The Monk

by Hallahan, William H. ;

  She landed on the red clay tiles of a roof and cocked her head, listening. In the square the evening passeggiata was under way, people strolling and greeting each other. Others were sitting at tavern tables under the stars, drinking wine, enjoying the evening breeze.

  Beyond the city walls, the worn hills, lying in moon shadows, were covered with vineyards heavy with the grapes that produced an ocean of Chianti wine each year.

  The hawk glided down the side of the building and landed on the railing of a balcony. The manifestation was stronger here and she tried to peer into the window but there was no crack in the shutters. The hawk gave a strong flap, glided down through the trees, then rose and flew toward the moon. She disappeared.

  The baby, a girl named Lucia, was barely three weeks old. During the evening she had been restless and she cried. Her mother, a knowing woman with four other children, had given her an extra feeding, held her until she raised some uncomfortable gas and watched her fall asleep.

  The mother sat with her husband in the small living room on the first floor, watching an American cowboy movie on the television. The house they lived in was over 150 years old and was too small for a growing family, so her husband was having a contractor add a large room at the back, of frame and stucco and red tile roofing. He was on the telephone, talking to the builder and watching the temporary sheets of plastic over the windows stir in the evening breeze. He was worried: There was talk of heavy rains coming.

  Up in the baby’s room the darkness seemed to intensify, in one corner, seemed to draw all the pale light into it. A faint shape loomed there. It stirred and moved toward the crib. Then it paused. It heard the mother’s step on the stairway.

  Deftly it reached into the crib and raised the baby, enveloped her in total blackness, covering the small face with a hand in a sleeve. The woman stopped in the hallway outside the door to pick up two school books and a pair of boys’ socks. “Peccato.” she said softly. Then she opened the door. The figure turned toward her and waited. She stepped back, seeing another sock. She now stepped into the room and almost into the waiting arms of the figure. She paused once again and saw a shirt. She took three steps in the hallway and retrieved it. She turned back and entered the room. There was for an instant an overwhelming sense of darkness in the room. She swung the door wider and by the hall light approached the crib. The baby was sleeping peacefully. She reached down and adjusted the blanket. Then she shrieked. The infant had stopped breathing.

  Of all the monks who had witnessed Brendan Davitt’s baptism and his aura’s color change, only two remained alive—Father Joseph, abbot of the order, who had baptized Brendan, and Father Ambrose.

  Monks are as prone to gossip as any other group of men, so after Brendan’s baptism Father Joseph summoned the entire order then in residence to the chapel and silenced them: They were not to discuss the baptism among themselves. Nor were they to disclose anything about it to the other monks who were away. In fact, never again till deathday were they to even utter so much as a syllable about the affair.

  This was a difficult promise for the monks to make and keep. The birth of a purple aura seemed a profoundly religious event. Might it not be that a saint had been born? If so, then they were witnesses to a miracle. And there was so much for the monks to discuss. Consider the cry of the banshee, the first time ever at a birth, so far as they knew. To discover the meaning of that would require long conversations. And then there was the mother’s second sight—some said she’d seen the Magus right there in the old ruins and elsewhere too. What did that mean? Surely these were signs from God. To fail to discuss them and to prize out their meanings would be wrong, wouldn’t it?

  But Father Joseph remained adamant. There would be no discussion forever. A purple aura had been born. And legend had it, as they all well knew, that Satan hated purple auras and killed such babies without hesitation. That was the reason the color of Baby Brendan’s aura had been changed to begin with.

  And, Father Joseph reminded his brothers in Christ, that Satan had minions everywhere. Babbling tongues could bring death to the baby with untold consequences. The monks could ruminate privately to their heart’s content but not one word, not even one mute sign must pass between or among them. Amen.

  Amen.

  So far as Father Joseph knew, from the day that he baptized Brendan Davitt to this, not one monk had violated his vow. Satan had never eavesdropped on one conversation about the purple aura.

