The Clowns of God

by Morris West

  “You were prompted for a reason. Even as I speak, the adversary begins to stalk the earth, roaring destruction! So, in the evil times which are now upon us, you are chosen to keep the small flame of love alight, to nurture the seeds of goodness in this small place, until the day when the Spirit sends you out to light other candles in a dark land and plant new seeds in a blackened earth.

  “I am with you now; but tomorrow I shall be gone. You will be alone and afraid. But I leave my peace with you and my love. And you will love one another as I have loved you.

  “Please!” He urged them to cheerfulness. “You must not be sad! The gift of the Holy Spirit is gladness of heart.” He smiled and the room seemed to light up. He joked with them. “Professor Mendelius and my friend Jean Marie are puzzled about my name. So much for scholarship, my dear Professor! And how quickly even Popes forget their Scripture! You were looking for one word. There are two. You will know them when I remind you. Maran Atha.… The Lord comes!”

  Jean Marie was instantly on his feet. His voice was a high challenge.

  “You lied to me! You said you were a nonbeliever!”

  “I did not lie. You have forgotten. You asked was I a believer. I answered that I was not. I said at another time that the act of faith was impossible for me. True?”

  “True.”

  “And still you do not understand?”

  “No.”

  “Enough!” Carl Mendelius spoke out, angrily in defense of Jean Marie. “The man is tired. He has been ill. He is not ready for riddles!” He turned to Jean Marie. “What he is saying, Jean, is that he cannot believe because he knows. They taught you that in first-year theology. God cannot believe in Himself. He knows Himself as he knows all the work of His hands.”

  “Thank you, Professor,” said Mr. Atha.

  Jean Marie stood silent, as the full meaning of the words dawned upon him. Once again he challenged the man across the table.

  “You have called yourself Mr. Atha. What is your true name?”

  “You have to tell me!”

  There was, again, the odd, abrupt silence. Out of it Jean Marie spoke.

  “Are you the promised one?”

  “Yes, I am.”

  “How do we know?”

  “Sit down, please!”

  Mr. Atha sat down first. Without a word he drew a trencher of bread towards him and poured wine into a cup. He broke a piece off the bread and held it in his hands over the cup. He said, “Father, bless this bread, fruit of Your earth, the food by which we live.” He paused and then began again. “This is my body.…”

  Jean Marie stood up. He was calm now and respectful, but still undaunted.

  “Sir, you know that these are very familiar words, most sacred to us all. You know enough of our Scriptures to remember that the early disciples recognized Jesus in the breaking of bread. You could be using that knowledge to deceive us.”

  “Why should I do that? Why are you so mistrustful?”

  “Because our Lord Jesus himself warned us: ‘There will arise false Christs and false prophets who will show great signs, so as to deceive even the chosen.…’ I am a priest. The people ask me to show them Jesus Christ. If you are He, you must give me what you gave your first disciples, a legitimizing sign!”

  “Isn’t all this enough?” The gesture embraced the whole room and the valley. “Doesn’t this legitimize me?”

  “No!”

  “Why not?”

  “Because there are communities which call themselves godly, but which exploit people and twist them into hate. We are not tested yet. We do not know if the gift is true or treacherous.”

  There was a long silence; then the man who called himself Jesus held out his hands.

  “Give me the child!”

  “No!” Even as he recoiled in fear, Jean Marie knew it was all presaged in the dream.

  “Please let me hold her. She will come to no harm.”

  Jean Marie looked around the assembly. Their faces told him nothing. He lifted the child out of the high chair and passed her across the table. Mr. Atha kissed her and sat her on his knee. He dipped a crust of bread in the wine and fed it to her, morsel by morsel. As he did so, he talked, quietly and persuasively.

  “I know what you are thinking. You need a sign. What better one could I give than to make this little one whole and new? I could do it; but I will not. I am the Lord and not a conjuror. I gave this mite a gift I denied to all of you—eternal innocence. To you she looks imperfect—but to me she is flawless, like the bud that dies unopened or the fledgling that falls from the nest to be devoured by the ants. She will never offend me, as all of you have done. She will never pervert or destroy the work of my Father’s hands. She is necessary to you. She will evoke the kindness that will keep you human. Her infirmity will prompt you to gratitude for your own good fortune.… More! She will remind you every day that I am who I am, that my ways are not yours, and that the smallest dust mote whirled in darkest space does not fall out of my hand.… I have chosen you. You have not chosen me. This little one is my sign to you. Treasure her!”

  He lifted the child from his lap, and passed her back across the table to Jean Marie. He said gently:

  “It is time to give witness, my friend. Tell me! Who am I?”

  “I am not sure yet.”

  “Why not?”

