Thomas, A Secret Life

by A. J. B. Johnston

  Thomas swings left, in front of the baptistery. Pale shafts of light from unseen windows on high, faint lunettes, do their best to brighten the gloom. Thomas lifts his gaze to the immense arches that bear the weight of the upper reaches of the church, up where the spire points to heaven. Great round pillars, five times the girth of the boy, plunge to the level of the faithful. His shoes slap softly on the stone floor as he walks over the great slabs. Here and there the giant stones underfoot show the hollowing wear of all those who have walked in the church since before long ago.

  When he was younger, Thomas recalls as he hurries deeper into the church, stepping from the central aisle over into the right transept, his mother once told him that this particular church – le Saint-Thomas – was named after him. Yes, him, her son, her Thomas. Yes, it’s true. He, little Thomas Pichon, he is the Thomas the church’s builders had in mind. They were leaving the Vire market at the time, when she told him that. He remembers it clearly. She had just purchased a dozen fresh plums. They were in her market basket beneath a linen cloth. He’d helped her pick them out.

  “And,” Marie said as she placed a hand atop her son’s head, picturing him as the tall handsome priest he was sure one day to become, “that is why you have to be especially good. Do you understand that Thomas, my Thomas? This is your church.”

  Thomas thinks he nodded that he did understand, that of course he was taking his mother at her word. Is that not what mothers are to their boys: the source of every truth? So Vire’s Saint-Thomas was named after him. He recalls that she kissed him on his cheek and then upon the brow. A week later, in catechism class, Thomas repeated what his mother told him, that the big church was named after him. There was a pause and a strange look came over Father Alexis’s face. Then the priest slapped Thomas hard across the cheek.

  Thomas did not tell his mother what happened, for fear she’d make a scene. Better take the slap, he figured, keeping the correction to her lie all to himself. But ever since that slap, he’s been thinking his mother’s idea of him becoming a priest is not for him. The church, however, the Saint-Thomas itself, is still a place he loves. He loves its darkness, its height and most of all its smell. Its scent is time itself. And if he gets up early enough on some mornings, he can have the place all to himself.

  Thomas skirts another mammoth pillar. It never fails to amaze him how the aroma in Saint-Thomas is always the same, no matter the hour, the day or the season. Its air is always thick, filled with the weight of centuries. The boy wonders if it’s that way to suffocate the faithless. Or perhaps to inspire its shaky believers, people like himself.

  “Both,” he mutters, nodding agreement.

  “Dry as death,” his father once said, on one of the rare occasions he actually came into Saint-Thomas. This coming weekend will be another such time, for a mortal sin it would be for anyone, men included, not to make the Easter communion. Anne will be on Father’s right, no doubt, with Mother on the man’s left. Thomas will be out on the end at his mother’s distant side.

  His eyes go to the closest of the Stations of the Cross, the one with the spear and sponge. Could his father be a heretic, Thomas wonders? Father Alexis has warned the boys, more than once, about the dangerous cult that calls itself reformed and Protestant. It survives in pockets here and there in Normandy, says the good father. “Despite the best efforts of the Church to reach them. We have an obligation to re-educate them. Or else.” Father Alexis occasionally implores the boys to come forward if they suspect anyone of such errors. And the good father, shaking his finger at Thomas and the other boys, lets them know that if they keep quiet about heretics then it will be their own souls at risk.

  Thomas gives a nervous twitch and glances down to the stone floor. He wonders whether he should tell his parish father the doubts he has about his family father, the cloth merchant Jean Pichon? But Thomas blinks the thought away as quickly as it comes. He starts to move again. After all, it is Jean Pichon is it not, who puts the roof over his and his mother’s heads? Food on their table too. Not as good a roof as he should or could and not as varied a diet as he might, but still, it’s better than no roof and no food at all. If Father Alexis were to discover and punish Jean Pichon as the heretical non-believer he likely is, it would only be worse for Thomas and his mother. And for Anne as well.

