by Lynn Austin
“I’ve been told that the monks here at Saint Catherine’s are very hospitable to pilgrims,” Miss Rebecca said. “As for getting home again, we’ll have a few weeks to figure that out and plenty of work to do in the meantime.”
They reached the large wooden gate that led inside the enclosure, and Kate was relieved to see patches of green plants and a sprinkling of skinny evergreens springing up from the desert. There must be water here, somewhere. They dismounted outside the walls, and Miss Rebecca and Miss Flora spoke with a bearded man who had come to the gate as they’d approached. He was dressed all in black and wore a strange black hat on his head—like a short stovepipe hat without the brim. After talking for a few minutes, Miss Flora turned to them. “He’s going to take us to see the monastery’s prior. You should come with us, Soren. You too, Kate.”
Kate followed them inside the compound and through the narrow streets, past a stone church with a square, stone steeple on top. All of the men inside the monastery looked tall and very thin to Kate, and wore long, black robes, scraggly beards, and hats just like the man at the gate. They looked so much alike, she wondered how anyone could tell them apart. Their guide stopped at a small wooden door in a stone and plaster building. He went inside and after a moment, beckoned to the sisters to come in.
“If you don’t mind, he wants you two to wait out here for now,” Miss Flora said. The door closed behind them and Kate was left outside with Petersen.
“I can’t believe we traveled all this way just to get here,” she said. “What could they possibly have way out here that we couldn’t get in Chicago?”
“Ancient manuscripts, for one thing.” Petersen sounded grumpy and impatient as usual. “Miss Rebecca warned you what this trip would be like, Kate. I was there. I heard her. You shouldn’t have come if you weren’t willing to visit strange places or try new things.”
“Don’t nag me. You’re not my boss.”
“Yes, I am. You—”
“I’m going to look around. You can stay here and boss yourself.” She started down the narrow street toward the old church, but Petersen grabbed her arm, jerking her back. “Ow! Let go of me!”
“You can’t wander around here on your own,” he said in a low voice. “This is a private monastery, where monks live. It would be like . . . like snooping through someone’s house, uninvited. Besides, Miss Flora told us to wait out here, and she is your boss.”
“Fine! I’ll stay here. Let go of me.”
“No. I don’t trust you. You’ve caused enough trouble for everyone already.”
“I didn’t do a single thing wrong. It’s not my fault the stupid sheikh wants to marry me. I certainly never encouraged him. And if you don’t let me go this minute, I’ll scream as loud as I can.” He dropped her arm.
With nothing else to do, Kate sank down in the shade beside the door to wait. In the distance beyond the walls, towering stone mountains surrounded the monastery, making her feel very small. A long time passed, but she figured things were going well inside because she heard laughter from time to time. Petersen stood over her as if he were made of stone, too—and he wasn’t laughing. In fact, she couldn’t remember ever hearing him laugh in all the time she’d lived and traveled with the sisters. He was so tall, pale, and cold. He reminded her of an icicle.
After what seemed like a very long time, the door opened again and the sisters and two bearded monks came out. Kate scrambled to her feet and dusted off her skirt. “Sorry you had to wait,” Miss Flora said. “The prior is going to show us around now and introduce Becky to Father Galakteon, the librarian. They’ve agreed to let us stay here and set up camp outside the gates in the monastery garden, so that’s good news.”
“Why can’t we stay inside the walls, away from the sheikh and his men?” Kate asked as they started walking toward the church.
“Because this is a monastery,” Miss Flora replied, lowering her voice. “It’s a religious place. Only men live here.”
“Did you tell the monks how the sheikh left us all alone in the desert and—”
“Shh . . . hush, Katie dear,” Miss Flora said. “One tiny step at a time.”
They peeked inside the church, and Kate never could have guessed from the outside how beautiful and mysterious it looked on the inside. She’d thought it would be dark and dreary, but the desert sun poured through windows high above the ornate pillars and lit up the gold that covered the front of the church as if it was on fire. A huge chandelier hung from the lofty ceiling, along with dozens of smaller dangling things. The entire place was very hushed and still and smelled like strong perfume.
