“Our visitor brings an order from our father general. Would you obey that order, Father Matthew, even if that order instructed you to consider the Mass not as a miracle, but, let’s say, just a pious ritual?”
“Far be it from me to speak out against my superiors,” Father Matthew thundered, “but I am ashamed to hear that talk coming from you—and under God’s roof.”
“Are you, now?” the abbot said, suddenly weary. “But, on the other hand, it seems you are not ashamed to act against the orders of your superiors. Even to the point of disobedience.”
“I do not consider that I have ever been disobedient to our rule.”
“You were told there were to be no vigils or special observances tonight.”
“I acted according to my conscience, Father Abbot.”
“Did you, indeed? And was it your conscience that sent you down to the shore, a while ago, singing hymns to annoy our visitor.”
“I sang a hymn, yes. Is he the sort of heathen who would be offended by the singing of a Catholic hymn?”
“Hold your tongue!” the abbot shouted. “Go to your cell. Tomorrow, at supper time, I want you in front of the chapter with an apology for your behavior. I have had enough of you, Matthew, all these years. Insolence and insubordination is the opposite of every vow you took when you became a monk. Are you not ashamed!”
“Father Abbot, I humbly apologize to you, since you ask me to apologize,” Father Matthew said. The abbot, in twenty years, had never spoken to him in this tone of voice. Shaken, but anxious not to show it, Father Matthew turned and genuflected to the altar. Rising, he made the sign of the cross. “Since you order me to retire, I obey your order.” Turning, he walked with heavy steps back down the aisle whence he came. The door at the foot of the nave banged shut.
The abbot sighed. Years ago, he would have knelt and offered up an act of contrition for his unruly temper. But, years ago, he had felt a certainty about so many things. Aggiornamento, was that when uncertainty had begun? Changes of doctrine. Setting oneself up as ultimate authority. Insubordination. He looked at the tabernacle. Insubordination. The beginning of breakdown. And, long ago, that righteous prig at Wittenberg nailing his defiance to the church door.
The abbot rose. He did not genuflect. He went down the side aisle and out into the night.
PART THREE
Kinsella woke at seven. In the rectangle of window above his bed, the sky was already light. Gulls rode that sky, kites held by invisible string. When, dressed and shaven, he opened the guesthouse door and stepped outside, he met the rush of breakers on shore, a long retreating roar of water. Obbligato of gull cries overhead, their harsh, despairing scream seeming to mourn a death. Winds whipped like penny tops, spinning the long grasses this way and that. The sky, immense, hurried, shifted its scenery of ragged clouds. From the cove below, four curraghs were putting out to sea. A fifth rode, far out, waiting for the others, as, bending to their oars, monks seal-wet in black oilskins pushed the curraghs stiffly over fencelike waves, moving toward the deeps. The day’s work had begun. Kinsella turned back toward the land. He felt the loneliness of islands, the sense of being shut in, here on a barren outcropping on the edge of Europe, surrounded by this desolation of ocean. Above him now, on a sloping field, four monks, skirts hitched up, spaded heavy shovels full of black earth. From the monastery itself he smelled the delicate scent of turf fires. An old monk, waiting just inside the cloister entrance, saw Kinsella standing outside the guesthouse, waved to him, and began to hurry toward him along the muddy path beneath the west wall of the monastery. The monk was not the abbot of Muck.
Came closer: Father Manus, tall, white-haired, and boyish, with the wanting-to-please smile of the Irish countryside. “Ah, good morning to you, Father. You slept well, I hope?”
“Yes, thank you.”
“Father Abbot asked me to find out if you would like to say Mass this morning? It would be easily arranged, so.”
Kinsella said he thought not.
“Then we’ll put some breakfast into you, will we?”
“The abbot was supposed to meet me here at eight. Perhaps I should wait?”
“Ah, well, he might be a bit delayed. He told me to look after you. He’s trying to get through on the telephone to Galway. We shipped some dulse down there last week and it’s still stuck in the railway sheds.”
