Ritual

by Graham Masterton

  They rejoined their table. Charlie sought Robyn’s face and tried to convey with nothing more than a slight shake of his head the horrors he had just witnessed. He felt as if his stomach was filled with worms and grease, and his throat was so parched that he found it almost impossible to say anything.

  ‘You look pale, Charlie,’ said the nun-like Mme Musette. ‘I thought restaurant inspectors weren’t supposed to be squeamish.’

  Charlie choked out, ‘I don’t usually inspect the kitchens, Mme Musette. And I have never inspected a kitchen like that. That kitchen is a human abattoir.’

  ‘Well, you’re right, of course,’ said M. Musette, cheerfully. ‘Look – here is our food.’

  Plates of thigh meat were set in front of each of them. Charlie kept his head raised so that he wouldn’t have to look at it; and so that he wouldn’t have to witness Mme Musette carefully slicing it up with her knife and fork and putting it into her mouth.

  The Guide sitting next to Charlie tapped him gently on the shoulder and said, ‘Don’t you want yours?’

  Charlie could do nothing but stare at him. The Guide said, ‘Do you mind if I...?’ and forked Charlie’s meat on to his own plate.

  The feast was slow and leisurely and proceeded with sinister stylishness. Outside, the sky became overcast and dark, and the clouds that Charlie could see through the clerestory windows looked like inkstains on wet cartridge paper. ‘Wouldn’t be surprised if we’re in for a storm,’ remarked M. Musette, with his cheek full of human liver. ‘Makes it more dramatic, in a way, don’t you think?’

  After every course, there were prayers of hope and thanksgiving, and the Célèstines sang a hymn. They ate thigh meat and liver and boneless ribs, and then they were served what M. Musette called, ‘a selection of delicacies’, which included thin slices of female breast, some of the best of them tinged with the nipple, and pale pink sushi-like arrangements of raw marinated labia. Mme Musette laughed a tinkling laugh at Charlie’s obvious disgust.

  ‘You sit down at Thanksgiving and eat the butchered carcasses of living creatures, served with sauces and herbs and vegetables. This is no different, once you have accepted the notion that there is nothing blasphemous or illegal in man eating man. This is a sacramental feast of body and blood. It is God’s gift, and you should be grateful, not disgusted. Those young people gladly gave their flesh and their pain – gladly – how can you sit there and feel self-righteous about rejecting their sacrifice?’

  Charlie said, ‘You might be able to persuade the rest of these freaks but you’re never going to persuade me. Haven’t you heard about something called the sanctity of human life?’

  Mme Musette smiled, and slipped something into her mouth that looked like a flesh-coloured oyster, but obviously wasn’t. Charlie turned away, his lips tightened, his stomach clenched in tightly suppressed nausea.

  By eleven o’clock, the feast was close to its climax. A choir of twelve Célèstine guides assembled solemnly in front of the altar, and began quietly to sing the Kyrie Eleison. The kitchen doors were opened, and a procession of Célèstine cooks emerged, headed by Fernest Ardoin. Between them, they were carrying in the most symbolic and most openly grotesque of all the dishes that had yet been served – the dish that showed conclusively that the eleven disciples were now dead, and that the assembled Célèstines were about to eat their very essence. On a large white dish were heaped, still steaming, their eleven brains, lightly poached in a stock made from boiling their lungs and their sweetbreads, served on a bed of red cabbage. The dish was carried up to M. Musette for his approval, within inches of where Charlie was sitting. Charlie did nothing more than glimpse the shining fawn-coloured convolutions of human cortices – did nothing more than breathe in one nostrilful of their pale, sweet aroma, and he started to gag. Without excusing himself, he pushed back his chair and walked quickly toward the exit. Behind him, M. Musette nodded to the man with the close-cropped hair to keep an eye on him.

  Charlie went outside and bent double under the oak tree and vomited coffee. The man with the close-cropped hair stood on the steps watching him. Charlie’s stomach went on convulsing for two or three minutes, but at least he managed to stand up straighter and lean against the tree, his throat sore and his eyes watering.

  ‘You done now?’ the man asked him.

