably in league with this worthless woman
here.”
And yet deep, deep within him the agitation grew till all his being was
in a tumult. Ah, no, the servant was not lying; Agnes was too proud to
confide in anyone, and least of all in her servants. Agnes was really
ill, and with his inward eye he saw her sweet face all stained with
blood. And it was he himself who had struck her the blow. “We thought
she had broken something inside her head.”
He saw the shifty eyes of the woman behind the bar glance swiftly in
his direction, with obvious surprise at his apparent indifference.
“But how did it happen?” he then asked the servant, but coolly and
calmly, as though seeking to conceal his anxiety even from himself.
The girl turned and confronted him, her dark, hard, pointed face thrust
out towards him like a rock against which he feared to strike.
“I was not at home when she fell. It happened this morning whilst I
was at the fountain, and when I got back I found her very ill. She had
fallen over the doorstep and blood was flowing from her nose, but I
think she was more frightened than hurt. Then the blood stopped, but
she was very pale all day and refused to eat. Then this evening her
nose began to bleed again, and not only that, but she had a sort of
convulsion, and when I left her just now she was lying cold and stiff,
with blood still flowing. I am very nervous,” added the girl, taking
the keys which Antiochus handed to her and wrapping them in her apron,
“and we are only women in the house.”
She moved towards the door, but kept her black eyes on Paul as though
seeking to draw him after her by the sheer power of her gaze, and the
woman seated behind the bar said in her cold voice:
“Why does not your Reverence go and see her?”
He wrung his hands unconsciously and stammered: “I hardly know... it is
too late....”
“Yes, come, come!” urged the servant. “My little mistress will be very
glad, and it will give her courage to see you.”
“It is the devil speaking by your mouth,” thought Paul, but
unconsciously he followed the girl. He had gripped Antiochus by the
shoulder and was drawing him along as a support, and the boy went with
him like a plank of safety upon the waves. So they crossed the square
and went as far as the presbytery, the servant running on ahead, but
turning every few steps to look back at them, the whites of her eyes
gleaming in the moonlight. Seen thus at night, the black figure with
the dark and mask-like face had truly something diabolical about it,
and Paul followed it with a vague sense of fear, leaning on Antiochus’s
shoulder as he walked and feeling like Tobit in his blindness.
On passing the presbytery door the boy tried to open it, and then
Paul perceived that his mother had locked it. He stopped short and
disengaged himself from his companion.
“My mother has locked up because she knew in advance that I should not
keep my word,” he thought to himself; then said to the boy: “Antiochus,
you must go home at once.”
The servant had stopped also, then went on a few steps, then stopped
again and saw the boy returning towards his own home and the priest
inserting his key in his door; then she went back to him.
“I am not coming,” he said, turning almost threateningly to confront
her, and looking her straight in the face as though trying to recognize
her true nature through her outward mask; “if you should absolutely
need me, you understand—only if you do absolutely need me—you can come
back and fetch me.”
She went away without another word, and he stood there before his own
door, with his hand on the key as though it had refused to turn in the
lock. He could not bring himself to enter, it was beyond his power;
neither could he go forward in that other path he had begun to tread.
He felt as if he were doomed to stand there for all eternity, before a
closed door of which he held the key.
* * * * *
Meanwhile Antiochus had reached home. His mother locked the door and he
went to wash up the glasses and put them away; and the first glass he
washed in the clean water was the one from which _he_ had drunk. The
boy dried it very carefully with a white cloth, which he passed round
and round inside with his thumb; then he held it up to the flame of the
lamp and examined it with one eye, keeping the other screwed up, which
had the effect of making the glass shine like a big diamond. Then he
hid it away in a secret cupboard of his own with as much reverence as
if it had been the chalice of the Mass.