  But silence was only one half of the problem. The other was protection. Since Father Joseph had himself changed Brendan’s aura, he assumed thereby a responsibility. When the day came that Brendan’s aura became noticeably purple again, if it happened at all, then Father Joseph would have to put Brendan somewhere safe from Satan’s eyes. He had no idea where that place might be. In the early years of Brendan’s life it was relatively easy to dispatch a monk each year or so to observe from a distance the condition of Brendan’s aura.

  However, as the older monks died off there were fewer and fewer who knew of the aura; fewer, therefore, whom he could send to observe Brendan. These last few years the assignment of observing Brendan fell almost exclusively to Father Ambrose, since Father Joseph had the monastery to run and traveled very little. And there were no other monks still alive who had witnessed the baptism. Even the boy’s parents were dead. By the time he was sixteen, Brendan began to show small purple spots in his aura. At eighteen, there were four. At twenty, there were eight.

  Last year Father Ambrose had returned quite alarmed. There were nearly two dozen spots now and the newest were larger. “One is the size of a saucer,” he whispered.

  Father Ambrose had failed visibly the last year or so. There was a slight tremor in his hands; he prayed frequently and muttered to himself. His eyes stared at eternity. Father Joseph patted Ambrose’s shoulder. “Sit down. Tell me about it.”

  They discussed at length. Reluctantly they came to the same conclusion: Brendan had to be concealed, preferably within walls on consecrated ground, his head permanently covered with a cap or hat for whatever protection it could provide.

  The problem was Brendan himself. Father Ambrose reported that the young man was not by disposition monastic. He was a creature of the world. An extrovert who reveled in the company of others, who loved city life, and who in his great benevolence loved to help others. He was now employed in a private social agency, helping young people. There was also a young lady in his life. Anne O’Casey. “How can such a young man endure life in a monastery?” Father Ambrose demanded. “It will be a prison to him.”

  Father Joseph questioned Father Ambrose about Brendan’s knowledge of his own condition. Did he know anything—anything at all—about his purple aura? Father Ambrose shrugged. Very little. But he was apparently beset with visions and premonitions about fighting a demon.

  Ah! Then for him the safety of a concealed place might have some appeal after all.

  “That would depend,” Father Ambrose replied, “on the place itself.” So before they approached Brendan, the right place of safety had to be found. And this required a long discussion. The place had to be selected with care.

  “With cloistered brothers,” Father Joseph said. “Little or no contact with the outside world.”

  “An order of monks who cannot see purple auras—as ours can,” Father Ambrose added.

  “Americans. Men of similar background and outlook.” Father Joseph was searching his mind for the right monastery in America. His doubts were increasing. The cloistered life had driven men mad, dedicated, deeply religious men. How could such a man as Brendan Davitt endure it—and for the rest of his life?

  Father Joseph regarded Father Ambrose with concern. They were both two very old men. Nearing eighty. And the mendicant’s life had imposed an added burden. Father Ambrose should stop his itinerant life and remain in the monastery. There was little strength left in him. Still, the Lord’s work is never done and there’s rest only in the grave. Father Joseph wondered if there
was one last mission left in the old monk.

  “We must search out a monastery for Brendan Davitt,” the abbott said. “In America. Do you have any recommendations?”

  Father Ambrose considered this question for some time. It had begun to rain, a cold penetrating rain in a gloomy dusk, and his flesh seemed to draw back from it. He was tired, so weary of coping with the elements. He’d come to prize above all else a warm dry bed. “I will go back to America and look.”

  “That’s a big place,” Father Joseph said, “and there’s so little time.”

  “I will leave at first light.” Father Ambrose regarded the rain and took himself to bed with an extra blanket.

  Father Joseph wondered if the old man would survive the trip.

  The months passed. And the abbot became increasingly anxious. What could have happened to Father Ambrose? And what of Brendan Davitt’s aura? It must be dangerously visible by now.