  Things used to be better. That was before the family suffered at the hands of Renaud Brouard, sieur de La Motte. What exactly went wrong Thomas doesn’t know, other than that his father spent a week in prison and lost a great deal of money as a result of trying to take on La Motte, the forever mayor of Vire who is also the judge of the bailliage court and the head of police. There’s the lesson of an example in this. His father’s mistake of trying to bring down someone above him Thomas vows not to repeat. Why couldn’t his father see it for himself? That it’s better to be with rather than against authority?

  Thomas shakes his head to clear the slate and glances up, farther along the transept. This time it’s a large painting that captures his gaze. A canvas as dark as it is huge. He comes to a halt and leans a shoulder against the closest pillar. The nuances of the tableau – the skull in one corner and the hourglass in another – do not interest him, not at all. He is taken instead by the crazed look on the saint’s face, the body cloaked in a frayed brown habit and the eyes burning with some distant vision. Some victory off the canvas is clearly foretold. The chin is set and the black-red lips delight in exultation. The dog represents fidelity, Thomas knows that much, while the snake underfoot means temptation. The painted saint waves a sword, long and leaden. Thomas imagines he could be someone to do the same.

  He continues on and in a few paces slips into a shadow. This is it, the favoured spot, the reason he has come. He looks round the little chapel. He has to make sure no one else is near, no one else is in sight. He is, as far as he can tell, alone. Except for the sacristan, of course, whose half-crippled scuff Thomas hears as a distant stirring off in the apse or over in the nave. He is fairly certain the sacristan doesn’t even know that he is in the church. That’s the idea. Thomas will have his private moment.

  He comes as close as he can get to the base of the pedestal. She stands above him, aloof and cloaked in blue. The red skirt hangs in folds, stopping just above bare feet in sandals. At her waist and to her chest she holds the child, fat and naked in her arms. Her head is bowed, slender hands cherishing the infant, the only son she’ll ever have. Thomas drops to his knees. He clasps his fingers and says the words he has come to say, and whispers them in a hush.

  Virgin, Virgin, close and near,

  Wrap me tight, calm my fear.

  He seeks the heavenly mother’s eyes. They’re aslant again, a gaze not quite his way. He understands she’s but a statue yet he yearns for her just the same. It isn’t long before he feels his knees grow numb. This is what he needs; it’s why he’s come, the longed-for swirl and spin. His body sinks into the stone slab and at once he feels the rise. His eyes turn up in what has become his own version of holy prayer.

  A hand moves along the line of her carved form, touching the cloak and hood that are coloured in shades of blue. The ecru chemise slips away. Her skin goes flush and warm, lips and cheeks run soft. The mother’s eyes shift his way. There is a hint of smile. There comes a hand, a light brush under chin, a thumb that traces the firm line of jaw. She strokes his face with the back of her hand, then with the front. His child’s face twists to wanted touch. The words come in spurts.

  Comes an opening,

  the chemise in folds gives up.

  Nose to silken skin,

  fingers curl and cup.

  Veins faint, blue coursing,

  a babe begins to sup.

  The sun reaches into the sky, high enough to send its first rays through the lower windows of Saint-Thomas. Blue, green and crimson – the glazier’s godly colours – splay across the granite floor. It is a quiet g
low.

  Thomas makes to stand. He hears the sacristan’s footfalls coming close. It’s time for first Mass, on this a holy day. He must away.

  Summer 1713

  The streets are awake. Hawk and cry, merchants shout their calls. It’s market day and the people who work with their hands have practical matters on their minds. They are on their way to fill their separate needs: bread and vegetables, fruit and fish, gossip and chat. A jabber of voices swells around Thomas, along with a rumble of wheels on cobbles. Thomas closes his eyes for just an instant. He does not much care for the excessively sweaty perfume of those who toil more than he does, those who are brushing past him on both sides. He is after all a merchant’s son, a cloth merchant’s son at that. Not as high a rank among the trades as some others in the town, but nonetheless higher than all the people sweeping past him in this lot. And yes, Thomas admits he likely has his own smell, yet he covers it with rosewater, orange water or some other scent. At the very least, he doesn’t smell like a goat. Thomas takes a shallow breath, more exhale than inhale.

