Ollie's Cloud

by Gary Lindberg

Mrs. Chadwick wags her head and walks to the bed. She sits and pats the bedcovers with the palm of her hand, beckoning Ollie to join her there. Amusement shows through her oval eyes, which strain to mask it. Ollie climbs onto the bed and lies down on his back, bony knees pointed toward the ceiling.

  Mrs. Chadwick places a hand on one of these knees, caressing it like a mother. “Ollie, I know this is confusing, but I want you to know that Christians do not have to lie on their bellies to pray.”

  “Is it wrong, then?”

  “Well, I imagine that no posture could be considered incorrect if one is praying. But it is unnecessary to prostrate yourself, and in some quarters people may think that you are, what shall I say, promoting your piety.”

  Ollie does not know what piety means, but he says nothing.

  “And another thing… God knows many languages. He is omniscient, after all. That means he knows everything, so to speak. So you do not have to pray in Farsi for God to understand you. Truth is, he understands English quite well but prefers Latin. Don’t ask me why. Are you clear about these things?”

  “Yes, Mum.”

  “Good. Then we have another issue to go over, something of great importance to you.”

  Ollie sits up and crosses his legs. Everything that Mum says is of great importance to him.

  “Reginald Pennick paid me a visit this evening. You remember Reginald, don’t you? The Anglican priest from St. Martin’s.”

  “The fat one, yes.”

  Mrs. Chadwick’s eyes glisten with delight at the boy’s candor. “Yes. Mr. Pennick stopped by to deliver some wonderful news. We have received permission for you to attend school at the Charterhouse, a fine boarding school.”

  “A boarding school?”

  “Yes, a boarding school, meaning that you will live there also. This is the best way for you to absorb the atmosphere of the school and get to know your fellow students and teachers.”

  Ollie is suddenly fearful. “But I want to stay here. With you, Mum. I don’t want to leave home again. I can learn to pray the correct way.”

  “Oh, Ollie, this is not a punishment. I’m not sending you away because you prayed incorrectly. This is… a reward. You will learn so much there. And you will receive the finest religious instruction.”

  Ollie wants to register another complaint, but this school, this Charterhouse, is beginning to sound like the famous madrisih in Mashhad. Yes, had not his mother promised that he would soon attend the finest school? She must have meant the Charterhouse. An English madrisih. It must be a very good school if Mum were sending him there. And while he is quite certain he cannot become a mulla at the Charterhouse, perhaps he will become a great Christian priest.

  His fear evaporates and excitement begins to surge, tempered only by the knowledge that his friend, Jalal, will not be there with him. “Then I am ready to go,” he says.

  Mrs. Chadwick, amazed at his sudden transformation, simply stares at him for a moment before saying, “Pardon me?”

  “I accept your reward. I would like to go to the Charterhouse very much.” He speaks with a sense of joy and throws his arms around Mrs. Chadwick as he says, “Thank you, Mum, thank you.” He remembers the day that his father gave him permission to attend the madrisih. He has the same feeling now.

  Mrs. Chadwick says, “You are very welcome, my son.” She embraces him, wraps herself around him, absorbs him into herself, and the years melt away until she is holding Augustus in her arms again.

  Chapter 4

  The picnic had been dreamy. Ollie and his mother and Gordon had romped and played in the sun, cuddled in the cool grass, stuffed themselves with Clare’s lunch of bread and cheese and haddock, sipped sweet tea, and then explored the park on foot. They had laughed at bad jokes, recalled stories of Persia, and had even shed a few tears over the memories of friends left behind. Ollie had never felt so safe and loved. His only regret, as he would recall in later years, was that Mum had not been invited. Then it would have been perfect. She would have seen that there was nothing to worry about.

  As daylight had faded, ominous clouds had begun to stir on the fringes of the sky and a chill had clawed its way through Ollie’s coat. The afternoon laughter and chatter had given way to silence as the carriage clattered down the rutted road to a dinner party at Walter Nettleship’s home. They had not changed clothes—Gordon had said the party was “informal.” But as their clothes had remained unchanged, the gay mood had altered considerably, perhaps due to fatigue or the return of more gloomy weather.

