The priest sighed. “No one can say: ‘I shall be spared temptation,’ but I pray God to send me, in the hour of death, a friend who will help me to overcome my weakness while there is yet time.”
M. Thibault shut his eyes. The movements he had been making had irritated the bed-sores in the small of his back, and they were smarting like fire. He stretched himself out in the bed; now and again a feeble groan escaped his clenched lips: “Oh, dear me! Oh, dear me!”
“Consider now!” the priest began in his measured, melancholy tones. “You, as a Christian, knew well this life on earth must end. ‘Pulvis es …’ Had you forgotten that this mortal life does not belong to us? You are protesting now; as if you were being robbed of something that was yours in your own right. Yet you knew our lives are only lent us by our Maker. It may be that the hour has come when you shall be required to pay your debt; how ungrateful it would be, my friend, to haggle!”
Through his half-opened eyelids M. Thibault shot a malevolent glance at the priest. Then, very slowly, his gaze roamed round the room, pausing on all the things he recognized so easily despite the feeble light, things that were his, that he had seen—seen and possessed—so many and many a day.
“To leave all that?” he murmured. “No, I don’t want to.” A sudden tremor shook the old body. “I’m afraid.”
Compassionately the priest bent towards him.
“Our Divine Master, too, endured the agony and bloody sweat. And He, too, for a brief moment, doubted His Father’s love, and cried, saying: ‘Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me?’ Think, my friend; is there not a remarkable analogy between your sufferings and those of our Divine Master? But Jesus in His hour of trial took new strength in prayer. With all the fervour of His love he cried: ‘O my Father, here am I. Father, I trust in Thee. Father, I yield to Thee. Not as I will be done, but as Thou wilt.’ ”
The Abbé felt the swollen fingers quiver. After a pause, he continued in the same tone.
“Have you reflected that for centuries, nay, for thousands of centuries, our poor human race has been working out its destiny on earth?” Then, realizing that such arguments were too vague to serve his end, he fell back on precise examples. “Only think of your own family, your father, your grandfather, and your ancestors—of all those men who went before you, lived and struggled, hoped and suffered like you; and all of them irrevocably, one following the other, at the hour appointed from the beginning, returned whence they came. ‘Reverti unde veneris, quid grave est?’ Is it not a comforting thought that all creation, every one of us, returns to the bosom of the Heavenly Father?”
“Yes,” M. Thibault groaned. “Only … not yet!”
“How can you complain? Only think—how many of those men I spoke of enjoyed your advantages? You have had the privilege of reaching an age denied to many. God has shown you mercy in granting you so long a life in which to work out your salvation.”
M. Thibault shuddered. “That’s just what is so terrible!”
“Terrible, yes. But you have less right than many another to feel fear.”
Roughly the old man withdrew his hand.
“No!” he exclaimed.
“Indeed you have.” The Abbé’s voice was gentle, consoling. “I’ve watched you at work, my friend. Always, with all your heart, you have aimed at something higher than worldly gain. You have loved your neighbour, fought the good fight against poverty and sin. You have lived the life of an upright man, and death should have no terrors at the close of such a life.”
“No,” the dying man repeated hoarsely.
When the Abbé tried to clasp his hand again, he freed himself angrily. The priest’s remarks had touched him to the quick. No, he had not aimed at something higher than worldly success. On that score he had deceived everybody, including the priest—and himself, too, almost always. In reality he had spared no effort to shine in the eyes of men. All his motives had been vile, wholly vile—under the surface. Selfishness and vanity. A thirst for riches, for ordering others about. A display of generosity, to win honours, to play a specious part. Sins of the flesh, hypocrisy, a whited sepulchre—ah, the falsehood of it all! If only he could wipe the slate clean, make a fresh start! That “life of an upright man”—he was heartily ashamed of it. He saw it now as it had really been. Too late. The day of reckoning had come.
“A Christian like you …”
M. Thibault could not contain himself. “Keep quiet, you! I, a Christian? I’m no Christian. All my life I’ve—I’ve aimed at … what? ‘Love of my neighbour’? Nonsense! I’ve never known what it is to love—anybody, anybody in the world.”
