A Day and a Life Read online

  After Matins, the cardinal6 Office of Lauds: the Benedictus with its antiphon, the prayers and blessings and eventually the Benedicamus Domino bringing Nocturns to a close. So they go up again to beds by now well cold, sandals shuffling on the stone, the quiet ripple of robes, the rumble of many men mounting the stairs. Then they give the abbey back to the nightwatch of stars as the moon’s remote beauty looks down on them and the great trees ranged about their home sigh in the restless wind.

  Back they all come for the Office of Prime in the first uncertain light of dawn. After Prime, the morrow Mass, a pause elapses, spent mainly in the reredorter and taking a quick wash in the lavatorium. Then they break their fast – standing, still wrapped in the Great Silence, just small ale and dry bread now in mid September. Their abbot watches over their wellbeing with common sense and compassion; in the winter he sees to it they have gruel seethed through the night over a low fire and doled out into wooden bowls held in hands numb with cold. But yesterday’s bread is entirely adequate for this time of year.

  Keeping custody of the eyes, eating and drinking tidily and quietly, they stand at the tables. Only the abbot catches the attention of the novice master, signalling a frown of perplexity. Father Theodore responds with the slightest shrug, a barely perceptible shake of the head. He grasps the question his abbot is asking; and he doesn’t know either. Yes. Where is Brother Cedd?

  As the men go from the frater to the chapter house, they leave their ale mugs on the waiting trays at the end of the long tables for the kitchener to collect and wash after Chapter. Theodore steps back from the stream of men passing through, and waits. They are no longer in Silence, and he murmurs quietly to his abbot when John comes to stand at his side: “Shall I go up and take a look in his cell? Now, I mean?”

  The abbot nods. “Please,” he says.

  He marks time in the chapter house as Brother Giles stands ready at the lectern, waiting for the novice master’s return. He is looking for the expression on Theo’s face as he comes through the door, slips quietly to his place, and takes his seat. Theodore meets his gaze, his face grave – again the slightest shake of the head. Evidently one of their novices has decided to leave them. It happens, and not infrequently like this. A furtive departure without discussion or announcement, as the sun goes down or in the first light of the dawn. His expression sober, Abbot John looks across to the reader, nods his permission to begin.

  “… let him not neglect or undervalue the welfare of the souls committed to him, in a greater concern for fleeting, earthly, perishable things; but let him always bear in mind that he has undertaken the government of souls and that he will have to give an account of them,” Brother Giles reads out clearly. The “him” in question is the abbot of the community; this one bends his head, looking down at his folded hands. He will have to give an account, he thinks, and the burden weighs heavy. It looks like he’s lost one.

  Chapter

  Two

  “I’m all saddled up and ready to go. Any other messages? Anything else you want me to take?”

  The abbot has asked his esquire to go on an errand. Another poor year for harvests, but in the hills where the ground drains well St Alcuin’s Abbey has fared better than some. Grain prices are high in the market place, and he wants to send his sister and brother-in-law a sack of oats and a sack of wheat. They have a cow, a goat, chickens, and an orchard. He is entirely sure they will have grown a healthy crop of peas, plenty of onions and greenstuff and garlic, and herbs in abundance. But their land is not extensive enough for grain. He is concerned they may go short, and wants them to have this against the leaner days of the winter. So Brother Thomas is taking the abbot’s grey mare. A Percheron, she will carry the extra weight with no trouble at all; and ten miles is not so far.

  Abbot John’s brother-in-law, William de Bulmer, is capable and shrewd, but his work has been more concerned with management and money than hedging and ditching or mending tumbledown buildings. Brother Thomas has no doubt in his mind that when he reaches Caldbeck there’ll be any number of minor repairs that could use the skill of a handy man. There’ll be more to this day than dropping off a couple of bags of supplies.

  “If you could take just a moment to stop by the almonry and see if Father Gerard has something Madeleine might like – I don’t know – a shawl, an apron, anything pretty and useful. And I’ll wager both of them would be grateful for a pair of boots.”