  Ollie remembers these things as he sits in a small room stuffed with frayed furniture and the gaudy souvenirs of Walter Nettleship’s missionary journeys. Nettleship and nine others, all unfamiliar to Ollie, have joined Anne and Gordon to celebrate Ollie’s passage into formal English education.

  Nettleship is a brittle stick of a man with trousers too tight and a fat, pasty face that seems squeezed out of a high collar. Dinner had been a buffet of tasteless sandwiches, dry fruit, and flat pastries that crumbled before you could put them into your mouth.

  Ollie is glad that dinner is over, but feels claustrophobic as the group gathers in a circle around him.

  “So young master Chadwick,” Nettleship says, “I understand that you have been a Christian for only a short while.”

  Ollie looks at his mother, who avoids his eyes, then turns to Gordon who is looking at a chip in the wooden floor. “Yes, sir,” Ollie says.

  “I wonder if you fully understand what it means to be a Christian.”

  Ollie feels his blood begin to stir. He knows that he is being challenged, but he does not know why. Still, he had stood up to Mulla Ibrahim in debate, and he remembers Jalal’s courageous defense of the Shaykhi at the caravanserai, so he stiffens in his chair and speaks up: “As you said, Mr. Nettleship, I have only been a Christian for a short time, so I am certain that I do not fully understand what it means to be a Christian. I hope that my education at the Charterhouse will teach me to be both an English gentleman and a Christian.”

  The group murmurs approvingly. In their experience, it is rare for a twelve-year-old to address adults in such an articulate and forceful manner. Walter Nettleship smiles and says, “Well said, young man. I had expected more of an accent, but your elocution is quite good. My compliments to your tutor.”

  “Thank you,” Gordon says.

  “However, your expectation that the Charterhouse will teach you how to be a Christian is misguided. You see, the Charterhouse propagates a High-Church brand of religion that has very little to do with being a Christian.”

  Ollie is confused by this statement, but then he begins to understand. This man, Nettleship, must be the mujtahid of the Evangelicals. He speaks with great authority. And the High-Church must be a kind of heresy, like the Shaykhi movement, that threatens the pure ideals and teachings of the Evangelicals.

  Nettleship turns to Gordon. In a deep baritone he commands the handsome missionary to speak. “Gordon, have you taught this young man about the sinfulness of human nature?”

  Ollie does not like this man, Nettleship, and he does not like the way that Nettleship puts Gordon on the spot in front of the others, so he interrupts: “I know about sin. I know that all men are sinful. If you want to know what I have learned, then please ask me.”

  “So you know that all men and women are basically sinful creatures, sinful from the day they are born, rotten to the core with sin. And you must know, then, that each human being has inherited the sins of his father, and his father’s father, all the way back to Adam, the first man. And you must also know that your soul, Oliver Chadwick, is putrid with sin, encrusted with it, oozing the venom of Satan. Everyone here knows that you have grievously sinned.”

  The room is silent. Everyone looks at Ollie. The blood rushes from the boy’s head and his stomach begins to cramp as he suffers under the gaze of the Evangelicals. His father had done many bad things, this he knows. But Ollie cannot understand how he, the son, can be blamed for them. Thinking back, h
owever—yes, he can remember his own sins. He had kicked Jalal, betrayed the Shaykhi, coveted a position at the madrisih in Mashhad. His mind had wandered during prayers. He had been prideful and selfish, disrespectful to his parents, less than completely honest with Mum.

  So it is true, then. He is a deeply sinful creature who deeply deserves the scorn of the others.

  “I can see that you agree, Oliver. Now the question is, do you know who has lived without sin?”

  Ollie knows this. Perhaps this is his redemption. “Yes,” he says quietly but bravely. “Jesus was without sin.”

  Nettleship gives Gordon a congratulatory glance for his tutelage.

  “And the Prophet Muhammad, praise be unto Him.” Ollie adds. He had promised Mum to be truthful to his heart.

  Nettleson turns back to Ollie, startled, but before he can speak Ollie adds: “And the Imam Ali, who was the perfect man.” Anne and Gordon stare at Ollie, astonished at his statements.

  “That’s enough blasphemy!” Nettleship roars. The resonant blast sends Ollie back into his chair. “Your head has been filled with satanic fantasies.”