“My poor friend!” the Abbé murmured. He was expecting M. Thibault to accuse himself once more of having driven Jacques to suicide. But no, not once in these latter days had the father thought of his missing son. All he could conjure up at present was much remoter phases of his past: his youth consumed with ambition, his start in life, his early struggles, first distinctions—sometimes, too, the honours he had earned in middle age. The last ten years had already faded out into the mists of oblivion.
Despite the twinge it cost him, M. Thibault raised an arm.
“It’s all your fault!” he burst out passionately. “Why didn’t you warn me, while there still was time?”
Then anger yielded to despair, and he burst into tears. Like ghastly laughter, sobs convulsed his body.
The Abbé bent towards him.
“In every human life there comes a day, an hour, a fleeting moment, when suddenly God deigns to reveal Himself as a real presence and extends His hand to us. Sometimes that moment comes after a life of sin, and sometimes at the close of a long life which has passed for Christian. Who can say? Perhaps it is tonight that God, for the first time, holds out His hand to you.”
M. Thibault’s eyelids lifted. In the twilight of his mind a certain confusion had grown up between God’s hand and the human hand, the priest’s, beside him. He put forth his hand to grasp it.
“What must I do?” he panted. “Tell me what to do!”
His tone had changed; the panic terror at death’s advent had gone out of it. He spoke as one who asks a question that can be answered; already tempered with contrition, the fear that still persisted in his voice could be dispelled by absolution.
God’s hour was approaching.
But, for the priest, this was of all hours the hardest. He communed with himself for a while, as he did in the pulpit before beginning a sermon. Though he had given no sign of it, M. Thibault’s reproach had stung him to the quick. For many years he had had spiritual charge of this proud nature; how far had his influence been effective? How had he fulfilled his task? Well, there was still time to make good the lapses—on both sides. He must lay hold of this poor, wavering soul, and guide it back to the Redeemer’s feet.
Then his knowledge of the man suggested a pious expedient.
“What we must deplore,” he said, “is not that your earthly life is drawing to a close, but that it was not as it should have been. Still, even if your past life has not always been a source of edification, let the leaving of it, at least, furnish a fine example of a truly Christian end. Let your bearing, when that moment comes, be a pattern for all who have known you, a pattern to observe and to imitate!”
The dying man made a movement and freed his hand. The priest’s words were sinking in. Yes, let it be said that Oscar Thibault had had a noble end, worthy of a saint. He locked his fingers awkwardly, and closed his eyes; his under-jaw, the priest observed, was trembling. He was praying God to grant him the grace of an edifying death.
Now fear was giving way to a vague dejection, a sense of feebleness; he was a small, pathetic atom amongst myriads of others, all ephemeral like him. But after those cataclysms of terror, there was some relief in this self-pity.
The Abbé raised his head.
“The Apostle Paul has bidden us not to be sorry, as men without hope. You, my poor friend, are amongst those men. How sad that,
at this crucial hour, your faith should have forsaken you! You have forgotten that God is your Father before He is your Judge, and you do your Father grievous wrong to doubt His mercy.”
The old man gazed at him with troubled eyes, and sighed.
“Come now, take heart!” the priest continued. “Be assured of the divine compassion, and remember that, granted sincere and thoroughgoing repentance, a pardon given in the extremity of death will cancel the sins of a lifetime. You are one of God’s creatures; does He not know, better than we do, the clay in which He has shaped us? For, mind you, He loves us as we are; and this assurance should be the cornerstone of our courage and our confidence. Yes, confidence; for in that word lies the whole secret of a Christian death. ‘In te, Domine. speravi.’ The Christian trusts in God, in His goodness and infinite compassion.”
The Abbé had a manner of his own, placid yet weighty, of emphasizing certain words; whenever he used them, his hand would rise with a slight gesture that added to their force. Yet there was little warmth in his monotonous delivery, any more than in the long-nosed, impassive face. And it was proof of the essential virtue of these hallowed words, it showed how centuries of usage had formed them to the exact requirements of the deathbed, that their effect was so immediate on such panic and revolt as M. Thibault’s.
