The Miracle at St. Bruno's

"Oh, better not. Promise.”

I promised.

Sometimes John and James, two of the lay brothers, came to see my father, who told me that once, long ago, he had lived at St. Bruno's Abbey.

"I thought I would be a monk and I lived there for two years. After that I came out into the world.”

"You would have made a better monk than Brothers John and James.”

"You should not say that, my love.”

"But you have said I must say what is true. Brother John is old and he wheezes, which Keziah says means his chest is bad. He needs some herbs from Mother Salter. And Brother James always looks so cross. Why did you not stay a monk?”

"Because the world called me. I wanted a home and a wife and a little girl.”

"Like me!" I cried triumphantly. It seemed a good enough reason for leaving the Abbey.

"Monks can't have little girls," I went on. "But they have the Child.”

"Ah, but his coming was a miracle.”

Later I thought how sad it was for my father for I came to believe he craved for the monastic life of solitude, study and contemplation. He had wanted a large family-stalwart sons and beautiful daughters. And all those years he had longed for a child and had been denied his wish-until I came.

I always liked to be near when Brothers John and James called at our house. In their fusty robes they repelled while they fascinated me. Sometimes the sight of James's sad face and John's pale one made a lump come into my throat, and when I heard them call my father Brother, I was strangely moved.

One day I had been playing with the dogs in the garden and was tired suddenly so I climbed onto my father's knee and in the quick way that children do I fell asleep.

When I awoke Brothers John and James were in the garden sitting on the bench beside my father talking to him, so I just lay still with my eyes closed, listening. They were talking about the Abbey.

"Sometimes I wonder, William," said Brother John to my father. "The Abbey has changed very much since the miracle. It is comforting to talk and we can talk to you, can we not, James, as to no other outside the Abbey walls?”

"That is true," said James.

"It was a sad day," went on Brother John, "when you made up your mind to leave us.

But mayhap you were wise. You have this life... Has it brought you the peace you wanted? You have a good wife. You have your child.”

"I am content if everything can remain as it is at this time.”

"Nothing remains static, William.”

"And times are changing," said my father sadly. "I like not the manner of their change.”

"The King is fierce in his desires. He will have his pleasure no matter at what price.

And the Queen must suffer for the sake of her who comes from Hever to disrupt our peace.”

"And what of her, John? How long will she keep her hold on his heart and his senses?”

They were all silent for a while.

Then Brother John said, "One would have thought we should have become spiritual with the coming of the Child. It is quite different. I remember a day... a June day some six months before he came. The heat was great and I came out into the gardens hoping to catch a cool breeze from the river. I was uneasy, William. We were very poor. The year before our harvest had been ruined. We were forced to buy our corn. There had been sickness among us; we were not paying our way. It seemed that St. Bruno's for the first time in two hundred years would fall into decline. We would stay here and starve. And in the gardens that day I said to myself, 'Only a miracle can save us.' I am not sure whether I prayed for a miracle.

I believe I willed a miracle to happen. I did not ask in humility as one does in prayer. I did not say, 'Holy Mother, if it is thy will that St. Bruno's be saved, save us.' I was angry within me, in no mood for prayer. It seems to me now that my spirit was bold and arrogant. I demanded a miracle. And afterward when it came I remembered that day.”

"But whatever it was your words were heeded. In a few years the Abbey has become rich. You have no fear now that Bruno will fall into decay. Never in the Abbey's history can it have been so prosperous.”

"It's true and yet I wonder. We have changed, William. We have become worldly, have we not, Brother James?”

James grunted agreement.

"You do great good to the community," my father reminded them. "You are leading useful lives. Perhaps it is more cornmendable to help one's fellow men than to shut oneself away in meditation and prayer.

"I had thought so. But the change is marked. The Child obsesses everyone.”

"I can understand that," said my father, putting his lips on my hair. I nestled closer and then remembered that I did not want them to know that I was listening. I did not understand a great deal of what they said, but I enjoyed the rise and fall of their voices and now and then I got a glimmer of light.