The Miracle at St. Bruno's

"I will look for this confession," I said, "and if I find it I will show it to Bruno and I will tell him what you have said.”

She nodded.

"I wish him well," she said. "He is my flesh and blood. Tell him I said so. Tell him he can be great but he cannot rise through weakness.”

Our conversation was broken up by my mother who came bustling in and declared that I was tiring out her invalid.

A few days later Mother Salter was dead. My mother planted flowers on her grave and tended them regularly.

THE MONK'S CONFESSION

THE MONKS' DORTER had become a place which I avoided. There was something more eerie about it than the rest of the uninhabited part of the Abbey; and although many of the Abbey buildings had by this time been demolished and so much rebuilding had been done, the dorter was a section which had been left intact.

Since Mother Salter's revelation I went there often. I wanted to find that confession which she said Ambrose had hidden there. If I could do this and present it to Bruno, he would then be face to face with the truth; and I could see, as Mother Salter had seen, that until he accepted it I could not respect him, nor could he respect himself.

Was this true? I asked myself. How difficult it is to test one's motive! Did I want to say, "Look, I am right"? Or did I really wish to help him?

Once he accepted the fact that his birth was similar to that of many others, would he start to grow away from myth? Would he build his life on the firm foundation of truth?

I did not know, for I did not understand Bruno nor my own feelings for him. I had been bemused by the story of his miraculous appearance on earth. I had been drawn into this union while in a state of exultation. It had not brought me happiness, except that it had given me Catherine.

Whatever the motive, I was urged on by some compulsion to search for the document which according to Mother Salter Ambrose had left behind.

As I walked up the stone spiral stairs with its thick rope banister I thought of all the monks who had filed down this stone stairway during the last two hundred years and it occurred to me that many of them must have left something of themselves behind.

At the top of the stairs was a long narrow landing and on either side of this were the cells. Each had a door in which was a grille through which it was possible to see into the cell.

Most of the cells were bare although some contained a pallet which had not presumably been considered worthwhile taking away by the vandals. Each cell was identical with its narrow slit without glass which was cut into the thick walls. It must have been bitterly cold in winter; the floor of each cell was flagged; and there were slabs of stone in the walls. No comfort whatsoever; but monks did not look for comfort, of course.

I had heard something from Clement and Eugene of what life in the Abbey had been like. I knew of the hours of penance which had to be performed in the cells and how at any time the Abbot would walk silently along the landing and peer through the grille to see what was going on inside.

"The watchful eye which came we knew not when," was Eugene's way of expressing it.

I knew something of their habits, how there were long periods when silence was the order of the day; how they were not allowed to touch each other in any way; how they must perform their tasks and their devotion with equal fervor. A strange life, particularly for men such as Clement, Eugene and certainly Ambrose, who had broken free of it on more than one occasion.

I could imagine the anguish of that man, the soul-searching, the earnest prayers for guidance, the suffering and torment that must have gone on in his cell.

I don't think I should have been very surprised when I reached the top of that staircase to have come face to face with some longdead monk who found it impossible to rest in his grave.

As I stood there on the landing I asked myself which of these identical cells had been that of Ambrose. It was impossible to know. Could I ask someone? Clement? Eugene?

They would immediately report my interest to Bruno. I did not wish for that. No, I must find Ambrose's cell and if possible his confession by myself.

I went into the first cell. I caught my breath with horror as the door shut on me. I felt a panic such as I had rarely felt before. It is amazing how much can flash through one's mind in a short time. I imagined myself imprisoned in one of the cells. No one would think to look for me there. I should remain in my cold stone prison until there was no life left in me, and in time I should join the ghosts of the monks who haunted the dorter.

But there was no need for such panic. The door had no lock. I remembered Clement's explaining that. Doors could be opened at any time by the Abbot or any of his subordinates without warning, in the same way that they could peer through the grille.