  Charlie nodded. He raised his head and looked around. Clouds had gathered above L’Église des Pauvres, and over towards Ville Platte and Evangeline County lightning was flickering all along the horizon like the tongues of electrified snakes. A cold wind began to stir the dried oak leaves that were scattered on the dirt, and the cypress trees dipped and swayed.

  There was an extraordinary feeling in the air. Excitement, fear, the sense that something incredible was about to happen. Charlie looked at the man with the close-cropped hair and for a moment they both shared this sense of oncoming apocalypse.

  ‘We’d better get ourselves back inside,’ the man suggested, his white robe ruffled by the wind. But at that instant, a blinding artery of lightning ran down into one of the abandoned cotton fields only a quarter-mile away, with a sizzling crack, and from inside the main building Charlie heard a deep, low moan, all the Célèstines chanting at once.

  Charlie wiped his mouth with his sleeve, and pushed his way quickly back into the feasting hall. The room was almost completely dark now, and assistants were going from table to table, lighting candles. M. Musette was standing at the head of the dining table, his arms outstretched, and he was reciting the Célèstine Creed, while his followers chanted their responses. Thunder burst over the rooftop with a noise like a collapsing bridge.

  ‘It is time!’ cried M. Musette. ‘It is time for the second coming!’

  Charlie quickly checked that Robyn was still at her place, and then walked purposefully up to M. Musette. ‘This is it,’ he said adamantly. ‘This is where the game finishes. I’m taking my son and I’m going.’

  M. Musette stared at Charlie and his eyes didn’t even look human. ‘This is the hour of the second coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. You will not deny Him your only son.’

  Charlie made a quick move toward M. Musette but the man with the close-cropped hair was quicker. He grasped Charlie’s arm and whipped it painfully behind his back in a half-nelson. ‘Keep still and I won’t break it for you,’ he murmured, almost apologetically.

  M. Musette raised his hand. ‘Bring the sacrificial lamb!’ he cried out. ‘Bring him here, for the moment is upon us!’

  Charlie shouted, ‘No!’ but four Célèstines rose from their table and went to one of the side rooms, their hands crossed over their chests.

  Through the clerestory windows, Charlie could see more flickers and flashes of lightning. Rain began to beat against the glass, and patter on the corrugated roof like dancing cats. He turned almost hysterically to Mme Musette, who was sitting upright in her seat, her face rigid and incandescently beautiful.

  ‘Don’t let him do it!’ he yelled at her. ‘Don’t let him murder my son!’

  Mme Musette said nothing, but gave Charlie a wan, mysterious smile, and turned away.

  The four Célèstines returned to the room, walking with their heads bowed. In the middle of them walked Martin, completely naked except for a white headband. Charlie struggled against the man who was holding him, but his arm was jerked upwards until his hand was almost touching the back of his neck, and there was nothing that Charlie could do to break free. Charlie looked desperately at Martin’s face, hoping for one last breakthrough of normal feeling, hoping for one last sign of love and recognition, but Martin was smiling the same idiotic, accepting smile that Charlie had seen on the face of so many Célèstines. Happiness is obedience. Nirvana is an empty mind. Heaven only comes to those who surrender their private will to live.

  ‘Martin!’ Charlie appealed to him. ‘Martin, this is your father! This is Daddy! Martin, listen to me, don’t let them do this to you! Martin, for Christ’s sake!’

  ‘Yes,’ murmured Mme Musette.
‘For Christ’s sake.’

  And M. Musette added, ‘Amen.’

  The four Célèstines brought Martin in front of the altar, and then turned him round so that he was facing the assembled company. He was the twelfth disciple, the final sacrifice. M. Musette approached him, walking all the way around him, and then stepped up to the altar, where he knelt down and bowed his head and spent a moment or two in silent prayer. Then he rose up again, and turned to the main body of the hall, and spread his arms wide in conscious imitation of the crucifixion.

  ‘Almost two thousand years ago, our Lord Jesus Christ sacrificed His body and His blood in order that we might live. Now, we have repaid the debt; and we are about to return to Christ that body and that blood which He so freely gave to us.’

  There was yet another crackling lightning-strike outside. Charlie jerked his head up. He felt sure that it had hit the crucifix on the roof. There was a strong smell of ozone and burned metal, and he could feel the hairs on the back of his neck lifted up by the huge charge of static electricity in the building.