  “In what size?” his esquire wants to know.

  “Oh – yes – I have it here – bear with me.” From a box on his table, the abbot takes two sets of two woven tapes, pinned together. “The dark one is the length, the lighter one the width. I’m sorry to delay you, Tom; I should have thought of this yesterday.”

  Aye, you should, thinks his esquire. He is anxious to be on the road, and it irritates him to contemplate how long it might take Father Gerard to sort through their pile of donated boots, to find in the first place one that might fit, and then its mate. But he takes the ribbons John is holding out to him, saying only, “Thank you. I’ll be on my way, then. You won’t forget to send someone else to help Father Bernard with the laundry?” He heads off towards the door, pauses, turns. “Father John – is all well?” It occurs to him his abbot looks troubled and preoccupied this morning.

  “Oh…” The abbot hesitates. He doesn’t want to make too much of this. Who knows how it may turn out. “I’ve lost something,” he says. “But no matter. You get on your way.”

  The almonry opens into the great arch of the abbey entrance, a door matching that of the porter’s lodge opposite. From the small room where Father Gerard keeps his records and inventories – what they have received, what they have given – leads a curving stone stairway to the storeroom above. Jesus was right when he observed that the world would never be short of men and women in poverty. As the fourteen hundreds trudge through decades of wet summers, leaving grain beaten down by rain and rotting in the fields, need has never been greater. They do what they can, at St Alcuin’s, to lighten the load of the frightened and hungry, the care-worn and cold. Living simply and frugally, no man of them having possessions of his own, working together and pooling skills and knowledge, the community tends to create prosperity. This is the source of the alms and hospitality they offer all who come to their door, whether beggars or guests. It is the duty of kindness, the practical love that stamps them as belonging to Christ. The woolmark of his sheep that says: “These are mine.”

  Brother Tom has to smile when he realizes it was William, spending ten days with them back in May, who sorted and organized the almonry store. Father Gerard lives in comfortable disorder, searching vaguely for what he dimly remembers is there. That’s not William’s style. Muttering, “Set your house in order, man,” and a few choice expletives on the side, he tackled the mayhem; categorizing, listing, separating, folding, matching. The late autumn and winter is panic season; just now, at the end of the summer, those who will feel the pinch when the cold comes are not too worried. So everything is much as William left it at the start of the summer. And he has his reward now, because it takes Tom hardly any time at all to find two sturdy pairs of boots, a warm woollen shawl, a fine linen kerchief, and a winter cloak. “Cross them off in your book,” he insists – in case William asks if Gerard checked them out properly.

  Then, the sun well risen by now, he is on his way. And his spirits lift. It’s a fine, warm, mellow day, a splendid day to be ambling along the lanes of England, not footsore but riding in style on this strapping, reliable mountain of a horse. He should make Caldbeck by noon. That will give him a good three hours to turn his hand to helping with any odds and ends that could use his help; and back by sunset, in time for Compline.

  He’s glad now that he didn’t grumble about the extra task of rooting through Father Gerard’s stocks in the almonry; it turned out there was nothing to it after all. As he takes in the loveliness of hedgerow and trees in full canopy, in these last few weeks before the frosts come, Tom reflects th
at it pays not to be too hasty; because you never know. And why make someone feel bad when you don’t have to? Why not just be patient, just be kind? If that’s the only gift you have to offer, well, it would be a good one. He pats the mare’s neck and she signals her friendly appreciation with her ears.

  In the Chapter meeting, the business for the day is concluded. The novices make their confessions, and leave. The professed brothers make their confessions. Father Francis asks about the arrangements for the tail end of the harvest, which Brother Stephen explains. No other concerns are pressing. The community disperses, about the work of the day.

  As the abbot goes to his house, and there sends Brother Tom on his way to Caldbeck, Father Theodore makes his way to the novitiate. Not fast.

