The Miracle at St. Bruno's

by Philippa Carr

  “I will look for this confession,” I said, “and if I find it I will show it to Bruno and I will tell him what you have said.”

  She nodded.

  “I wish him well,” she said. “He is my flesh and blood. Tell him I said so. Tell him he can be great but he cannot rise through weakness.”

  Our conversation was broken up by my mother who came bustling in and declared that I was tiring out her invalid.

  A few days later Mother Salter was dead. My mother planted flowers on her grave and tended them regularly.

  The Monk’s Confession

  THE MONKS’ DORTER HAD become a place which I avoided. There was something more eerie about it than the rest of the uninhabited part of the Abbey; and although many of the Abbey buildings had by this time been demolished and so much rebuilding had been done, the dorter was a section which had been left intact.

  Since Mother Salter’s revelation I went there often. I wanted to find that confession which she said Ambrose had hidden there. If I could do this and present it to Bruno, he would then be face to face with the truth; and I could see, as Mother Salter had seen, that until he accepted it I could not respect him, nor could he respect himself.

  Was this true? I asked myself. How difficult it is to test one’s motive! Did I want to say, “Look, I am right”? Or did I really wish to help him?

  Once he accepted the fact that his birth was similar to that of many others, would he start to grow away from myth? Would he build his life on the firm foundation of truth?

  I did not know, for I did not understand Bruno nor my own feelings for him. I had been bemused by the story of his miraculous appearance on earth. I had been drawn into this union while in a state of exultation. It had not brought me happiness, except that it had given me Catherine.

  Whatever the motive, I was urged on by some compulsion to search for the document which according to Mother Salter Ambrose had left behind.

  As I walked up the stone spiral stairs with its thick rope banister I thought of all the monks who had filed down this stone stairway during the last two hundred years and it occurred to me that many of them must have left something of themselves behind.

  At the top of the stairs was a long narrow landing and on either side of this were the cells. Each had a door in which was a grille through which it was possible to see into the cell.

  Most of the cells were bare although some contained a pallet which had not presumably been considered worthwhile taking away by the vandals. Each cell was identical with its narrow slit without glass which was cut into the thick walls. It must have been bitterly cold in winter; the floor of each cell was flagged; and there were slabs of stone in the walls. No comfort whatsoever; but monks did not look for comfort, of course.

  I had heard something from Clement and Eugene of what life in the Abbey had been like. I knew of the hours of penance which had to be performed in the cells and how at any time the Abbot would walk silently along the landing and peer through the grille to see what was going on inside.

  “The watchful eye which came we knew not when,” was Eugene’s way of expressing it. I knew something of their habits, how there were long periods when silence was the order of the day; how they were not allowed to touch each other in any way; how they must perform their tasks and their devotion with equal fervor. A strange life, particularly for men such as Clement, Eugene and certainly Ambrose, who had broken free of it on more than one occasion.

  I could imagine the anguish of that man, the soul-searching, the earnest prayers for guidance, the suffering and torment that must have gone on in his cell.

  I don’t think I should have been very surprised when I reached the top of that staircase to have come face to face with some long-dead monk who found it impossible to rest in his grave.

  As I stood there on the landing I asked myself which of these identical cells had been that of Ambrose. It was impossible to know. Could I ask someone? Clement? Eugene? They would immediately report my interest to Bruno. I did not wish for that. No, I must find Ambrose’s cell and if possible his confession by myself.

  I went into the first cell. I caught my breath with horror as the door shut on me. I felt a panic such as I had rarely felt before. It is amazing how much can flash through one’s mind in a short time. I imagined myself imprisoned in one of the cells. No one would think to look for me there. I should remain in my cold stone prison until there was no life left in me, and in time I should join the ghosts of the monks who haunted the dorter.

  But there was no need for such panic. The door had no lock. I remembered Clement’s explaining that. Doors could be opened at any time by the Abbot or any of his subordinates without warning, in the same way that they could peer through the grille.

  I stepped back into the cell. I examined the walls. I could see no place where a confession could be secreted. I touched the walls, all the time looking over my shoulder, so convinced was I that I was not alone.

  The cold dankness of the place chilled me. I looked into several of the cells—all alike. If only I could discover which one was Ambrose’s that would help. A confession secreted in the wall! Why should Ambrose have confessed when his great desire was to cover up his sin?

  I wanted to convince myself that there was no confession, and the reason was that I wanted to get out of this place and never come here again. I could not rid myself of the feeling that I was overlooked and that something evil was waiting to catch up with me.

  There were forty cells on this landing. I looked into all of them; they were all alike, every one of them. How could I possibly tell which had belonged to Ambrose?

  At either end of the landing was a spiral staircase. I reminded myself that while I was mounting one stairway, someone else could be mounting the other. Someone could lurk in one of the cells and leap out on me.

  Who?

  What was the matter with me? At one moment I was afraid of ghosts, at another I was looking for a human assailant.

  I could not understand myself. All I knew was that whenever I entered the monks’ dorter I was conscious of something warning me that if I were wise I should keep away.

