The Oblate's Confession (51 page)

Of course looking back on it now, it's easy to see why Father Dagan spoke to me of obedience that day. He had just watched a boy, a boy he no doubt loved, walk unhappily toward him across a field, a boy who had been like this for some time now, brooding, peevish, resolutely forlorn. And he guessed, as anyone would have guessed, that it was the usual problem—authority, a young man’s reluctance to submit to authority—exacerbated in this case perhaps by the arrival of Godwin, but otherwise no different from any other. And now the boy had done something to earn himself stone removal, an assignment anyone might resent. So Father had lectured me on obedience, the joys accruing to those who lead a life of unquestioning obedience. Granted it had been a rather new speech, one made fresh by experience, but there was nothing truly

extraordinary about it, certainly nothing clairvoyant. Yet how could I have seen it otherwise—I who then prayed daily for the destruction of my bishop? The young live life at a fever-pitch, don’t they, wear their hearts upon their sleeves, see angels behind every kindness, the devil beneath every ill? And who’s to say they’re wrong? Scripture teaches kindness to strangers “for some have entertained angels unawares.” Is it not possible that, on occasion, we entertain angels even absent the presence of strangers, that some thoughts, arising as they so often seem to out of thin air, may be just that: the issue of heavenly hosts? Who is to say then that Father, however unwittingly, did not give voice that day to Something long frustrated, Something yearning, groaning, to speak, Something which, up until that moment, had awaited only the proper vessel? Certainly not I. For if God Himself had come down and paid me a visit, His face afire, the effect could not have been greater.

And yet, when I think about it, it wasn’t really Father’s lecture so much as the manner of its delivery that affected me. Again and
again, in the days that followed, my mind’s eye pictured our former prior as he lay on those rocks, the little smile that played over his face when he spoke, the way his eyes had brightened as if, even as he made his points, he saw the logic of his argument unfold before him, as if God Himself supplied the text, revealed for him, moment by moment, the beauty of our Rule. And that he told me these things, said these things, not out of self-interest, not out of any hope that my acceptance of the Rule could make a difference to his station (for it could not), but because he so clearly wanted what was best for me, so clearly and unambiguously cared for me. And, finally, that he could do this without pretense. That this man who was assigned stone removal, who spent the better part of every day on his knees in the mud, could so unhesitatingly advise me to do the same thing, could lie there on the rock pile to which his Rule had led him and so humbly, so unselfconsciously, and yet so forthrightly, recommend the selfsame path.... This was what hurt. This was what cut to the bone. For I too had once been as sure as that. I too had once received the Body of Christ without
thought or reservation. I too had seen God’s bow in the sky, been saved by His grace, witnessed His presence in the flowering of a cherry tree, the kindness of the men who watched over me. But now I was no longer worthy of those men, that God: I was become different, soiled, impure: I carried my prayer within me like a contagion—noxious, lethal, malign. I was amazed no one noticed. As I walked about the cloister, I felt the evil within me as a sort of stain, a heat that bloomed upon my face, stole up on me from out of my loins. I needed a clapper, a bell, something to warn these good men away, turn them from the devil in their midst. And how I envied them their innocence, how I regretted that prayer, that prayer which now I could not undo, that prayer which set me apart, placed me at odds with my community, indeed, with the world!

Children revel in such predicaments, don’t they, preferring always that which is unresolved, a middle course between two alternatives, over any decision that might set them finally and irrevocably upon what must seem to them a thankless path? Which is not to say I did nothing as a result of my conversation with Father Dagan. I did amend my behavior. From the moment Father and I arose from that rock pile, Bishop Wilfrid became safe from any further harm I might do him. But of course he was not safe from the harm already done. I
had
prayed for the man’s downfall, and, though I now expressly unprayed those prayers, I was not so foolish as to blithely believe their effect undone. I was after all a child of the monastery, from my earliest days I had known only the familiar cycle of sin followed by confession, followed by sin and confession again. That my offense against the Rule could only be righted according to the Rule was as much a part of me as my hands or my feet. I could no more believe myself forgiven without recourse to Faults than I could believe myself fed without recourse to food. And unforgiven, my prayers might mean nothing. Yet I feared confession. I had seen what had happened to Ealhmund. To be expelled from the monastery at a time when winter stocks had been reduced to scraps and famine was abroad upon the land...it did not bear contemplation. Still, I
wanted
to confess. I
wanted to be pure again. I wanted to be like Dagan, like Osric; I wanted to be as I believed I once had been: blameless, chaste, happy, free. And so, like many before me, I bargained with God. I would follow His Way, become a slave to His Rule, if He (I prayed) would overlook the sin that gave birth to my devotion, the broken vow that played both midwife and fool to it all.