His head had sunk, and his beard was brushing his chest. Stealthily a new emotion was permeating him, an emotion less sterile than self-pity and despair. Tears were rolling down his cheeks again, but tears of joy; and all his spirit yearned towards the Omnipotent Consoler. Now his one desire was to lay down the burden, yield his life to Him who gave it.
But then he clenched his teeth; the pain had come on again, shooting through his leg, from the thigh downwards. He ceased listening, stiffened. After a moment the pain died down.
“… like the climber,” the priest was saying, “who has reached the summit and looks back to see the path that he has travelled. And what a sorry retrospect is a man’s life! A series of struggles, never ending, unavailing, in a preposterously narrow field of action. Vain activities, tawdry pleasures, an undying thirst for happiness that nothing, nothing in the world can quench. Am I exaggerating? Such was your life, my friend; such, indeed, is the lot of every man on earth. How can a being created by God be content with a life like that? Has it anything worthy of an iota of regret? Very well! To what, I ask you, is it that you cling so much? Is it to your suffering body,, this weak, miserable body, that always plays you false, that shirks its proper functions, that nothing can safeguard from pain and decay? Ah, let us face the facts! It is a blessing that after being so long enslaved to our vile bodies, held prisoner by them, we can at last discard them, slough our mortal skins, cast them away, and leave them like a beggar’s rags upon the wayside.”
For the dying man the words had such immediate cogency that all at once the prospect of escape seemed utterly delightful. And yet —what was this new-found solace but once more the life-impulse, the stubborn hope of survival under a new disguise? And it struck the priest, whose insight had not failed him, that the prospect of another life, of living for eternity in God’s presence, is as necessary in the hour of death, as in life the certainty of living the next moment.
After a brief silence the Abbé spoke again.
“Turn your eyes Heavenwards now, my friend. Now you have judged how little it is, what you are leaving, see what awaits you! An end of all the pettiness of life, its harshness and injustice. And ended, too, its trials and responsibilities. Ended, those daily acts of sin, with their aftertaste of remorse. Ended, that anguish of the sinner torn between good and evil. There, in the Kingdom of Heaven, you will find peace and plenitude, and the rule of divine order. You are leaving behind the things that are corruptible, to enter into the realm of things everlasting. Do you understand, my friend? ‘Dimitte transitoria, et quaere aeterna! You were afraid of dying; your imagination pictured some vague horror of great darkness. But a Christian death is just the opposite of that; it opens out a vista of unfading light. It brings us peace, the peace that passes understanding, rest eternal. What am I saying? It does more than that. It brings Life to its perfection, consummates the union of human and divine. ‘I am the Resurrection and the Life.’ Not merely an escape, a sleep, or a forgetting; but an awakening, the opening of a flower. To die is to be born again. Death is a resurrection to a new life, in the fullness of understanding, in the communion of the saints. Death, my friend, is not merely the rest that nightfall brings when the labourer’s task is done; it is a progress upward and onward into the light of an eternal dawn.”
While the priest was speaking, M. Thibault had nodded several times, approvingly. Now a smile was hovering on his face. The shadows had lifted, a dazzling effulgence was kindling facets of the past. With his mind’s eye he saw himself a little boy kneeling at the foot of his mother’s bed, this very bed on which he now was lying; his mother was clasping his childish fingers while in the radiant light of a summer morning he repeated one of the prayers which first had opened heaven to him: ‘Gentle Jesus, who art in Paradise …” He saw himself at his first communion, trembling with awe before the Host, for the first time vouchsafed to him. And then he saw himself as a young man, one Whit-Sunday after mass, walking with his fiancee up the garden path at Darnetal, between the peonies. Back with those sunny memories, he had forgotten his old, dying body; he was smiling.