  M. Musette nodded to his wife, and she left her place and walked up to Martin. She touched his forehead, she touched each of his nipples, she touched his navel. Then she drew out of her robes a long steel-bladed knife with a handle fashioned out of gold and silver.

  ‘The sacrificial knife,’ said M. Musette. Charlie watched in fascinated horror as Martin accepted it from M. Musette, and lowered it between his thighs.

  ‘You said you had to have my consent!’ he screamed at M. Musette.

  M. Musette turned to Charlie in acknowledgement. ‘Of course; but only when it comes to giving his life. And I am sure that by the time he has finished sacrificing his arms and his legs and his genitalia to the Saviour, you will be quite prepared to give your consent in order to release him from his earthly suffering,’

  Charlie found himself unable to speak. He looked away, he couldn’t bear to see Martin hurting himself. But then he found that he had to watch. Martin was his son, his responsibility. He had to know what agony Martin was going to go through, or he would never be able to redeem his own guilt for it in the future.

  If he had a future, of course. The Célèstines were probably planning to kill him, too, once this ritual was over. Especially when it failed to produce a second coming.

  M. Musette pressed his hands together and prayed. ‘All flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man like the flower of grass. The grass withereth, and the flower thereof away falleth, but the Word of the Lord endureth forever.’

  As he spoke these words, Charlie alone in that company of Célèstines, raised his eyes. Directly above the altar, suspended only a few feet below the ceiling, he saw a white light, soft and radiant and steady. He thought at first that it must be static electricity, something like St Elmo’s Fire, but it remained calm and steady and unblinking.

  M. Musette continued to pray, and while he did so, the light very slowly descended, growing brighter and larger as it neared the top of the altar. ‘Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take away the members of Christ and make them members of a harlot? It shall never be! Or do you not know that the one who joins himself with a harlot is one body with her? For He says, “The two will become one flesh.’”

  ‘But the one who joins himself to the Lord is one spirit with Him.’

  One by one, then more quickly, the praying Célèstines raised their eyes. A ripple of astonishment ran all the way around the room. Only M. Musette remained as he was, with his hands pressed together and his eyes closed. Charlie had to admire his faith. He knew what was happening, he believed in it, and by God it was actually coming to pass.

  The light hovered a few inches above the altar and it was now as dazzling as phosphorous, and impossible to look at directly. Charlie used his one free hand to shield his eyes, although the man with the close-cropped hair gave him a sharp tug on his other arm to remind him that he was still held captive.

  Martin hadn’t moved. His eyes remained bright. He held his knife ready. All he was waiting for now was the word from M. Musette that would begin his self-sacrifice. The first cut, which would instantly change him from a young man to a eunuch.

  The light above the altar seemed constantly to shift and change, as if it were a living spirit. M. Musette at last turned around to face it, and he genuflected and crossed himself and cried out in a voice choked with tears, ‘Oh, Saviour! I know that my Redeemer liveth!’

  There was a moment of utter silence. Then a hair-raising voice spoke all the way around the room, a soft, deep voice that was everywhere and nowhere at all. Charlie wasn’t sure whether he was hearing it with his ears or through his bone marrow.

  ‘You have summoned Me here. You have called upon Me and I have heard your voices.’

  M. Musette let out a cry of sheer ecstasy. ‘Oh Lord, you have returned to us! We thank you, Lord, for hearing our cry! Everything is ready, we have consumed the thousand thousand, but for the very last, and your earthly temple awaits You!’

  There was weeping and shouting and clapping in the hall. Many of the Célèstines dropped to their knees. But none of them could take their eyes away from the bright, pure light.

  ‘Where is this last sacrifice?’ asked the soft, deep voice.

  M. Musette stepped back from the altar and took hold of Martin’s shoulder, turning him around so that he was facing the light. ‘Here, O Lord, a boy pure in body and spirit.’

  ‘And who gives him to Me?’

  ‘We do, oh Lord, the church of the Cétèstines.’

  There was a pause. Charlie could see M. Musette biting at his lower lip in tension. Then the voice said. ‘Only the boy’s father can give him to Me. It is the law – just as Abraham offered Isaac in the old writings.’