“Dulse?”
“Dried seaweed. It is good eating. They sell it abroad, too. Have you never heard of it?”
“I’m afraid not.”
In the refectory, the breakfast plates had already been cleared away. The old kitchen monk put his head around the door. “Two boiled eggs or one?”
“One, thank you.”
The second old monk now appeared with a pot of tea and slices of homemade bread.
“Butter, for our visitor. And jam, too,” Father Manus said, anxiously.
“I am getting it, so.” The old monk sounded cross.
“You see,” Father Manus told Kinsella. “We don’t eat jam except on special occasions.”
“Feast days!” the old monk said, and chortled unexpectedly.
“I will leave you, so, to your breakfast,” Father Manus said, withdrawing.
The second old monk approached, bearing a boiled egg on a plate. Kinsella, sensing it was expected, bowed his head and silently said an Ecumen grace. No one said private grace nowadays. Grace was public and used only in mixed Ecumenical groups. The old monk withdrew. The kitchen door shut. Kinsella was alone in the refectory.
It was ten past eight. The abbot’s absence might well be deliberate. Hartmann, suspended in his back brace, not seeming to be seated, but rather hung in his orthopedic chair, his freckled fingers knitting and unknitting on the outer steerer wheels. “Almost always, the techniques were the same. When the bishops had decided to deny our requests, we were made to wait. Conferences were cancelled, interviews delayed. Excuses offered without conviction. You must show them that while you are the Revolution and they are Tradition, the Revolution is the established faith and will prevail. Power is the concept they have always understood. Use it, and use it from the beginning.” If this monastery was organized as others were, the abbot would know the exact moment the helicopter was due, might even wait almost to the moment of departure to offer some delaying tactic, or bring a compromise offer into play. It would not do. Immediate compliance could be ordered under threat of transfer. An acting abbot could be installed at once. There was, however, a complication. The abbot might not know it, but, under Ecumen rules, he had the right of appeal to the Amsterdam World Council. He would lose, of course, but the case might drag on for months. And, meantime, he could not be deposed. Such a confrontation was to be avoided. For one thing, it would almost certainly inspire a media circus with the abbot as martyr. If the abbot knew these rights of his, Kinsella also knew the catch to them. By Ecumen rules, the abbot must, before bringing his case to the Amsterdam World Council, first have had a direct confrontation with his order superior. That superior, Father General Humbertus Von Kleist, of the Albanesian order, grand chancellor of the Pontifical Athenaeum of St. Vicente, would face the abbot on his arrival in Rome. The abbot would need to be strong. Very strong.
But Kinsella felt it would not come to that. There were ways of shading the options, ways of exploring one’s adversary’s intentions without actually making a committing move.
“Was that egg fresh?”
The abbot had come into the refectory, without any sound. He stood behind his visitor, thumbs hooked in the broad leather belt in which his rosary was knotted, his face mild in a morning smile.
“Delicious.”
“They are our hens. They were not laying last month, but they are usually quite cooperative. I hope you slept well?”
“Yes. And you?”
“I was late to bed,” the abbot said, swinging his leg over the refectory bench and sitting down opposite Kinsella. At once, as though he had been peering through a crack in the door, the old
kitchen brother appeared. He set a bowl before the abbot and poured black tea into it, then went further down the table, wiping the top off with a dishcloth. The abbot looked at the bowl. “Sometimes I wish my insides were lined with tin, like one of those old tea chests. I have a terrible taste for tea.” He looked down the long table. “Brother Pius, get back to your work, if you please!”
“I am working,” the old brother said, crossly, but stopped wiping off the table, and went back into the kitchen.
“There is great curiosity,” the abbot said. “The walls not only have ears, they have tongues as well. They announced to me at first light this morning that a helicopter is due in here at nine. Is that right?”
“There is supposed to be a bad storm coming up at noon.”