  Brother Cedd is… where? This – if the absence lengthens into finality – will be the first one Theo has lost. Where is he? The novice master gets up slowly from his place in the circle of seats built into the round walls of the chapter house, slowly he walks across the open space at the centre, the last man to leave, and slowly he walks through the church towards the cloister. He stops by the statue of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. He takes one of the small candles from the pile there. He lights it, using the taper provided, from the lamp Father Bernard set burning before the morrow Mass. Deep in thought, very deliberately, he sets the candle there at the feet of Jesus. He knows it is only a statue, not the Lord himself, just as much as he knows the light he has kindled is only a little candle – it’s not his soul, it’s not Cedd’s soul, it’s not anyone’s soul, just a candle Brother Mark has made from the abbey’s beeswax. But it’s all he can think to do, this simple token of his soul reaching out – where are you, Cedd? My brother, my son. Please, his heart begs; please, Lord. At least to know, is he safe? Is it well with his soul? Is he at peace? What has happened? Please, Lord. Still he stands there, until from the roots of his love for these young men arises what he really wants to say: Oh, beloved Lord Jesus; won’t you… please bring him home.

  And having admitted this is what he’s really asking for, he lets his feet now take him, with their quiet monastic tread, out of the church and into the cloister. Slowly, still.

  Theo isn’t sure quite how he absorbed the recollection of this way of walking. It’s not something his own novice master ever discussed. He doesn’t even think about it consciously. But they all walk like this, every man of them. The mindful, deliberate placing of every step, so that their bodies move in a manner conducive to peace, without the bustle of self-importance or the self-advertisement of a confident, open stride. The gait of humility and recollection, the walking of a man gathered quietly into himself; his exterior in the world only so far as it needs to be, his interior an open window. For the rays of Christ’s light to shine in. For the Holy Spirit to perch and maybe fly right inside. For the air of heaven to keep fresh the hidden chamber of his soul. Too, there is a stability in this way of walking, as though the monk’s feet are touching the sacred earth with tenderness, taking nothing for granted; a man who is properly grounded, to be swayed neither by praise nor by blame. This is the nature of humilis, lowliness – the point at which heaven kisses earth. It has to do with feet, and how a man walks through the world.

  To this discipline of recollection, add profound reluctance; and you have the measure of Theo’s feet walking the length of the cloister from the church, past the abbot’s door, along the south range to the day stairs, climbing them to the upper floor, and coming to a standstill outside the door of the novitiate.

  His early days in this beloved house, how often he stood like this; one hand on the latch, summoning the courage to open it, always (Why? How did this happen?) late. And how has this happened, now? Even when he has become the novice master, the man in charge, the one to instruct them, the one whose authority they must obey – still, he stands with his hand on the latch, afraid to go in. Because he knows what they will ask; and when he finally opens the door, treads quietly across to his place in the circle, they do ask him. Brother Robert says it (Aye; you would): “Father Theodore? Where’s Brother Cedd?”

  “I don’t know,” says Theo quietly. And that tells them they must not ask; because if he is gone, then he is dead to them. Sorrow is the native air of death. All loss is grief. So the atmosphere is subdued and their faces solemn as they sit ready for this morning’s lesson. Somehow they are not surprised when it turns out the novice master wants them to think about the committed life, about the disciplined outworking of the way they have chosen.

  “Because,” he says, “the teaching of our Lord in the Gospels is that unless a man gives up everything he has, he cannot be Christ’s disciple. Do you see how big that is? Everything. Consider, what might be important to a man?”

  They wait respectfully lest this question be rhetorical, but seeing he is actually asking them to come up with something, Brother Cassian suggests: “Wealth – material possessions?”

  “The pleasures of human love?” Brother Boniface picks his way delicately to this modest expression of what he means. Then he remembers what the novice master has taught them in the past, about attitudes monks and married people have in common. “Treating someone else as if they were only there to get what you wanted out of them,” he therefore adds. “As if they were only tools for your personal satisfaction.”

  “Power? Like, influence, and having your own way?” Brother Placidus says (he thinks Boniface seems to be going on a bit).