I began again to keep the Vigil. For the first time in my life I threw myself into the monastic round. I fasted regularly, spent entire holy days lying prostrate on the floor of the church, the deep sounds of the river rising to me through the flags, thrumming the bones of my chest. The only thing that I did not do was pray as the hermit had taught me to pray. For I feared that form of prayer now, feared opening myself up like that, exposing myself like that before God because...well, who knew what God might do with someone who had asked what I had asked? But always excepting this, I otherwise became the very image of a good oblate: silent, devout, unstinting in his attention to the office, uncomplaining in his acceptance of fate. Of course very little of this was real, sincere, though it did provide some diversion. Fasting for instance made the general hunger (common, degrading, banal) seem somehow private and unique, while lack of sleep kept what bad thoughts did arise vague, fleeting, immaterial. Which is not to say that, just because my devotions lacked depth, they did not
appear
genuine. Indeed, it sometimes seems it is exactly those devotions that are the most vain, the most superficial, that attract the most attention. And in this, my case was no different from any other. I became an object of speculation in the monastery. The suddenness of my conversion of manners was commented upon favorably in Faults. Brothers began to point me out to one another upon the garth, their fingers a blur of breathless approval. Why once even Maban mentioned me in Chapter, setting me up as an example to be followed, and I had to swallow back the bile, assume custody of the eyes, pretend I was only embarrassed when in truth I felt an almost physical revulsion. Oddly enough it was Baldwin, grown deaf and half-blind with age now, who saw through this duplicity. I’ll never forget the day he stood up in Faults and pointed at me

across the hall, his face long and pale beneath his hood, arm stretched out before him like the arm of God, voice filling the space between us, rising into the rafters. “I know you,” he said, “I know your secret. I know what goes on when you think no one is looking, how vile it is, how disgusting. I know what true innocence looks like!” And then, voice cracking, eyes filling suddenly with tears, he began to speak of Oftfor, little Oftfor, that name so seldom heard in Chapter now, so nearly unremembered, the earth where his body received its final ablutions long since grown untidy with weeds, neglected, forgotten. But of course the tears didn’t help. Baldwin was old now, cried easily now, and so it was a simple matter to overlook what he said, the monks shouldering one another good-naturedly, pointing with their chins at the old has-been, chuckling silently. I’ll never forget the way Prior Maban— tossing me a glance of understanding that froze my blood— walked across to the old obedientiary, patted him on the shoulder, whispered something in his ear; how Baldwin started up, glanced down at himself, back at the man before him, the man he probably only vaguely recognized, looked at him as if he were some sort of savior; and, finally, I’ll never forget what it felt like to watch Baldwin—Baldwin who for so long had held such power over our lives—bow gratefully to that small man, bow and, holding himself like a little boy desperate for the reredorter, turn and hurry across the room, out the door. There were one or two snickers, silenced by a look from Maban, and then a general sigh of relief, the brothers settling back into the real business at hand, shaking their heads, congratulating themselves on the wisdom of their prior, the way in which he had so tactfully relieved them of this tiresome old man. And only I, only I, still felt the force of what had been said, still saw Baldwin standing there, arm raised, finger pointing, the name that he had spoken still hanging on the air—Oftfor, holy little Oftfor, he whose sandals I was not fit to untie.

But, as I have said, Baldwin was the only one who recognized my deceit. For the others I became, I think, a sort of ornament, the shiny bauble they held up to each other as proof of our monastery’s precision: that such a place could turn a child so

obdurate and pig-headed into one so humble and devout showed we must be headed in the right direction, proved that the Rule could be depended upon to deliver its charges safely and unerringly into the hands of God. What was for me a remedy, a salve, a penance for sin so grave as to be unmentionable, became likewise a balm for their doubts. When things went poorly, when the rains came and we couldn’t plant or the drains clogged and the whole place smelled for days on end offish, they nudged each other and smiled as I passed them on the garth, confident that, despite such minor setbacks, the monastery must be headed in the right direction...for look at Winwæd, how else to explain Winwæd?

When whimsy supplants wisdom as ruler of a man’s thoughts, it’s said he must give said whimsy a proper throne, place a laurel upon its brow, crown it with gold and precious stones, for how else can he see it, how else perceive such a formless nothing amid the hard cold realities of his world? And so it was with me and the role I now came to play in our monastery. Surely, it was said (upon the garth, at the lavabo, down among the peas), such a boy is destined for greatness—the priesthood, an abbacy, who knew, maybe even a bishopric? And, needless to say,

I was not so lost in my devotion to the Rule as to be deaf to such opinions. Indeed, I even began to allow myself to consider them, to tell myself that maybe, maybe if I did all the wonderful things that were predicted for me, threw myself into a life of service, then maybe, maybe God would overlook the other, maybe, in some heavenly balance, such achievements would make expiation for my sin, outweigh the secret evil I had done. But God is a loving God. He will not permit such self-deception to go long unchecked. And, for One who was not above humbling Himself upon a cross, it must have seemed a minor thing to lower Himself that night to the dortoir.

For some reason Waldhere and I were being led around the village in a wagon. I knew we must have done something good
because everyone was standing outside their houses clapping and cheering, but I had no idea what it was that we had done. And Eanflæd was there. Eanflæd and another girl were dancing in front of us, dancing in front of us as the great wagon (I now recognize it as the one we found upon the mountain) made its ponderous way around the village. The two girls had filled their aprons with cherry blossoms and, as they danced, they tossed great handfuls of these into the air. When Eanflæd threw to her right, a dark cloud burst suddenly into bright pink snow; but when she threw to her left, across her body, it was as if she were sowing seed.