I wanted to run. I wondered if I could do it. If I could run free and outside where the dawn was coming, where the birds of winter had begun to sing. His words confused me and tormented me, and yet when I thought of the surrounding woods, the valley itself, I was too frightened to move. Some hideous dread rose out of me, causing my heart to beat and my palms to become wet.
"A Taltos is nothing!" he said, leaning close to me. "Go into the forests if you would be a Taltos. The little people will find you. They will take you prisoner and seek to make by you a legion of giants. It will not happen. It cannot happen. Your progeny will be monstrous or nothing. But a saint! Dear God, you can be a saint!"
Ah, the little people, yes. I gazed at him, trying to understand him.
"You can be a saint!"
Several men had come into the Cathedral, heavily armed and covered in furred capes, and to these he gave his instructions in Latin, which at that point I barely understood. I knew I would be taken "by sea" to Italy. And that I was a prisoner, and in terror I stood there, and then in my desperation I turned to face the window of St. Ashlar as if he could save me from all this.
I looked up at the stained-glass window and at this moment a simple miracle occurred. The sun had risen, and though it did not strike this window with its rays, the great swelling light filled it and brought it into vivid and beauteous color. The saint was filled with quiet fire. The saint smiled down upon me, his dark eyes burning in the glass, his lips pink, his robes red. I knew it was the trick of the sunrise, yet I could not take my eyes from it.
An immense peace filled me.
I thought of my mother's horror-stricken face, her screaming, echoing in the little chamber. I saw the great kindred of the Clan of Donnelaith scurrying away from me like so many black rats!
"Be the saint!" said the priest to me in a whisper.
And there in that moment the vow made itself clear to me, though I did not have the courage to speak the words.
I gazed at the window. I took the details of the saint to my heart. I saw that he stood barefoot upon the prone bodies of the little people...the Ganfers, the Sluagh, the Demons of Hell. And behold, in his hand he held a staff, and the foot of the staff pierced the body of the Devil. I studied the well-drawn bodies of the dwarf people. I heard my heart.
The light had now swelled against the window so that the brighter colors had begun to glow. The saint was made of jewels! A shimmering vision of sparkling gold, and deepest blue and ruby red, and shining white.
"St. Ashlar!" I whispered.
The armed men took hold of me.
"Go with God, Ashlar. Give your soul to God and when death comes again you will know peace."
That was my birth, gentlemen. That was my homecoming. Now I shall tell you of what followed, of how high I was to reach.
I was then taken away--I was never to see the old Laird again. For all I knew, I was never to see the glen, the Cathedral, or this priest. A small boat was waiting for me, which had to fight its way through the icy harbor and then south along the coast until I was put aboard a large ship. My chamber was cramped. I was a virtual prisoner. I drank only milk because all other food disgusted me and the boisterous sea made me constantly sick.
No one thought to tell me why I was locked up, or to give me comfort. On the contrary, I had nothing to study, to read, no beads with which to pray. The bearded men who tended me seemed frightened of me, unwilling to answer any question. And at last I fell in a stupor, singing songs, making them up from the words I knew.
Sometimes it seemed to me that I was making songs from words as people might make garlands from flowers, with only a thought as to how pretty was this word or that. I sang for hours. My voice was deep and I liked the sound of it. I lay back in contentment, eyes shut, singing variations of the hymns I'd heard in Donnelaith. I would not stop until awakened, until pulled from this trance, or until I fell asleep.
I do not remember when I realized that the winter had ended, or that we had traveled out of it, that we were along the coast of Italy, and that when I looked out the little barred window I saw the sunlight falling down gracefully on green hills and cliffs of indescribable beauty. At last we docked at a thriving city, the like of which I'd never seen.
Then the most remarkable thing befell me. I was taken by these two men, who still would answer no question from me, and left at the gate of a monastery, after the bell had been rung.
A small parcel was thrust into my hands.
I stood there dazzled by the sun, and then turned to see the monk, who had opened the gate for me, looking me up and down. I wore still the fine clothes from London, but they were very soiled now from the long journey, and my beard and hair had grown very long. I had nothing with me but this parcel, and in confusion I gave it to the monk.
At once he unwrapped it, removing the ragged linen and leather from it, and then he held it and I saw that it was a large parchment letter which had been folded over in quarto.
"Come in, please," said this monk in a kindly manner to me. He glanced at the unfolded parchment. Then he rushed away, leaving me in a still and beautiful courtyard filled with golden flowers, and warmed by the midday sun. I could hear singing in the distance, the melancholy mournful sound of men's voices like those of the monks of Donnelaith. I loved the singing. I closed my eyes and breathed the singing, and the perfume of the flowers.
Then several monks came into the courtyard. Those in Scotland had worn white but these men were in coarse brown and had sandals on their feet. They surrounded me and kissed me on both cheeks and embraced me.
"Brother Ashlar!" They all addressed me, more or less in one voice. And their smiles were so warm, so filled with love that I began to cry.
"This is to be your life now. Don't be frightened anymore. You will live and thrive in the love of God."
I saw then the unfolded quarto which one held in his hand.
"What does it say?" I asked in English.
"That you have dedicated your life to Christ. That you would follow in the steps of our founder, St. Francis, that you would be a priest of God."
Then came more tender words and embraces from these men, who were utterly unafraid of me, and it came to my mind: they don't know anything about me. They don't know how I was born. And inspecting myself--my hands, my legs, my hair--I thought, except for my height and my long locks I might as well be one of them.
This puzzled me.
Throughout the evening meal--and they fed me much better than they fed themselves--I sat silent, not certain of what I should do or say. It was quite obvious to me that I could leave this place if I wanted. I could go over the wall.
But why should I do it? I thought. I went into the chapel with them. I joined in their song. When they heard my voice, they nodded and smiled and touched me with approval, and I was soon lost in the singing, and staring at the crucifix again, the very same symbol, Christ nailed to the Cross. I don't say it like this to sound simple. I say it to make you picture it, as I saw this, this tortured body, afflicted, beaten, crowned with thorns and shedding blood. Jack of the Green, burnt in his wicker; driven through the fields by those with sticks.
A great swimming happiness came over me. I made this bargain with myself. Stay for a while. You can always run away tomorrow. But if you run, then you have lost this place, you have lost St. Ashlar.
That night, when they put me in my cell, I said, "You do not have to lock it."
They were surprised and confused. They had not intended to do so, they said. Indeed, they showed me--there was no lock.
I lay there, remaining of my own free will, dreaming, in the warm night of Italy, dreaming, and from time to time, I heard them at their chapel song.
In the morning, when they told me it was time to go to Assisi, I said that I was ready. We would walk, they said, for we were Franciscans, and we were of the Observant Franciscans who were true to the spirit of Brother Francis and we would not sit on the back of a horse.
Thirty-five
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