  “Status?” Brother Robert knows this is one of the things you might give up to follow Jesus, and at this stage in the journey it isn’t yet clear to him whether never having had the remotest chance of any kind of social status in the first place will make the renunciation easier or harder, in the long run.

  Seeing most of the things a man might renounce to take the way of Christ have now been spoken for, and he is the only one who has not yet said anything, Brother Felix feels it incumbent upon him to come up with a contribution. So, thinking of his own private struggles, he says tentatively: “Being right?” And that turns out to be a good one; it actually makes the novice master laugh. Everyone breathes easier.

  “Yes,” says Father Theodore, “all of that. It’s about having a quiet eye and a single heart. What the book of Revelation calls our ‘first love’. Not that we aren’t human; of course we are. But that nothing – absolutely nothing – matters more than this. How I like to think of it is that we are concentrating. You know how Brother Conradus will sometimes boil away water from broth, to get a concentrated stock for a wonderful sauce – one of his masterpieces? That’s what this way of life is doing for us, boiling away everything tasteless and unsavoury. We’re concentrating. And that means paying attention. Brother Robert, are you all right? Have you got an itch, or are you just bored?”

  Chapter

  Three

  They allocated these two rooms to the novitiate in no random manner. It’s upstairs, in the east range, so right at the back of the cloister buildings, tucked away as privately withdrawn from guests as it could possibly be. Since the main work of the day is done before noon, and studying texts forms a central part of work in the novitiate, it is well to have the morning light streaming in through the tall arched windows from the moment the sun climbs above the protective circle of hills behind the abbey. But the seclusion motivated the setting, more than the light.

  This is not so of the scriptorium lodged next door. Here, it is critical to see well. Ideally, Father Clement would have liked the true, unambiguous northern light; but since the abbey church constitutes the entire north range, he couldn’t have it. At least the eastern light rises earliest. His scribes’ desks are set beneath the windows, slanting double lecterns for two men to work opposite each other. Candleholders are affixed to the upper edges of the desks – with lamp-glasses to prevent wax splashing in any sudden draught. The wall furthest from the windows is entirely full of shelves – except for the doorway through to the passage sitting above the corresponding cloister walk below. The shelves c
ontain an abundance of resources both expensive and valuable (not always the same thing). Different sizes of sheets of a variety of thicknesses and quality of vellum. Inks, quills, reed pens, charcoal, chalks, burnishers. A multitude of bottles and stacks of small bowls for mixing gesso and size. Ink horns, knives, pumice stones, rulers, and spikes. Beautiful, almost globular glass bowls to magnify candlelight on a stormy day. Loose pages of books half-finished, or stacked ready for binding. And gold. It is a beautiful, magical place, a treasure trove of curious objects and lovely works of art. The intent, focused quality of its absorbed silence is magnified rather than diminished by the quiet scratchings and scrapings, the sounds of men breathing, shifting, getting up to cross the room, the small sounds of bowls and bottles moved. Nobody who works with feathers and leaf gold, creating wonders, is going to be noisy. Just now and then the silence is marred by someone swearing in frustration; but even that is spoken softly, exasperation in undertone.

  Monks are quiet, their voices and movements discreet. Scribes are quiet, their movements careful and precise. Monastic scribes are the quietest of all, disciplined and cautious. There is nothing blatant or rambunctious about these men. Even so, their life does not lack drama. Just now, a tragedy observed but never discussed is playing out its full slow cruelty in their midst; because Father Clement, they know, is gradually going blind.

  It has been his desperate hope that the abbot would permit him to train up Father Theodore to step into his place; Theo’s illumination is exquisite, and he is the best scribe among them. Father Clement’s heart sank when their abbot – not this one, Abbot Columba, his predecessor – announced in Chapter that Father Theodore would replace Father Matthew as novice master. Men in so central an obedience usually either prove disastrous in short order, or stay many years. That day in Chapter Father Clement, with all the composed restraint of a monastic scribe, bowed his head in silent acceptance of his trampled dream.