  He steps over to the side of the street. He recognizes many of these people, the other Virois. He doesn’t know all their names, not in every case, but he can place their faces and their clothes and which occupation they practice. What he would give to live in a place where he would not know everyone and fewer still would know him in return. His future is unknown, as the future must be, but he’s certain it won’t unfold at this market or in Vire, or maybe not in Normandy at all. Just to show the world a little of this inner thought, Thomas decides to strike a pose. He imagines it to be the stance of a painter of note. He’s too young still to see the absurdity of such pretense. He has none of the painter’s tools or in truth the slightest aspiration to that profession. If there is an art that he does see as maybe being within his grasp, it would be the scribbler’s toil. When Father Alexis circled some phrases Thomas had used on a history essay about Henri IV and wrote in the margin “Very well done,” it made Thomas’s chest puff out. It also made him think he had the gift to write. So, to let the smelly market people know that he is not like them, he puts hand to chin like he might be a sculpture. Then he adjusts his tricorn hat to give it first a jaunty then a rakish tilt. Thomas imagines he makes a pretty picture, someone far beyond his thirteen years.

  He swivels his head, studying the way the ground slopes slightly down from where he’s standing to the tree-lined market square below. A gentle grade, he observes, nodding as if he’s come up with something new. Ahead, the packed earth of the square is dotted with what he guesses must be nearly a hundred awnings over an equal number of rolled-in carts. The rows appear ordered from his would-be artist’s distance, and the square is filling with people. He too will descend to be among them soon enough. He has come to get some cherries, but he will wait a little bit.

  Frozen in his foolish pose, Thomas does not hear them coming, the lads who are pointing at him and laughing at his awkward fake artist stance. The sudden whack on the back of his head buckles his knees and sends the tricorn flying.

  “Oh my, lost your hat?”

  The words, like the blow to the head, come from behind. Thomas spins round and finds a laughing face. It’s the boy everyone calls Vinaigre. Thomas knows Vinaigre well enough. They were in the same catechism class a year or so ago. Sometimes they sat side by side. When they did, Thomas liked to correct or improve on Vinaigre’s answers. Vinaigre didn’t like it much but Father Alexis did, which is why Thomas kept it up. Vinaigre would breathe heavily out his nose whenever Thomas spoke up. Now when they walk by each other in the streets of Vire, if Vinagire doesn’t give him a snub then it’s a glare. Until now that is. Beside Vinaigre stands some other fellow who has his hands in his pockets and a stupid grin on his face. The grinning fellow is nearly a head taller than Vinaigre, who is already taller than Thomas.

  Vinaigre and his friend come quickly forward, the one pinning his arms and the other leg-tripping Thomas to the ground.

  “Tripped up?” says Vinaigre. “Or I suppose, it’s down in your case.” Vinaigre gestures with his hands like he’s doing some kind of conjuring trick before placing them akimbo on his hips.

  Thomas looks up at the two of them with a blank expression on his face. He rises to stand again, as slowly as he can, and as he does he feels his fingers forming into fists. He’d like to knock the triumphant smile clear off Vinaigre’s face.

  Vinaigre notices Thomas’s reaction with an expression of mock fear. Then he lowers his arms to his sides and lifts and bobs his chin in a way that Thomas takes to mean “come closer and take a swing.” Angered though he is, Thomas is not a fool. These two lads would make short work of him. He makes his fists uncurl. Next he finds an aloof look to put upon his face. He bends down to pick up his hat.

  “Wind catch your hat?” Vinaigre taunts.

  “Guess so,” Thomas says.

  He recalls that the only fight he has been in was nothing to brag about. The surgeon’s son, Guillaume, jumped on his back as he was going down the rue du Pont with Jean-Chrysostome. The two friends were on their way to the collège for Latin class. Thomas responded to the sudden weight on his back – the arrival of the slender Guillaume – by bending low. The poor thing rolled right over Thomas, cracking his head on the cobbles. Face contorted, Guillaume got up and smashed Thomas in the guts then full in the mouth. Thomas stayed doubled over until Jean-Chrysostome held Guillaume at a distance and convinced the surgeon’s son that the fight was done. Thinking of that episode, Thomas decides that this little knocked-hat incident with Vinaigre is not worth a fresh drubbing.