“This church is more than one thousand years old,” Miss Flora whispered to Kate and Petersen. “Can you even imagine that?” Kate couldn’t. She couldn’t count that high. Living on the streets, she’d had no way to keep track of the months and years except by the changing weather.
She shaded her eyes as they came back outside into the blinding sunlight, and they walked around the church to look at a scraggly tree that seemed to be growing out of the side of a building. The sisters seemed very impressed and reverent, nodding solemnly as the monks gestured to it and went on and on in their mumbling voices. “They’re explaining that this is the burning bush that Moses saw in the desert. Its roots are beneath this chapel.”
“The same Moses from the Bible story?” Kate asked in disbelief. “Wasn’t that a long time ago?”
“Yes, thousands and thousands of years,” Miss Flora said.
“I don’t believe it,” Kate said. “That bush would be a lot bigger if it was thousands of years old.”
“I’m skeptical, too, Kate,” Miss Rebecca said. She looked as though she was trying not to laugh. “But we need to act as if we’re very impressed. Otherwise, we’ll be back out in the desert with the Bedouin.” Kate did her best not to roll her eyes.
The last stop was what they called a library, even though it looked like a dusty storage room to Kate with shelves full of old papers. The librarian, Father Galakteon, looked exactly like the prior and all of the other monks except that he was much more enthusiastic as he greeted them, chattering away with the sisters as if he hadn’t had anyone to talk to in a thousand years. Maybe he hadn’t. They talked and laughed for such a long time that Kate started looking around for a place to sit down. No sooner did she find one than it was time to leave.
“Wonderful news!” Miss Flora whispered on the way back to where the camels were waiting. “The librarian remembers my Edmund from years ago. He has agreed to let Becky and me work in the library with him. We can start tomorrow morning.”
“That’s good news,” Petersen said with his customary frown.
Kate simply shrugged. At least they hadn’t come all this way for nothing. “Is he going to help us get rid of the sheikh and get home again?” she asked.
“Never mind the sheikh for now,” Miss Flora said. “I’ll ask around and find out what we can do about him. We came all this way to work in the library, and now that we have permission, we need to concentrate on that.”
“You can work in the library with me, Kate,” Miss Rebecca said. “Maybe if you’re out of sight for a while, the sheikh will lose interest.”
Mr. Farouk and the Bedouin drivers had set up both camps by the time they were led back outside to the garden. Kate was distressed to see that the camps were within sight of each other, as if the sheikh was determined to keep his eye on them. The cook had uncrated the chickens and turkeys, and the birds were running around the enclosure squawking and pecking as if savoring their freedom. Little did they know how temporary their freedom would be! Her own situation was the same as theirs, Kate realized. She had hoped to be safe at the monastery and rid of the sheikh and his men for good, but she still felt a cleaver hanging over her head—or in the sheikh’s case, his rusty, old rifle.
“We’re no better off here than we were in the desert,” Kate said as she plopped down on a camp stool. “Those skinny, old monks couldn’t defend themselves, let al
one us.”
“The Lord knows when the hour of our end will be,” Miss Flora said.
Kate wanted to scream every time Miss Flora repeated those words. All they did was remind her that she was going to die, and she didn’t want to. “Call me when supper is ready,” she said and went off to hide inside her tent.
Early the next morning, Kate awoke to what sounded like fire alarm bells. She leaped right off her cot, ready to run, her heart racing. “Don’t worry,” Miss Flora said with a yawn. “The bells are calling the monks to prayer.”
“I thought only the Bedouin prayed this early in the morning. The sun is barely up.”
“I know. But as long as we’re awake,” Miss Rebecca said, “we may as well have a quick breakfast and get to work.”