  Kate wrote that she was bringing Catherine back to the Abbey.

  I replied that I would be delighted to see her as always, and I trusted that Catherine had behaved with the decorum which was now becoming necessary to her increasing years.

  I looked forward to Catherine’s return and the arrival of Kate with great pleasure. Both of them had a cheering effect on me.

  I had not yet found the confession although I had been several times to the dorter. I would attempt to search and then some inescapable feeling of imminent danger would come to me. I should look through my grille expecting to find someone standing there and even when my gaze met nothing, the fear persisted.

  I began to dread going there and yet had a great compulsion to do so.

  I should have liked to confide in someone. Kate was not the one on this occasion. Rupert? I thought. No, I could not talk to Rupert. The fact that he had asked me to marry him and still thought of me tenderly debarred me from that for I could not speak openly to him of my feelings for Bruno. In fact I scarcely knew myself what they were.

  I went again to the dorter. I mounted the stone stairs. I always hoped that this would be the time when I should find what I sought. I had examined six of the cells thoroughly, touching the stone slabs on the walls carefully to assure myself that nothing could be secreted there. My efforts had been without success.

  Perhaps this afternoon, I thought.

  How quiet it was everywhere on that afternoon. A pleasant June day; the sun was hot on the grass outside but the dorter was cold as ever.

  My steps on the stairs had a hollow echo. I mounted them quickly and stood on the landing, and as I did so I thought I heard a sound from below. I stood still listening.

  There was nothing.

  I went into the seventh cell. Lightly I touched the buttress, then the walls which separated this one from that
on the other side. I went to the long narrow slit and looked through the aperture in the very thick wall. Suddenly I felt the goose pimples rise on my skin because I knew that I was not alone. I swung around. A pair of eyes were watching me through the grille.

  I heard myself gasp and putting out my hands grazed them against the granite wall.

  The eyes disappeared.

  I wanted to get out of this place but I had to know who was there in the dorter. But had I imagined those eyes peering at me? I thought of monks who had lain in their cells and suddenly looked up to see a pair of eyes watching them. That was the purpose of the grille—that someone outside could look in and catch the cell’s occupant unaware.

  I began to shiver. I went out into the corridor. I walked along it, looking into the cells. They were empty except for the pallets which had served as beds and which Cromwell’s men had not thought worthy of taking away. I stood still and listened. Silence…and yet there was that uncanny awareness which clung to me and which told me I was not alone.

  I pushed open the door of one of the cells. I stared aghast. Seated on one of the pallets was a man. I looked again to assure myself that it was Bruno. His eyes were cold, snakelike. He gave a sudden low laugh which had an unpleasant ring.

  “Bruno,” I cried, “what are you doing here?”

  “I might ask what you are doing here.”

  “It was you who looked at me through the grille.”

  “Did that disturb you?”

  “Naturally. It was so…uncanny. Why didn’t you speak? Why didn’t you let me know you were there? Why go away so dramatically?”

  “Did you think it was a ghost who was looking through the grille at you? You had a guilty conscience, Damask. Why? Was it because you were doing something you would rather not be caught doing? What were you doing?”

  I could not tell him. How far we were apart! We were enemies. And yet this man was my husband. How could I tell him that I was hoping to find something which he would go to great lengths to stop my finding?

  “I…I was looking at the dorter.”

  “You find it interesting…suddenly?”

  “Not suddenly. It was always interesting.”

  “You were here recently. You seem to make a habit of visiting the place. I wondered why.”

  “So you followed me.”

  “What I want to know is why you are so startled to be found here.”

  “Startled?” I countered. “Who would not be startled to see a pair of eyes watching them from the other side of a grille?”

  “Sit down, Damask.”

  He moved along the pallet.

  I was deeply aware of the silence of the place and a great urge swept over me to turn and run…to run away from my husband.

  I said: “Not now.”

  “You are in a hurry? Surely not. You were making a leisurely search. Feeling the walls! What did you hope to discover? Were you looking for something?”

  He had risen and was standing close to me. What was the meaning of the strange expression in his eyes? Did he know of the confession? Had Ambrose told him? Suppose he did know. Then he would guess that I was looking for it; and he would do all in his power to stop me. All in his power? He had great power. I knew that. I knew something else too. He would stop at nothing to prevent my finding that confession for in it would be a denial that he, Bruno, was the man he was determined to be—the prophet, the near-god, the superhuman man whom he wanted all those about him to believe he was.

  Yet I assured myself that I must find that confession. I must make him accept the truth for I saw how right Mother Salter was when she said that his pride could destroy him, and perhaps us all.

  I knew that he must not suspect that I was searching for the confession. He must not know that I was aware of its existence. If he did…what then? I dared not examine my thoughts too closely. I saw him clearly…too clearly for comfort…but he was my husband and I had loved him once. And a voice within me kept insisting: He must not know. You would be in peril if he did.