  Each day he scanned the twisting roadway outside the monastery. In rain or sunlight, or in the star-filled darkness, monks arrived periodically from all over the world, some young and hale, healthy from the endless walking, others older and slower, some bent, all arriving footsore and road-weary, eager for a short stay in their sanctuary. But Father Ambrose was not among them and none of the arriving monks had seen him.

  Then with the springtime Brother Dominic returned. Yes, he had seen Father Ambrose in Philadelphia. He seemed well enough, although, yes, at times he appeared confused. He insisted on addressing Brother Dominic as Brother Sebastian, who had died years ago. He talked to himself frequently and seemed obsessed with his errand. He told Brother Dominic they had to protect the purple aura. What was that? Brother Dominic wanted to know.

  The abbot was shocked. The old man was senile. He had to be returned to the monastery quickly and silenced in isolation, and Brendan Davitt had to be put in a place of safety too. If it wasn’t already too late. How many people had Brother Ambrose told of the purple aura? How long could it be before Satan heard of it—or discovered Brendan Davitt himself?

  Brother Joseph made hasty preparations to leave—to find Brother Ambrose and to house Brendan Davitt somewhere. As he set out, he realized how tired he’d become. He turned his head back and looked at his beloved monastery. And he wondered if he’d ever see it again. Then resolutely he walked into the lovely Irish springtime and the gravest assignment of his life.

  It was pure chance that brought the Magus, Timothy, to the monastery.

  He had long ago detected a geographic pattern in the births of purple auras, and tried to anticipate their appearance. Often they were connected with other religious events—holy visions, miraculous cures, supernatural events. The mendicant monks with their ceaseless wandering of the earth were prime sources of such religious gossip, especially in their monastery, where all such information flowed. The monastery was like a godly spy center.

  He came to the old stone buildings in the cliff this time to arrange his next walking tour. While in France he had planned to cross through the Balkans into Turkey and from there to Asia Minor. At the last minute he had an intuition and turned downward toward Ireland and the monastery. There hadn’t been a birth of a purple aura in years that he knew of.

  The monastery never changed. The halo of circling seabirds remained: The eternal diving into the rising and falling surf amid the rocks continued. Long before he reached the holy place, he could hear the seabirds call. The Irish countryside in spring became a great piece of tweed with gorse and heather and multitudes of purple flowers, with Irish roses and the long lanes of stone walls like white threads shot through the nubby fabric.

  The monks as usual put him up without a question and always with those sidelong glances.

  This time there was an unusual agitation among the monks. Nothing spoken, but there was a preoccupation in their minds. He also noted that the abbot, Father Joseph, was absent. He asked for him.

  “Away,” answered Brother Kevin. He had become lame many years before and now hand-illuminated Bibles on vellum after the style of The Book of Kells. For a garrulous man like Brother Kevin that was a significantly short answer.

  Timothy asked when Joseph would return.

  “Soon.”

  Soon. Brother Kevin, who was always swollen like a teakettle with information—speculation, gossip, chat—remained terse with Timothy. The other monks avoided him, eagerly busy with their monastery duties—the shoemaker, the gardener, the cooks, the launderers, all furiously preoccupied.

  During the night he heard them rise and go to their prayers through the biting chill of their stone corridors, shivering in their heavy wool habits. Even the rain that washed down the roof slates and muttered at his window seemed evasive.

  Timothy felt he’d been paying his debt of repentance at usurious rates. Eons. Millenniums. The stars had crossed the sky countless thousands of times. Civilizations had risen, thundered and fallen, one after another, and still the debt remained unpaid, the toll of human suffering grew. If he were a mortal, he could have at least the comfort of tears.

  He looked up at the stars that had been watching him struggle all these centuries, watching him easily vanquished by Satan. Yet always they remained little gleams of hope in the darkness. Patience, they said. Hope.

  In the morning he was served fresh bread with preserves and a large white bowl of tea.

  “Strong enough to trot a mouse across,” the young acolyte said as he put down the steamy bowl. “You’ll need it. The wind is out of the west and that means a cool day with rain.”

  The boy had a heavy Cork accent.

  “What’s your name?”