“There is a storm,” the abbot said. “I heard it on the wireless. It will be here some time today. That is sure. There will be rain, starting anytime now. But that is nothing new. Rain is what we get most of here, you know.”
Kinsella nodded, hoping to encourage further talk.
“So you are off,” the abbot said.
“I hope so.”
“Yes,” the abbot said. “You are right to go. No sense hanging around. You delivered your letter and that’s all that’s necessary.”
“Not quite all,” Kinsella said, very carefully. There was a great silence in the dining hall.
“Brother Pius and Brother Malachy, who is in there with you?” the abbot shouted, suddenly.
“Nobody at all, Father Abbot.”
“Well, get on with your work, then. Let me hear some noise.”
There was a sudden rattle of pots and the noise of running water. The abbot listened to be sure it continued. Then, putting his head to one side in his quizzical fashion, he stared at Kinsella. “Not quite all, you said? Was there something else?”
“You haven’t told me what you’re going to do. I don’t feel I should leave until I know that.”
“Do?” the abbot said. “I will do as I am bid. Father general’s letter is perfectly clear. No more Latin Mass here or on Mount Coom. No more private confessions. That is his wish, is it not?”
Kinsella stared; the helicopter on its way now, the abbot’s late arrival, this sudden volte-face, this suspicious obedience. What was the trap, he asked himself, even as he nodded, yes, yes, indeed, this was what father general wanted.
“Then it will be done,” the abbot said. “I had no right to take upon myself decisions that belong to my superiors. I have written a letter of apology to father general, which I would ask you to deliver for me.”
“Yes, of course.” What was the catch? There must be a catch.
The abbot took an envelope from the inner pocket of his robe. “I have not sealed it. You may read it, if you wish.”
Carefully, Kinsella put the letter, unread, in the inside pocket of his fatigues jacket. “Why?” he said.
“Why, what? Why read the letter?”
“No. Why have you acted as you did?”
“Because it is my duty to obey.”
“Yes, but, earlier, you felt that it was your duty to disobey—to retain the old Mass and so on.”
The abbot turned and stared at the kitchen door. “They are very nosey,” he said. “Let us go outside. You’ll want to be getting your bag, won’t you?”
“Yes, of course.”
Through the cloister they went, and over to the west entrance. Spits of rain in the wind, as the abbot and his visitor turned onto the muddy path leading to the guesthouse. The abbot took Kinsella’s arm. “I did not want to discuss it in front of them,” he said, distractedly. “You see, that will be the important part, how I break it to them. Some of them are very devout. They will take it hard. No, it will not be easy at all. To tell you the truth I am a bit nervous about it.”
“Perhaps you would like me to break it to them.”
“Oh, no, no, no,” the abbot said. “I want you to go. I want you away before they know. Oh, believe me, they would bother the life out of you, if they knew what you and I know now.”
Bent his head, and gripped his visitor’s arm tightly as they faced into the wind. “You asked why I acted as I did. I do not want you to think it was from an excess of zeal. On the contrary, it was, rather, from a lack of it. However, that’s neither here nor there, is it? That is of no interest to anyone but me.”
“It interests me,” Kinsella said.
“I am not a holy man,” the abbot said. “Far from it. I would not like to fly under false colors. There are some holy men here, I suppose. On Muck, I mean. But I am not one of them. I have become a very secular man. Do you know what I mean?”
“I don’t think I do.”
“I am a sort of foreman here, a sort of manager. It is not a lot different from a secular job. The monks work hard and my job is to keep them together and see that they make a go of it. It’s a simple life, here. Little jokes, little triumphs, little disasters. We’re like a bunch of children, we pass the days as if we had an endless supply of them. It’s only when someone like yourself comes along that we ask ourselves what are we here for. What good do we do?”
The abbot stopped outside the guesthouse door. He turned the key and pushed the door open. “Ah, you are a tidy man. Bag all packed. You travel light. It is the best way. I’ll take your bag.”
“No, please.”