  My wits came to my aid. I said quickly: “I was thinking to what purpose we could put this place. The building is so solid. It could make an excellent buttery.”

  “You have suddenly decided this?”

  “I have been thinking of it for some time. I am constantly thinking of how we can put these places to good use.”

  “Doesn’t the present buttery suffice?”

  “It is scarcely adequate now that there are so many people here. I daresay that in the future you will be entertaining even more.”

  I was trying to sound matter-of-fact.

  “Yes,” he said, “that’s true.”

  “Then what do you think of the idea?”

  He was studying me intently and his eyes still held that cold snakelike quality. “It’s worth considering,” he said.

  I felt a great relief flooding over me. I believed I had convinced him that I had been inspecting the monks’ dorter for this domestic reason.

  I went to the bakehouse. Clement was there with two of his scullions and when he saw that I wished to speak to him alone he sent them off to scour some pans in readiness for the day’s cooking.

  “Tomorrow,” I said, “Lady Remus will be here. She is bringing Mistress Catherine home.”

  “Ah, I shall be glad to see the young mistress home. I’ll make some of her favorite marchpane. There is no one that appreciates it but her now that Mistress Honey has left us.”

  “And for Lady Remus?”

  “There shall be a game pie and I’ll work the Remus coat of arms in paste for her. There’ll be bacon and sucking pig. Those are favorites of hers.”

  “You will know how best to please her. Clement,” I went on, “you must prepare almost as much food now as you did in the old days.”

  He nodded thoughtfully.

  “Do you regret the old days, Clement?”

  He narrowed his eyes, looking back. “This present day suits me well, Mistress.”

  “Do you ever go into the dorter, Clement?”

  He shook his head. “Not since that day when the heretic”—he crossed himself—“Simon Caseman informed against us and almost took us to death.”

  “Before that did you go to your own cell and imagine the old days were back?”

  He nodded, smiling.

  “I was looking at the old cells not long ago. I thought we might make a buttery there. Those thick walls make it very cool. What do you think, Clement?”

  “What does the master think?”

  It was always so. They seemed afraid to express an opinion without Bruno’s approval.

  “I spoke to him of it. He thought it an excellent notion. Would you come and look at it some time and give me your opinion?”

  There was nothing Clement liked so much as to be asked for an opinion. His face creased into smiles.

  “When would that be, Mistress?”

  “There is no time like the present. Could you meet me there in half an hour?”

  He was delighted. I waited below for him. It felt different going up those stairs with him lumbering behind me.

  “One of these must have been your cell, Clement.”

  “Oh, yes.”

  “Which one was yours?”

  He led me along the landing.

  “They are so much alike, can you be sure?” I asked.

  “I’d always count,” he said. “Number seven, that was mine.”

  “And who was next to you?”

  “Brother Thomas that way. Brother Arnold there.”

  “I daresay you can remember the names of most of them.”

  “We were many years together.”

  “I have heard you talk of some of them. Eugene now…where was he?”

  “He was there. And next to him was Valerian and then Thomas and Eugene.”

  “Where did you say Ambrose was?”

  “Ambrose? I didn’t say.” He crossed himself again. “I said Eugene. But Ambrose was here opposite me. I used to hear him, pray
ing in the night.”

  I hastily counted to myself. Seventh from the end was Ambrose’s cell.

  “Well,” I said, “what do you think of my idea of the buttery?”

  He thought it excellent. I had to listen to his views on storing salted meats for he thought these cells would be ideal for that purpose.

  “The thick stone walls keep out the heat,” he said. “I could keep salt pig in here for a very long time.”

  I listened; I agreed; and I longed to be rid of him; for now that I knew which was Ambrose’s cell I was eager to get to work. I came back that afternoon. It took me an hour to examine the cell. Then I discovered that behind the crucifix which hung on the wall, one of the slabs was loose.

  I removed it. Behind it was a cavity and in this I found Ambrose’s confession.

  I took it to my bedchamber. I shut myself in. It began:

  “I, Brother Ambrose of St. Bruno’s Abbey, have committed mortal sin and have imperiled my immortal soul.”

  It was the cry of a man in torment and I was deeply moved by the suffering he had obviously endured. He had written it all down: his dreams and longings, his erotic imaginings in that cell as he lay there on his hard pallet. He wrote of his great desire to purge his soul of lust and the hours he spent in prayer and penance. And then the coming of Keziah; the temptation which had been too great to resist; the hours of remorse that followed. The torment of the hair shirt and the lacerations of his flesh. He had indulged it; he would crucify it. But the sin was committed and then he knew that that sin was to bear fruit.

  Doubly he had sinned. He had broken from the enclosed state; he had had speech with the witch of the woods, he had agreed to her monstrous plan to deceive the Abbot and everyone in St. Bruno’s. And this he had done for yet another temptation had come to him—to watch over his son, to see him educated and raised to greatness. Again he had been unable to resist.

  He would never expiate his sin; he was doomed to eternal damnation, so he had plunged headlong into sin and loved this son with the idolatry which should have been given only to God.