Petersen came with them to the monastery’s library, lugging the heavy camera equipment. While he unpacked, Kate turned in a small circle in the room, surveying the dusty shelves. “What is all this stuff? It doesn’t look like the library at your house.”
“That’s because these ‘books’ are very old,” Miss Rebecca said, “from a time when things were written on scrolls that rolled up instead of in leather-bound volumes. I’m hoping that some of these date from the time of Jesus. Can you imagine? Our job will be to look over each one and help Father Galakteon catalogue them.”
“What does that mean?”
“We’ll make a list of everything that’s here and put things in order so the monks will know what they have and where to find it again. Then scholars who want to come here and study will know what’s here, too. I also plan to photograph some of the scrolls so biblical experts who can’t travel to the monastery can begin studying the pictures right away.”
“Why can’t the monks do it themselves?” It still wasn’t clear to Kate why they’d traveled all this way in the first place.
“Well, because many of these scrolls and codices are written in Syriac,” Miss Rebecca said, “and in other languages that the monks don’t understand. I’ve been studying ancient languages for just this purpose.”
“And because we hope to find an ancient copy of the Bible,” Miss Flora added, “so that the professor will see that the words of Scripture haven’t been altered over the centuries.”
They began working in one corner of the room, close to the door, with plans to make their way around the perimeter of the room first, then tackle the shelves in the middle. Miss Rebecca made Kate wear silk gloves and gave her the task of carefully removing the scrolls and documents from the shelves, one by one, and unrolling the delicate parchment and vellum leaves so Miss Rebecca could examine the writing with her magnifying glass and decide what it said. Miss Flora wrote everything down in a huge ledger for the monastery to keep, and made a second copy for the scholars back home. Miss Flora’s other job was to talk to Father Galakteon, the librarian, and keep him occupied and out of Miss Rebecca’s way, so she could work faster. It helped that he kept jumping up and running off to pray a bunch of times a day.
Kate and Miss Rebecca worked at a little table that looked so old Kate wondered if Moses had built it himself. They went through each manuscript, one by one, and Kate had to be very careful or the pages would crumble in her hands. Her nose tickled from all the dust, and every now and then she had to turn away and sneeze. She’d never had a job like this before where she needed to be so patient and still. And except for Miss Flora and the monk chattering away in Greek, it was very quiet in here, much different from the noisy garment factory where she’d once worked. “You’re very good at this,” Miss Rebecca said after Kate had opened a particularly delicate scroll. “You have a very gentle touch.”
“I learned that by picking pockets.”
Miss Rebecca laughed out loud, making Miss Flora and Father Galakteon stop talking and peer over at them. “Sorry . . . sorry . . .” Miss Rebecca said before saying something else in the monk’s language. The pair resumed their discussion, and Miss Rebecca turned to Kate again. “I admire your honesty, Kate. It’s very refreshing in someone who’s . . . well, basically dishonest. You’re a curious contradiction. I like that. It’s so much better than being boring.”
Kate wasn’t sure if Miss Rebecca had just praised her or not, but she thought so. Even after all this time, she still didn’t know what to think of the sisters. But they had been very kind to her. And generous. And Kate had never met anyone else in her life who’d been kind without wanting something in return.
“What do you most wish for, Kate?” Miss Rebecca suddenly asked her. She had stopped working and laid down her little magnifying glass.
“What do you mean?”
“Is there something you long to do or see? Something you dream of doing with your life?”
“I can’t think of anything,” Kate said with a shrug. “I just take one day at a time. . . . Find something to eat, a place to sleep, watch out for—” She’d almost said Joe and his men or the police but she caught herself in time.
“Watch out for what, dear?”
“You know . . . for trouble . . . and for bad people. Where I come from, there’s always someone trying to get the better of you. I learned to look out for myself because nobody else will.”
“This situation with the sheikh must be very hard for you. You’re obviously used to taking care of yourself. You know your way around the streets, so being way out here where you’re no longer in control must be difficult.”
