The Ghost Rider

by Ismail Kadare

  There were some folk who had prayed for Doruntine on Sunday at the funeral, asking over and over again that the dust and mud treat her kindly and not weigh too heavily on her breast. But now it didn’t occur to them that the calumnies they were putting about were more crushing than any amount of earth or stone.

  Passing from ear to ear by word of mouth, the rumour was borne by every breath of air and certainly conveyed many a reproach, of the sort that everyone refrains from expressing directly but is prepared, in such circumstances, to evoke in roundabout ways. And as it grew more distant it began to dilate and change its shape like a wandering cloud, though its essence remained immutable: a dead man had come back from the grave to keep the promise he had made to his mother: to bring his married sister back to her from far away whenever she so wished.

  Barely a week had gone by since the burial of the two women when Stres was urgently summoned to the Monastery of the Three Crosses. The archbishop of the principality awaited him there, having come expressly on a matter of the greatest importance.

  Expressly on a matter of the greatest importance, Stres repeated to himself again and again as he crossed the plain on horseback. What could the archbishop possibly want of him? The prelate did not leave his archiepiscopal seat very often, especially to travel in such awful weather.

  A chill wind blew over the frosty, autumnal plain. On either side of the road, as far as the eye could see, despondent hayricks looked as if they were slowly collapsing on themselves. Stres pulled up the collar of his riding cape. What if it had to do with the Doruntine story, he wondered. But he rejected that possibility out of hand. Ridiculous! What did the archbishop have to do with it? He had enough thorny problems of his own, especially since tension in the Albanian territories between the Catholic Church of Rome and the Orthodox Church had reached fever pitch. Some years before, when the spheres of influence of Catholicism and Orthodoxy had become more or less defined, the principality remaining under the sway of the Byzantine Church, Stres had thought that this endless quarrel was at last drawing to a close. Not at all. The two churches had once more taken up their struggle for the allegiance of individual Albanian princes and counts. Information regularly reaching Stres from the inns and relay posts suggested that in recent times Catholic missionaries had intensified their activities in the principalities. Perhaps that was the reason for the archbishop’s visit – but then Stres himself was not involved in those matters. It was not he who issued safe conduct passes. No, Stres said to himself, I have nothing to do with that. It must be something else.

  He would find out soon enough what it was all about. There was no point in racking his brains now. There was probably a simple explanation: the archbishop may have come for some other reason – a tour of inspection, for instance – and decided incidentally to avail himself of Stres’s services in resolving this or that problem. The spread of the practice of magic, for instance, had posed a problem for the church, and that did fall within Stres’s remit. Yes, he told himself, that must be it, sensing that he had finally found some solid ground. Nevertheless, it was only a small step from the practice of magic to a dead man rising from his grave. No! – he almost said it aloud – the archbishop can have nothing to do with Doruntine! And spurring his horse, he quickened his pace.

  It was really cold. The houses of a hamlet loomed briefly somewhere off to his right, but soon he could see nothing but the plain again, with the haystacks drifting towards the horizon. The puddles beneath his horse’s hooves reflected nothing, and thus seemed hostile to him. The plain is in mourning … he muttered, repeating one of the lines of the professional mourners’ chants. He had been astonished to come across the phrase again in his informers’ reports. He’d certainly heard it said of a person that he or she was in grief, or in mourning … But not of a landscape!

  The Monastery of the Three Crosses was still some distance away. Along that stretch of road, Stres kept turning the same ideas over in his mind, but in a different order now. He brought himself up short more than once: nonsense, ridiculous, not possible. But though he resolved repeatedly not to think about it for the rest of the journey, he couldn’t stop wondering why the archbishop had summoned him.

  It was the first time Stres had ever met the archbishop in person. Without the chasuble in which Stres had seen him standing in the nave of the church in the capital, the archbishop seemed thin, slender, his skin so pale, so diaphanous, that you almost felt you could see what was happening inside that nearly translucent body if you looked hard enough. But Stres lost that impression completely the moment the archbishop started to speak. His voice did not match his physique. On the contrary, it seemed more closely related to the chasuble and mitre which he had set aside, and which he would no doubt have kept by his side if he had not had such a strangely powerful voice.

  The archbishop came straight to the point. He told Stres that he had been informed of an alleged resurrection said to have occurred two weeks before in this part of the country. Stres took a deep breath. So that was it after all! The most improbable of all his guesses had been correct. What had happened, the archbishop went on, was evil, more evil and far-reaching than it might seem at first sight. He raised his voice. Only frivolous minds, he said, could take things of this kind lightly. Stres felt himself blush and was about to protest that no one could accuse him of having taken the matter lightly, that on the contrary he had informed the prince’s chancellery at once, while doing his utmost to throw light on the mystery. But the archbishop, as if reading his mind, broke in.

  “I was informed of all this from the outset and issued express instructions that the whole affair be buried. I must admit that I never expected the story to spread so far.”

  “It is true that it has spread beyond all reason,” said Stres, opening his mouth for the first time.