  “Yeah, guess so,” Thomas repeats. He whacks his hat against his thigh to rid it of any dust it may have picked up. He floats a forced smile, though it comes out more like a grimace than he can control.

  “That’s right,” says Vinaigre. His chin is upraised as if he has just outwitted Thomas. “You guess so. Be more careful next time, right?”

  Thomas nods but right away pretends he has better things to do. He shifts his gaze to the open street that leads down the incline to the market area below. He straightens his posture then re-positions the tricorn. He pulls it down tight and snug. No more jaunty angle for him.

  Yet against his own thinking, he feels his chest puff out. His mouth opens to say something to Vinaigre. Something, anything. Yet nothing comes. So Thomas does the only thing he can: he spins and shows his back. He hopes the ruffians will not strike again, not at the tricorn nor at the vulnerable body below. Just in case, he braces for the blow should it come. The end result is that Thomas moves something like a scarecrow as he stiff-walks away. He would laugh to see himself so awkward and afraid, but happily he is spared any such sight.

  —

  Thomas tries not to look longer or more frequently than he should. An occasional glance across the aisle in the girl’s direction is all he allows. He has to keep his observations within what he imagines his mother will think normal. They are after all in church and not at the fountain of Esmangard or in the market square.

  Yet Thomas cannot resist. He cannot help but gaze and then gaze again at the girl seated across the aisle. Her row is only one row in front of his, a mere ten feet away. And most of the distance is open aisle.

  Thomas pictures them with their arms around each other, the two of them wrestling across the stone floor of the church after the service has ended and everyone emptied out. They would knock the chairs this way and that as they rolled about.

  Wisps of hair are peeking from beneath her Brussels cap. The dark green material of her dress is showing through the lace shawl that hugs her shoulders tight. When she inclines her head to listen to the priest or to offer the appropriate prayerful reply, the girl’s neck is as slender as … Thomas searches for the right word. It does not quickly come.

  From time to time the object of Thomas’s attention turns his way, a fleeting backward glance. She pre
tends to be oblivious to his gaze, but he likes the look of her dark brown eyes, wide mouth and defined nose. He also likes the faraway expression on her face. He imagines she bathes in warm milk to make her skin look like cream.

  If his mother were to catch him staring and ask him what it is he’s looking at – Thomas has thought about this – he will say that he is admiring the girl across the aisle, that he’s inspired by her devoted look. It’s the simple truth, only explained in a mother’s way. The deeper truth is that what’s stirring in Thomas is not an admiration of piety but something else, something between his legs. It occurs to him that he would like to run his piece of silk along his urge. Thomas shifts in his seat at the thought.

  “Stop it,” his mother hisses, loud enough to make the woman two rows ahead noticeably flinch. “Stop it now,” Marie repeats in a lowered voice. This time her hand squeezes the boy’s knee to make up for the missing volume of her voice.

  “What?” mutters Thomas, feeling the pinch.

  His voice carries. Heads turn, including that of the woman two rows up. She takes the vocal disturbance as permission to turn full round. What she sees is an errant lad with a startled face who has done something wrong, something for which his mother has correctly inflicted a bit of pain. Before she turns back to face the front of the church the unknown woman sends an acknowledging nod to Thomas’s mother. She wants to let Marie know that whatever she has done to the boy she approves and understands.

  “Why? It’s nothing,” whispers Thomas leaning his mother’s way. His face has turned crimson, and he clasps his hands across his lap to hide what’s bulging, the buttons rising from his breeches.

  The mother glances down and sees what her son is doing. Her head moves left and right as she gives the boy a withering, scornful look. Thomas, poor Thomas, wishes he were dead.

  The drone from the front of the church continues, a mumbled Latin said too faintly and too fast for Thomas to follow, if he were the least bit inclined. Which he is not. It strikes him that the priest is in a rush. He must want the service over and done and him on his way to somewhere else. Thomas can understand that and wishes the priest would run through the words even faster than he is.