Not merely had all fear of death departed, but what troubled him just now was that he had still to live, if only for a little while. The air of this world had become unbreathable. “A little patience,” he thought, “and I’ll have done with it all.” It seemed to him that he had discovered his true centre of gravity, had reached the vital core of his being; he had found himself at last. And this gave him happiness such as he had never known before. True, his energies seemed broken up, dispersed, lying as it were in havoc round him. What matter? He had ceased to belong to them; they were the rags and tatters of an earthbound being, with whom he felt that he had broken for good and all; and the prospect of a still more complete disruption, very near at hand, gave him an intense delight—the only joy of which he now was capable.
The Holy Spirit was hovering in the room. The Abbé had risen, full of thankfulness to God. And with his humble gratitude mingled a very human self-satisfaction—like that of a lawyer who has won his suit. No sooner was he conscious of this feeling, than he upbraided himself for it. But this was no time for self-analysis. A sinner was about to appear before his Maker.
Bowing his head, he folded his hands under his chin and prayed aloud:
“O Lord, the hour has come. Father of mercies and God of all comfort, I beseech Thee to vouchsafe this last grace, and grant me to die in peace and in Thy love. De projundis, out of the darkness, from the deep pit where I lay trembling with dread, clamavi ad te, Domine, have I called to Thee, O Lord; Lord, hear my voice. The hour has come; I am on the brink of Thy eternity, when at last I shall see Thee face to face, Almighty God. Consider my contrition, accept my prayer, and let me not be outcast in my unworthiness. Let Thy gaze fall upon me, pardoning my sins. In te, Domine, commendo. Father, into Thy hands I commend my spirit. My hour has come. Father, O Father, forsake me not.”
The dying man’s voice came like an echo: “Forsake me not.”
There was a long silence. Then the Abbé bent over the bed.
“Tomorrow morning I will bring the holy oil. Meanwhile, my friend, make your confession, so that I may give you absolution.”
M. Thibault’s swollen hps began to move; with a fervour he had never shown before, he stammered a few phrases, in which the confession of his sins had less place than a passionate avowal of repentance. Then, raising his hand, the priest murmured the words that wash all sins away.
“ ‘Ego te absolvo a peccatis tuis. In nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti.’ ”
The man on the bed was silent. His eyes were wide open—open as if they were never to close again—and in his gaze there was at ye
t only the faintest hint of questioning or wonder. The bland innocence of the eyes made the dying old man look strangely like the pastel portrait of Jacques, hanging on the wall above the lamp.
He felt the last threads linking his soul to the world of men strained almost to the point of snapping; but their tenuity, their brittleness, filled him with abounding joy. He was no more now than a frail flame gently flickering out. Life was flowing on without him, as a river goes on flowing after the swimmer has made the further shore. And he felt not only beyond life, but beyond death as well. He was rising, floating up into a zenith, bathed, as is sometimes a midsummer-night sky, with supernatural light.
There was a knock at the door. The Abbé ceased his prayer, crossed himself, and went towards it. The doctor had just come; Sister Céline was with him.
“Please continue, M. l’Abbé,” Thérivier said, when he saw the priest.
The Abbé caught the nun’s eye, and discreetly moved aside.
“Come in, doctor,” he said in a low voice. “I’ve finished.”
Thérivier went up to the bed, rubbing his hands. He thought it best to assume a hearty, hopeful tone—his bedside manner.
“Well, well? What’s the trouble tonight? A touch of fever, eh? That’s the new injection doing its job, of course.” Stroking his beard, he glanced at the nun, as if calling her to witness. “Antoine will be back any moment. Meanwhile, there’s no need to worry. I’ll put you right. That new serum, you know …”
Without saying a word, M. Thibault watched this man lying to him. He could see through it all now—the doctor’s cheerfulness-to-order, his professional play-acting. He was no longer taken in, as he had been too often and too readily, by these infantile “explanations.” The make-up had worn thin; he knew them all for what they were: mummers in a macabre comedy that they had been playing for his benefit, for months. Was Antoine really coming back? Could anything they said be trusted? In any case, it was all the same to him. Nothing mattered; nothing whatever mattered now.
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