  Since the archbishop himself admitted that he had not foreseen these developments, Stres thought it superfluous to seek to justify his own attitude.

  “I undertook this difficult journey,” the archbishop went on, “in order to gauge the scope of the repercussions for myself. Unfortunately, I am now convinced that they are catastrophic.”

  Stres nodded in agreement.

  “Nothing less would have induced me to take to the highway in this detestable weather,” the prelate continued, his penetrating eyes still fixed on Stres. “Now, do you understand the importance the Holy Church attaches to this incident?”

  “Yes, Monsignor,” said Stres. “Tell me what I must do.”

  The archbishop, who apparently hadn’t expected this question so early on, sat motionless for a moment, as if choking down an explanation that had suddenly proved unnecessary. Stres sensed he was on edge.

  “This affair must be buried,” he said evenly. “Or rather, one aspect of it, the one that is at variance with the truth and damaging to the Church. Do you understand me, Captain? We must deny the story of this man’s resurrection, reject it, unmask it, prevent its spread at all costs.”

  “I understand, Monsignor.”

  “Will it be difficult?”

  “Most certainly,” said Stres. “I can prevent an impostor or slanderer from speaking, but how, Monsignor, can I stop such a widespread rumour from spreading further? That is beyond my power.”

  A cold flame glimmered in the archbishop’s eyes.

  “I cannot prevent the mourners from singing their laments,” Stres went on, “and as for gossip—”

  “Find a way to make the mourners stop their songs themselves,” the prelate said sharply. “As for rumour, what you must do is change its course.”

  “And how can I do that?” Stres asked evenly.

  They stared at each other for a long moment.

  “Captain,” the archbishop finally said, “do you yourself believe that the dead man rose from his grave?”

  “No, Monsignor.”

  Stres imagined that the archbishop had given a sigh of relief. How could the man have dreamed that I was naive enough to credit such insa
nity, he wondered.

  “Then you think that someone else must have brought back the young woman in question?”

  “Without the slightest doubt, Monsignor.”

  “Well then, try to prove it,” said the archbishop, “and you will find that the mourners will suspend their songs mid-verse and rumour will change of itself.”

  “I have sought to do just that, Monsignor,” Stres said. “I have done my utmost.”

  “With no result?”

  “Very nearly. Of course there are people who do not believe in this resurrection, but they are in a minority. Most are convinced.”

  “Then you must see to it that this minority becomes the majority.”

  “I have done all I can, Monsignor.”

  “You must do even more, Captain. And there is only one way to manage it: you must find the man who brought the young woman back. Find the impostor, the lover, the adventurer, whatever he is. Track him down relentlessly, wherever he may be. Move heaven and earth until you find him. And if you do not find him, then you will have to create him.”

  “Create him?”

  A flash of cold lightning seemed to pass between them.

  “In other words,” said the archbishop, the first to avert his eyes, “it would be advisable to bear witness to his existence. Many things seem impossible at first that are crowned with success in the end.”

  The archbishop’s voice had lost its ring of confidence.

  “I shall do my best, Monsignor,” said Stres.

  A silence of the most uncomfortable kind settled over the room. The archbishop, head lowered, sat deep in thought. When he next spoke, his voice had changed so completely that Stres looked up sharply, intrigued. His tone, as polite, gentle, and persuasive as the man himself, now matched his physical appearance perfectly.

  “Listen, Captain,” said the archbishop, “let us speak frankly.”

  He took a deep breath.

  “Yes, let us speak plainly. I think you are aware of the importance attached to these matters at the Centre. Many things may be forgiven in Constantinople, but there is no indulgence whatever for any question touching on the basic principles of the Holy Church. I have seen emperors slaughtered, roped to wild horses, eyes gouged, their tongues cut out, simply because they dared think they could amend this or that tenet of the Church. Perhaps you remember that two years ago, after the heated controversy about the sex of angels, the capital came close to being the arena of a civil war that would have certainly led to wholesale carnage.”

  Stres did recall some disturbances, but he had never paid much attention to the sort of collective hysteria which erupted periodically in the Empire’s capital.

  “Today more than ever,” the archbishop went on, “when relations between our Church and the Catholic Church have worsened … Nowadays your life is at stake in matters like these. Do I make myself clear, Captain?”

  “Yes,” said Stres uncertainly. “But I would like to know what all this has to do with the incident we were discussing.”

  “Quite,” said the archbishop, his voice growing stronger now, recovering its deep resonance. “Of course.”

  Stres kept his eyes fixed upon him.

  “Here we have an alleged return from the grave,” the prelate continued, “and therefore a resurrection. Do you see what that means, Captain?”

  “A return from the grave,” Stres repeated. “An idiotic rumour.”

  “It’s not that simple,” interrupted the archbishop. “It is a ghastly heresy. An arch-heresy.”

  “Yes,” said Stres, “in one sense it is indeed.”

  “Not in one sense. Absolutely,” the archbishop said, nearly shouting. His voice had recovered its initial gravity. His head was now so close that Stres had to make an effort not to take a step backwards.