Kate felt tears spring to her eyes and quickly looked away. She’d never felt so out of control in her life. “I didn’t know it would be like this,” she said when she trusted herself to speak. “I never imagined anything like this place.”
“I’m so sorry. It’s my fault for not making certain you were better prepared before you made the decision to come. But I was surprised and very glad when you did because it showed that you have a sense of adventure. You’ve got fortitude and courage, Kate Rafferty, and I admire you for that. Yet it remains to be seen what will come of this journey you’ve undertaken.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, whenever Flora and I have gone on one of our trips, we’ve always discovered another piece of the puzzle of our lives, and we’ve returned home with a renewed sense of purpose. I was glad when you came on this trip because I’ve been hoping that you would also learn about yourself and what God wants for you. You have so many admirable qualities that He could use.”
“Ha! Like being a thief?”
“He’s using your light-fingered touch right now. All of our experiences make us who we are. And if we’re willing to ask, God will show us how He wants to use those experiences.”
Kate bent over the scroll again, concentrating on her work. She was growing very uncomfortable with this conversation. If God really knew everything about her, like Miss Rebecca said, then He wouldn’t want anything to do with her.
“Let me ask you again, Kate—what would you like your future to be when you get home?”
“You mean if we get home,” she said, desperate to change the subject.
“Oh, we’ll be fine,” Miss Rebecca said with a wave of her hand. “I don’t think God is ready to take any of us to heaven just yet. Surely there’s something you’d like to do besides work for Flora and me. What do you most enjoy doing?”
“I never had a chance to think about it.”
“Would you like to go to school? Fall in love and get married?”
Kate felt her temper flare at all the nosy questions and fought to keep it under control. “I’ve never loved anybody or been loved by anybody.”
Miss Rebecca didn’t reply, and when Kate looked up at her, she saw that she had tears in her eyes. She rested her gloved hand over Kate’s. “I want you to know that you can take a chance and dare to dream, Kate. God created you for a purpose. Can’t you see how He has directed your life so far? It wasn’t an accident that He led you to us.” Kate didn’t reply, hoping Miss Rebecca would take the hint and stop prying if she kept quiet. Did she dare to imagine a future th
at didn’t require running from Joe or from the police? What would she like to do if she had a choice?
“Give it some thought, Kate,” Miss Rebecca said, patting her hand, “and we’ll talk about it again.”
A week passed, and Kate enjoyed working with Miss Rebecca so much that she could almost forget about their problems with the sheikh. Miss Rebecca was teaching her how to operate the camera, and although Kate wouldn’t be able to see her finished photographs until they returned home, the process fascinated her. Working together, they had made their way around the perimeter of the library, cataloging each item. They were ready to start on the shelves in the center of the room next.
“We’ve found some interesting texts,” Miss Rebecca was telling her sister as they sat around the camp table after dinner, “but I’m sorry to say that we haven’t unearthed anything I can use to change Timothy’s mind. But there are still a lot of documents to go through, so I’m hoping that—”
Suddenly the quiet desert evening exploded with gunfire, followed by what sounded like a war cry from the Bedouin camp. Kate leaped up, searching for a place to run and hide. The sisters had jumped up from their camp stools, too, nearly upsetting the folding table.
“What in the world is going on?” Miss Flora said. “Do you know, Mr. Farouk? I hope the Bedouin are simply having a celebration.”
Mr. Farouk ducked his head, as if he feared one of the sisters might strike him. “The sheikh is angry. . . . He asks to speak about the girl, but I told him he must wait.”
“So now he’s shooting at us to get our attention?” Miss Flora asked.
“Why would you say such a foolish thing?” Miss Rebecca asked him. She looked ready to shake some sense into the little man. “You should have told us right away! Isn’t that how you got us all into trouble in the first place?”
“I did not wish to disturb you—”
“Disturb us!” she shouted. “He’s firing his rifle to get our attention! You and I need to get over there right now and calm them down.”