  Gordon speaks up: “Walter, I have been teaching him for months. He knows that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and the only one who has lived without sin. I don’t understand…”

  “The boy has heard you, Gordon,” Nettleship says, “but Satan is strong within him, whispering lies and insulating him from the saving power of Jesus Christ. God knows the evil climate in which this child was reared. Heresy and heathenism, immorality and whoring within his very home, wickedness and blasphemy of every kind. The child was plucked from the bowels of hell on earth. Did you expect that the demons in him would faint away upon hearing your words?”

  Ollie knows that Nettleship is referring to Persia and his life there, but he cannot relate to these words. London had seemed more like hell than Bushruyih. And he was quite certain there were no demons inside him. Wouldn’t he know? Still, he believed in demons and jinns and evil eyes, so maybe…

  “Oliver, I want you to listen to me very carefully,” Nettleship says, pressing his doughy face close to Ollie’s. “Are you listening?” He pauses. “You are doomed to hell, my child. And there is only one thing that can save you from eternal damnation. The atoning blood of Jesus Christ, who died and rose again that you, Oliver Chadwick, might have eternal life and be spared the unending torment of hellfire and brimstone.”

  Anne suddenly breaks into tears. She is afraid for her son’s soul. Please God, she prays, help Ali to accept your Son and denounce the false gods of Islam.

  Nettleship continues. “We are here tonight, Oliver, because God has a plan for your life, but we have only this one evening to help you understand how Jesus can save you and help you follow that plan. Yes, I said God, not Allah or any other false god that Satan has concocted to deceive you. And I said Jesus, not Muhammad or any other anti-Christ that Satan has invented to lead you astray. The path of Muhammad is a shortcut to hell!”

  Ollie is hyperventilating. Could it be true? Yes, it could be!

  Nettleship leans forward and cradles Ollie’s face in his hands. His angry roar now becomes a personal plea, heartfelt and tearful, a song of salvation. “Ollie, I don’t want you to burn in the fires of hell. But your sins are so great that they are like heavy weights tied to your soul. Your belief in Muhammad is the greatest sin of all, because if Muhammad is in your life and your heart there is no room for Jesus Christ, and Jesus is the only one who can remove your sins and help you soar into the heavens, free of your burden, saved at last and forever from your bondage to Satan, protected from his claim on you.”

  Nettleship motions for the others to gather around Ollie. The bodies push in and hands reach out to touch him like the tentacles of a great beast. The weight of so many hands is like the weight of a mountain and he feels as though he is being buried alive. He gasps for breath. Could it be that he is a container for Satan and his demons? How could Ollie have thought that he, one of the greatest sinners of all, was the Promised One? This, perhaps, was his greatest sin!

  Nettleship’s soothing, pleading voice continues to wrap Ollie in hope. “The Bible is God’s incorruptible, infallible Word of God, my son, and the Bible says that man cannot serve two masters. My dear boy, you cannot serve both Jesus and Muhammad, you cannot serve both God and Satan. You must make a choice. If you do not choose tonight, we may not be able to help you, because tomorrow you enter another hell, a school that will deceive you in many new ways, and you may be lost forever.”

  Ollie’s face is flushed and his body trembles. The scorching heat of his guilt sears his heart. Had everyone in his past lied to him? About Muhammad and Ali and the Promised One and the path to heaven and the Qu’ran…?

  “There is but one choice, Ollie. Accept Jesus as your savior. Reach out to him. Accept him as your only master and guide. Renounce Satan and his minions, Muhammad and his book of lies. Ask Jesus to forgive your sins and he will do it. He will take them and fling them into the fiery pit, throw them into the face of Satan himself. And you will be free. Will you do this, Ollie? Will you ask Jesus?”

  Ollie shakes violently. His body aches with guilt. He is so afraid. So confused He will do anything to remove this terrible pain. To end this torment. “Yes,” he says. “Yes, yes.”

  Then say the words, Ollie, say these words: “Jesus, come into my heart and forgive my sins.”

  Ollie sobs. “Jesus, come into my heart and forgive my sins.”

  “I accept you as the Son of God and the Lord of my life.”