“Very well, so. Let us go along now to the field. It is nearly nine. I want to get you off, you see, and then I have to face up to it. Face the music. It is all in how you tell them. The thing about being in charge is, you must be firm. As father general is firm. And yourself. What would you have done if I had said I wouldn’t follow orders?”
Kinsella laughed but did not speak.
“You are right, better not ask. By the way, what do you want me to say to the press and the telly people if they call up here?”
“Refer all inquiries to me. James Kinsella, Ecumenical Center Information Office, Amsterdam.”
“I will do that,” the abbot said. “Let us cut across the field. Do you see them up there, waiting?”
Ahead, in the field where Kinsella landed yesterday, some ten or fifteen monks were gathered, looking about them, oblivious to the rain, scanning the skies in every direction. “They should be at their work,” the abbot said. “Of course they will all be after me, the minute you go. By the way, if they ask you something, do not answer. Let me deal with them.”
As they came up the field, the monks turned to look at them. At that moment, above, the sound of an engine. “Your machine is on the way,” the abbot said, looking up.
“I don’t see it.”
“I do. It is over there. Here he comes. Right on the dot.”
Three monks detached themselves from the larger group. The oldest of them, very tall, with white hair and beard, stood straight in the abbot’s path. “Do you have any news for us, Father Abbot?”
“Are the horses brought up from that lower field to take the load of fertilizer over to Doran’s?”
“Yes, they are. May I ask our visitor a question?”
“You may not!” the abbot said. “Let us pass.”
Reluctant, the tall monk drew aside. The abbot, still gripping his visitor’s arm, hurried him on. “A holy man that,” he said. “But a tiresome one.”
“You really are expecting trouble.”
“Not trouble, no. It is just difficult. Ah! There he comes. The frumious bandersnatch.”
Engine noise made all speech impossible until the helicopter had landed and throttled back its motor. “You have my letter, have you?”
“Yes, I have.”
“Well, safe home to Rome. And good luck to you, Father Kinsella.”
“Good luck to you, sir.”
The rain was heavy now as the pilot slid open the Plexiglas door. Kinsella shook hands with his host, then, bending low, ran to the machine. The pilot reached out to pull him up. The door shut. The monks, in a ragged circle, seemed to press close. But, at that point the heli
copter rose, lurched forward, and went out to sea.
Kinsella looked down. The abbot, standing alone, waved, waved. The other monks bunched in a cluster, stared up at the helicopter as it passed over the abbey tower, out to that splendor of sea. Kinsella saw the old man, a tiny figure on the promontory of land, turn and walk back toward the monastery gate. The monks, moving as in a pack, followed him in.
PART FOUR
Heard their shuffling feet, their voices, the whisperings as in church in the moment of talk at the end of the silence of a retreat, the mutterings increasing until, although he knew they were not more than twenty monks, they sounded as he imagined a mob might sound: knowing those who were and were not here, knowing that eight fishermen who always had the least to say in community disputes were out now in their curraghs, serving the sea, a master hard as eternity, but the land was a hard master, too, yet all the monks from the farm were here, Terence’s crew and Daniel’s, who worked packing dulse and gathering kelp, yes, there were not more than nine men missing in the whole community, it would be what happened now that would decide it. What I say now. What I say to them now.
“Father Abbot?”
He turned in the cloister, saw all of them crowding in behind the triumvirate: Matthew, Manus, Walter. It was Walter who had called him.
“Yes, Father Walter?”
“Can you tell us, now? The man is gone.”
Waited till they were all in, lined up in a long queue in the cloister walk. “Yes, I can tell you now. Father general, in Rome, has written me a letter of instruction. It will be obeyed. From now on, the new Mass will be said in English, here and at Cahirciveen. The altars will conform with liturgical changes and will face the congregation. There will be no further private confessions, except in the very special circumstances prescribed, where the nature of the confession warrants private consultation. That is all. We have our orders and it is up to all of us to carry them out to the very best of our ability. I am sure we will do that, won’t we?”
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