  “I am a fool,” said Jean Marie Barette. “I am a clown touched in the head.… Truly!” He looked around at the little company. He tapped his skull. “A little part of me up there doesn’t function anymore. I limp, like Jacob after his wrestle with the angel. I drop things. Sometimes I open my mouth and nothing comes out. I chase the words as a child chases bu… bu…” At the last moment he seized on the word. “Butterflies! So you must be simple with me. Tell me: can you really change your mind?”

  “Why do you ask?”

  “Abraham bargained with God for Sodom and Gomorrah. He said, ‘If there be a hundred or twenty or ten just men in the cities, will you spare them?’ And God, so the Scripture said, was very reasonable about the whole affair. Our Jesus who was of the seed of Abraham said that whatever we ask will be given us. We should knock at the door and clamour to be heard. But there’s no point in that if there’s no one inside—or if the one inside is a mad spirit whirling heedless with the galaxies!”

  “Ask then!” said Mr. Atha. “What do you want?”

  “Time.” Jean Marie Barette held the child close to him and pleaded as he had never pleaded in his life before. “Enough to hope, work, pray, reason a little longer together. Please! If you are the Lord, do you want to march into your world like the old barbarians on a carpet of dead bodies? That would be surely an unworthy triumph.… This child is a great gift; but we need all the children and time enough to deserve them. Please!”

  “And what can you offer me in return?”

  “Very little,” said Jean Marie with bleak simplicity. “I am diminished now. I have to think in small ways; but, such as I am, you can have me!”

  “I accept,” said Mr. Atha.

  “How much time will you give us?”

  “Not too much—but enough!”

  “Thank you. Thank you from us all.”

  “Now are you ready to testify?”

  “Yes, I’m ready.”

  “Wait!” It was Carl Mendelius who uttered the final challenge. For all his ravages and his wounds he was still the doughty old skeptic of Rome and Tübingen. “He has promised nothing, Jean. He has uttered only words familiar to us for centuries. I can list their sources for you, every one! He talks as though time is in his gift. You abdicated because you had no patent of authority for your prophecy. Why do you accept less from this man?”

  There was a murmur of approval from the small assembly. They looked first at Mr. Atha sitting calm and composed in his place, then at Jean Marie, clasping the child close to him and rocking back and forth in his chair. Lotte Mendelius got up from her place to take the child from him. She said, so softly that only he could hea
r:

  “Whatever you decide, we love you.”

  Jean Marie patted her hand and surrendered the little girl. He gave Carl Mendelius the old sidelong grin which acknowledged all the things they had shared in the bad times in Rome. He said, “Carl, old friend, there’s never enough evidence. You know that. You’ve been digging for it all your life. We make do with what we have. From this man I have had nothing but good. What more can I ask?”

  “The answer, please.” Mr. Atha prompted him firmly. “Who am I?”

  “I believe,” said Jean Marie Barette, and prayed for a steady tongue. “I believe you are the Anointed One, the Son of the Living God!… B-but…” He stumbled and recovered himself slowly. “I have no mission, I have no authority. I cannot speak for my friends. You will have to teach them, as you have taught me.”

  “No!” said Mr. Atha. “Tomorrow I shall be gone about my Father’s other business. You must teach them, Jean!”

  “How… how can I with this halter on my tongue?”

  “You are a rock of a man!” said Mr. Atha. “On you I can build a small standing place for my people!”

  EPILOGUE

  Pierre Duhamel stood at the window of the President’s chamber and watched the snow falling over Paris. He fumbled in the pocket of his jacket and his fingers closed round the tiny enamelled comfit box, which held the two gelatin capsules: the passport to oblivion for Paulette and himself. The sensation gave him a weary kind of comfort. At least Paulette would not need to suffer anymore and he himself would be spared the sight of Paris in the aftermath. He wanted to be quit of this long, despairing deathwatch and go home to bed.

  The man he had served for twenty years sat behind him at the great desk, chin propped in his hands, staring sightlessly at the documents in front of him. He asked, “What time have you got?”

  “Five minutes to midnight,” said Pierre Duhamel. “It’s a hell of a way to spend Christmas Eve.”

  “The President promised to call me from the White House the moment he’d reached a decision.”

  “I think he’s reached it already,” said Pierre Duhamel. “He’ll tell us just as they’re pushing the last button.”

  “Nothing we can do about that.”

  “Nothing,” said Pierre Duhamel.

  Out of the silence that followed, the telephone shrilled. The man at the desk snatched it up. Duhamel turned back to the window. He did not want to hear the death sentence read. He heard the phone replaced and then the long exhalation of relief from his master.

  “They’ve called it off! They think they see a breakthrough with Moscow.”

  “What’s the next deadline?”

  “They haven’t set it yet.”

  “Thank Christ!” said Pierre Duhamel. “Thank Christ!”

  Somehow it sounded like a prayer.