  ‘My Lord, he will give you the boy,’ said M. Musette.

  ‘The boy must be untouched, and whole,’ the voice insisted.

  M. Musette looked around in panic. ‘Charlie?’ he said. ‘Charlie? Did you hear that?’

  Charlie was staring at the light. A remarkable feeling had come over him; a feeling of bottomless peace and wholeness. He relaxed his arm, and the man with the close-cropped hair, sensing that something extraordinary was happening, released him. Charlie could see his whole life behind him like a tangle of black briars: all the lies, all the cheating, all the cowardice, all the aimless driving from place to place. He saw himself in hotel rooms all across America, thumbing through Polaroids of his son he hardly ever saw. He saw himself in Milwaukee, betraying the only woman he had ever really loved. Yet he knew that this part of his life was over now. He understood what it meant to have your sins redeemed. He felt as if he were being healed all over, mind and body. There were tears running down his cheeks, but he wasn’t even aware of them.

  ‘Do you have to take my son, Lord?’ he whispered.

  The voice replied, ‘Do you believe in Me?’

  Charlie nodded. ‘I don’t believe in what the Célèstines have been doing, that’s all. I don’t believe that You could condone such pain and suffering.’

  ‘If that is what you believe,’ the voice told him, ‘your choice is as clear as the day.’

  Charlie frowned. And then he understood.

  At least, God Almighty, he hoped he understood.

  ‘Take him,’ he said, so quietly that not even Mme Musette could hear him.

  M. Musette snapped, ‘What? What? What did he say?’

  ‘Take him,’ Charlie repeated, more boldly now.

  M. Musette’s eyes widened. ‘You’re going to give him to us? Freely, willingly?’

  ‘Not to you,’ said Charlie. ‘To the Lord.’

  M. Musette grasped Martin’s bare shoulders in unconcealed glee. ‘Now, Martin!’ he whooped. ‘Now is your time! Now!’

  Martin lifted the shining knife, and held himself out in preparation for the first cut. M. Musette rushed back to the altar, and abased himself in front of the dazzling light, and cried out, ‘Lord! O, Lord! The
very moment of your second coming has arrived!’

  But the soft voice was suddenly stern. ‘You have not summoned Me, you evil man. I came because I was aware that you had summoned another.’

  M. Musette slowly raised his head. ‘What?’ he said. ‘What do you mean? What do you mean I’ve summoned another? What other?’

  ‘You have performed today the culminating ritual of him whose day is the sixth day, a spirit long banished for his cruelty and evil. Your devouring of human flesh is the greatest of all sins; and your love of its taste is the deepest of all iniquities. I came today to save the innocent and the pure, and he stands before me, freely sacrificed to Me by his father, as Abraham freely sacrificed Isaac.

  ‘For this man knows, as Abraham knew, that your Lord is neither cruel nor murderous; that He gave His body and blood in order that man should no longer kill or maim or cause suffering to the defenceless and the innocent.

  ‘And I say to this man, as My Father said to Abraham, ‘Indeed will I greatly bless you, because you have obeyed My voice.’ And I say to him, go now, and take with you those whom you love, untouched, unharmed, and always be blessed.’

  M. Musette stood aghast. He turned to Charlie, and then to Martin, and then to Mme Musette. Mme Musette came over and held her arms around him, and stared at the light in mounting horror.

  M. Musette screamed. ‘You can’t do that! You can’t do that! I––I am your earthly temple!’

  The voice remained completely calm. ‘It is time that the temple gates were opened, and the souls of those you have taken prisoner were released, in order that they may take their rightful place by the side of their Maker. And – since you have summoned another, I shall leave you with him, in order that you and your sinful disciples may suffer the punishment which you have brought upon your own heads.’

  M. Musette shrieked, ‘You aren’t the Lord! You aren’t Christ! You’re nothing but a falsehood! You’re nothing but a liar and a deceiver!’

  But the brilliant light began to rise up, and as it rose it faded, until the feasting hall was once more drowned in the eerie darkness of the electric storm. There was a terrible silence. M. Musette looked all around him, like a caged animal, and then he suddenly lunged forward and grabbed Martin around the neck.