  “Until now Jesus Christ alone has risen from his tomb! Do you follow me, Captain?”

  “I understand, Monsignor,” Stres said.

  “Well then, He returned from the dead to accomplish a great mission. But this dead man of yours, this Kostandin – that is his name, is it not? – by what right does he seek to ape Jesus Christ? What power brought him back from the world beyond, what message does he bring to humanity? Eh?”

  Stres, nonplussed, had no idea what to say.

  “None whatsoever!” shouted the archbishop. “Absolutely none! That is why the whole thing is nothing but imposture and heresy. A challenge to the Holy Church! And like any such challenge, it must be punished mercilessly.”

  He was silent for a moment, as if giving Stres time to absorb the flood of words.

  “So listen carefully, Captain.” His voice had softened again. “If we do not quell this story now, it will spread like wildfire, and then it will be too late. It will be too late, do you understand?”

  Stres returned from the Monastery of the Three Crosses in the afternoon. His horse trotted slowly along the highway, and Stres mulled just as slowly over snatches of the long conversation he had just had with the archbishop. Tomorrow I’ll have to start all over again, he said to himself. He had, of course, been working on the case without respite, and had even relieved his deputy of his other duties so that he could spend all his time sifting through the Lady Mother’s archives. But now that the capital was seriously concerned at the turn of events, he was going to have to go back to square one. He would send a new circular to the inns and relay stations, perhaps promising a reward to anyone who helped find some trace of the impostor. And he would send someone all the way to Bohemia to find out what people there were saying about Doruntine’s flight. This latter idea lifted his spirits for a moment. How had he failed to think of it earlier? It was one of the first things he should have done after the events of 11 October. Well, he thought a moment later, it’s never too late to do things right.

  He glanced up to see how the weather looked. The autumn sky was completely overcast. The bushes on either side of the road quivered in the north wind, and their trembling seemed to deepen the desolation of the plain. This world has only one Jesus Christ, thought Stres, repeating to himself the archbishop’s words. The sound of his horse’s tread reminded him that it was this very road that Kostandin had taken. The archbishop had spoken of the dead man with contempt. Come to think of it, Kostandin had never shown much respect for Orthodox priests while he lived. Stres himself hadn’t known Kostandin, but his deputy’s research into the family archives had produced some initial clues to his personality. Judging from the old woman’s letters, Kostandin had been, generally speaking, an oppositionist. Attracted by new ideas, he cultivated them with passion, sometimes carrying them to extremes. He had been like this on the question of marriage. He was against local marriages and, impassioned and extremist in his convictions, had been prepared to countenance unions even at the other end of the world. The Lady Mother’s letters suggested that Kostandin believed that distant marriages, hitherto the privilege of kings and princesses, should become common practice for all. The distance between the families of bride and groom was in fact a token of dignity and strength of character, and he persisted in saying that the noble race of Albanians was endowed with all the qualities necessary to bear the trials of separation and the troubles that might arise from them.

  Kostandin had ideas of his own not only on marriage but on many other subjects too, ideas that ran counter to common notions and that had caused the old woman more than a little trouble with the authorities. Stres recalled one such instance, which had to do primarily with the Church. Two letters from the local archbishop to the Lady Mother had been found in the family archives in which the prelate drew her attention to the pernicious ideas Kostandin was expressing and to the insulting comments about the Byzantine Church he had occasionally been heard to utter. To judge by the report that Stres had read, Kostandin and some of his equally pigheaded friends had been against the severance with Rome and the compact with the Eastern Church. And there were other, more important matters, his aide had told him, but these would figure in the detailed r
eport he would submit once he had concluded his investigation.

  Stres had not been particularly impressed by this aspect of Kostandin’s personality, possibly because he himself harboured no special respect for religion, an attitude that was in fact not uncommon among the officials of the principality. And for good reason: the struggle between Catholicism and Orthodoxy since time immemorial had greatly weakened religion in the Albanian principalities. The region lay just on the border between the two religions and, for various reasons, essentially political and economic, the principalities leaned now towards one, now towards the other. Half of them were now Catholic, but that state of affairs was by no means permanent, and each of the two churches hoped to win spheres of influence from the other. Stres was convinced that the prince himself cared little for religious matters. He had allies among the Catholic princes and enemies among the Orthodox. In truth, the principality had once been Catholic, turning Orthodox only half a century before, and the Roman Church had not given up hope of bringing it back to the fold.

  Stres was a servant of the state, and strived to remain neutral on the issue of religion, which was not really close to his heart in any case. All the same, he wasn’t pleased to see a part of Arbëria absorbed by the Eastern Church after a thousand years of Roman Christianity. Indeed, he might well have sought some excuse not to respond to the archbishop’s summons were it not for the fact that the prince, eager to avoid poisoning relations with Byzantium, had recently issued an important circular urging all officials of the principality to treat the Church with respect. The circular emphasised that this attitude was dictated by the higher interests of the state and that, consequently, any action at variance with the spirit of the directive would be punished.