  “Michael.”

  “A happy life to you, Michael.”

  As Father Timothy watched Michael work, there was another acolyte, a new one, and Michael was teaching him his diurnal duties; together on their hands and knees, their skirts hiked up they washed the old stone floor of the kitchen with sopping rags soaked in salty seawater. Their hands were purple with the cold.

  Michael talked and the new boy half listened. The pain in his purple hands must have made him wonder if he had made a mistake coming here: a lifetime of numb fingers and aching knees.

  Michael talked of monastic affairs—which brother had a vile temper, which was helpful, which was a little strange—and then the words jumped out like clarion. “Purple aura,” Michael said.

  Timothy jumped to his feet. The bench fell back and the bowl of tea tumbled to the floor and smashed.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. The two acolytes stared at the broken bowl. Timothy picked up the biggest pieces. “I’ll take care of this,” he said.

  He looked at the acolyte Michael, unable to frame the questions that swarmed in his mind. After such a long time—ages of defeat and failure and wracking loneliness—to hear the two most significant words in his universe uttered by a stripling mopping a floor was more stunning than even his angelic soul could contain.

  The two boys hastily mopped up the tea and the bowl splinters. And Timothy realized that it was this matter of a purple aura that had made all the monks so strange and taciturn. It also probably explained why their abbot, Father Joseph, was away.

  Timothy knew he’d get no more information from the acolyte mopping at his feet or from any of the others. Father Joseph was the one to find. The old abbot was away on business somehow involving a purple aura.

  “Where’s Father Joseph?” he asked Michael.

  “Oh, he’s in America,” the boy said in his Cork accent, “with Brother Zebulon.”

  “How long has he been gone?”

  “Oh, a month or more.”

  “Where in America?”

  “Oh, it’s a place called Baltimore.” Michael looked at the other boy. “I’m not supposed to talk about it.”

  The hawk took note of Timothy, hastening from the monastery with his mastiff. She knew every gesture of Timothy’s, the way he carried his head, the way he walked, the set of his shoulders, even the subtlest changes of ex
pression on his face.

  And this morning, circling high in the Irish sky, she saw his agitated gait, his purposeful manner, and she sensed his great excitement. She turned and flew south rapidly.

  Satan summoned Beelzebub to the Hall of Pandemonium.

  “Timothy’s on to something,” he said without elaboration.

  Beelzebub was immediately interested. “What is it?”

  “He’s almost running.” Satan watched Beelzebub for a reaction. “He’s never done that before. I’ve never seen him so excited.”

  “There’s only one thing that can excite Timothy,” Beelzebub said.

  “It can’t be.” Satan was defensive. “It’s not possible. I never miss.”

  “Well—”

  “I know, I know. His excitement is like an alarm bell.”

  “Maybe it’s a tactic to torment you,” Beelzebub said.

  “Now, you know as well as I do, he doesn’t have ‘tactics.’”

  “What shall we do?” Beelzebub said.

  “You can’t do anything. You know that. There’s only Timothy and the dog or me and the hawk.”

  “And the purple auras.”

  Satan nodded. “And the purple auras,” he echoed. He felt Beelzebub’s eyes searching his face. Of all the fallen host this was the one who needed the most watching. Beelzebub was always alert. Ambitious. Always watching the first stumble, the hesitant hand or the smallest sign of irresolution, of mellowing. If ever Satan’s authority was challenged, Beelzebub would be the challenger. Satan met his gaze. Beelzebub had been his aptest pupil. Better to reign in hell than serve in heaven—Beelzebub subscribed to that as eagerly as Satan did—only he wasn’t reigning in hell. Not yet.

  “Where is Timothy going?” Beelzebub asked.

  “America.”

  “Oh.” And in that “Oh” was the whole unspoken substance of their talk. If Timothy had somehow discovered a purple aura and obtained forgiveness then the prediction made by the Lord would surely come to pass: Timothy would return to heaven. Satan and all the fallen angels would receive their ultimate punishments.