  Beneath the layer of hands, Ollie reaches inside his shirt. “I accept you as the Son of God and the Lord of my life.”

  Nettleship looks up at the ceiling, perhaps seeing God there, and says, “I renounce Satan and his hold on me, and all other false gods and prophets.”

  “I renounce Satan and his hold on me,” Ollie repeats, “and all other false gods and prophets.” Inside his shirt he tenderly caresses the silver tubular charm that hangs from his necklace. It contains a verse from the Qu’ran: And those who put away false gods lest they should worship them and turn to Allah in repentance, for them there are glad tidings.

  With a sigh, Nettleship says, “In Jesus name, Amen!”

  The many hands all lift heavenward with a chorus of Amens, and Ollie breathes deeply, saved from suffocation.

  Silently, Anne thanks God for her son’s salvation while Gordon weeps for his own sins.

  Chapter 5

  The man is smaller than he had expected. The long caravan journey to Karbala had magnified Kujiri’s imagined picture of the Shaykhi leader into a shimmering, larger-than-life mirage, and now the human scale of Shaykh Ahmad seems to belie the man’s station. How can so much wisdom and knowledge be captured in such a small frame? Can this frail person truly be the legendary Shaykh Ahmad?

  Kujiri had arrived in Karbala three days earlier. After burying his wife and the others in a sprawling cemetery near the Tomb of Imam Husayn, he had inquired about the Shaykhi school. For many years it had been his fondest dream to meet Shaykh Ahmad and beseech him for enlightenment on various topics. Eventually, Kujiri had met a man named Siyyid Kazim, a disciple of Shaykh Ahmad, and was invited by him to attend a gathering of students. At that time he was not told the Shaykhi leader also would be present at the gathering or he may not have survived the excruciating anticipation of meeting face-to-face the object of his arduous quest.

  The simple stone building had given Kujiri no hint of the personage—so venerated and reviled—hidden within its crumbling walls. Kujiri had entered with no sense of the moment except historical—that here, at some time in the past, the great man himself had been present. Siyyid Kazim had ushered him quietly into a large room that now echoes with the voices of at least twenty students, all sitting on the floor and facing a small, aged man seated on cushions.

  “Who is the teacher?” Kujiri had asked Siyyid Kazim.

  “He is the man you have come all this way to meet—Shaykh Ahmad
.”

  And now the enormity of the occasion overwhelms Kujírí. He sits down for fear that he may otherwise collapse. This man, this small and unimposing creation of flesh and bone, is the holy man that Kujiri has traveled hundreds of miles to meet. The man whose ideas had almost cost Kujiri’s life at the caravanserai. The man whose teachings had polarized Muslims and provoked charges of heresy.

  Jalal is homesick. The long journey with his father from Bushruyih to the madrisih in Mashhad had been an adventure, but now the boy finds it difficult to think of anything but his family and friends. Especially one friend—Ali Qasim. The friend who had vanished.

  He remembers the night that ‘Abdu’llah, Jalal’s father, had given him the precious sword. Jalal remembers how anxious he had been for morning to come so that he could carry this treasure to the kelauntar’s compound and show it to his best friend. He had barely slept that evening. At dawn, after prayers, he had grabbed the sword, in its rich velvet wrap, and had been ready to race from the house with it when his mother had stopped him, smiling as she always did, understanding his excitement but insistent on performing her motherly duties. “Not without breakfast!” she had said. And so he had set down the sword to eat with his family.

  After breakfast he had walked (so difficult not to run) to the main gate. As he had approached it, the massive gate had been flung open and at least twenty men, all of them nervous and staring straight ahead, had marched hurriedly from the compound, muskets raised and swords clattering at their sides, followed by an ashen-faced kelauntar.

  “Jalal! Come here!” the kelauntar had ordered. And Jalal had run to the side of Ali’s father, who seized his arm painfully with an expression of—what? Panic, perhaps. Fear. Anxiety. “You must tell me the truth or I will have your father tortured and exiled. Do you understand?”

  “Did Ali tell you that he was planning to leave Bushruyih?”

  “What? No! Never!”

  “Tell me the truth! What did Ali say to you in the past several days about his mother and the missionary? Be honest, now! Were they all planning to leave Bushruyih together?”