Читать книгу The Seven Pillars - Wenceslao Fernández-Flórez - Страница 5

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The hut lay hidden under a great rock, black and pinnacled; in front a few level yards, then the abyss. It was a high balcony overlooking the plain chequered with rich fields.

The mountain, vast and empty, brooded in the dusk; the strong scents offered by the lusty earth to the midday sun were quenched, and the thin air held only the sweet and delicate perfume of thyme. In the tense stillness, that gentle scent, replacing the heady aroma given by the pines to the heat of June, seemed like the voice of a choir-boy when the cathedral organ had hardly ceased to resound. As by a soft enchantment, the mountain was changing to blue and the solitude was being steeped in an eerie charm.

The hermit, Acracio, felt his spirit caught as in a net. The nightfall was so comforting that he recognised in it too carnal a flavour, something of sin. He sat motionless in front of his hut, arms crossed, his fiery eyes hidden under the bony forehead, his beard scanty and ragged; he was as still as the pines and the rocks. In that ineffable moment he could have wished that his soul would ascend, a humble vapour, above the mountain, to the longed-for Presence. So intense was the stillness that it seemed to precede and announce a miracle, not peace but a bewilderment. These arrests of time came often at summer sunsets when miracles seemed about to happen, and the heart of the hermit would throb in expectation. Always he hoped. He was filled with the deep and sweet longing to obtain from the Divine Bounty some consolation such as those which were granted to hermits of old; but in his ten years of penitence, stern and unrelenting, on that spur of the mountains, far from other human beings, always hungry, exposed to cold and tempests, never had the supernatural come near him. One day, indeed, as he was praying, a ring dove, circling near him, alighted on the edge of the precipice. The air seemed unnaturally clear. The blood beat in his attentive ears; he remembered the ravens which carried bread to the prophet Elijah, and the eagle which served St. Vito and St. Modesto in the desert of Lucania. Pierced with an emotion that was half pleasure and half anguish, he closed his eyes and bowed his head to the ground. Was there in truth a fragrance of incense and sandalwood? But the bird looked at the servant of God, turning its lovely head, pecked at the ground, and flew away. The beating of its wings undeceived the hermit. He meditated on his illusion, and saw that it was vanity.

“Lord,” he cried, “I know my unworthiness.”

Another day, when the sun was setting in a sultry calm, there came out of the thicket and down towards his rock, a huge black dog with ears pricked and fiery eyes. There fell on Acracio a different thrill and another vanity. He thought that the Evil One had come to conquer him by terror, in the fashion He had tried the faith of many a holy solitary. He awaited the assault, his soul valiant, his arms crossed on his bony and panting breast. The last rays of the sun, already set, fanned out behind the clouds, and the scarlet splendour of the sky seemed to be pouring a glory on the defender of the faith, awaiting the battle without fear. But a shepherd whistled in the wood, and the dog, turning round, hurried off in obedience to the call.

The hermit was wont to punish rudely such lapses from humility, although in truth they came from a longing for perfection and a holy impatience for putting his faith to the proof. In the same fashion an untried warrior pants to face the enemy.

The fame of the good hermit grew day by day. Sorrowful mothers brought him their ailing children; a brave young fellow risked his life climbing through the winter snow to cheer the hermit with a load of firewood or relieve his hunger by a supply of food; in the city, in that home of vice, they knew of him and marvelled. And yet, notwithstanding his edifying steadfastness, never had there been launched against him, to conquer him, the hellish devices of temptation which had been lavished on other saints; neither slaves bearing shining jewels; nor pale horsemen, exhaling sulphur and offering dominion and power; nor those infernal women who dance in the moonlight at the doors of hermits, their shifts wantonly opened to display their softly lighted bodies, their arms inviting, their breasts aflower, the fire of hell in their eyes, their skins with the lovely golden tint that comes from eternal flames.

When he examined the depths of his conscience, Acracio believed that he found the sin for which he must continue to do heavy penance; but he was so entangled in the coils of the Serpent that no penitences could free him. This was the sin; ever since, in a moment of unpardonable vanity, he had thought of attaining sanctity, he was discontented with his name. He was a Pérez, son of Pérez, the weaver, and his forefathers, ’bus drivers, were also called Pérez. How was it possible, he thought, to enter on the roll of saints a surname so base; how could anyone be expected to pray to a Saint Pérez? It helped him little to recall that Juan Gonzáles y Martínez had an altar in the chapels, because everyone had come to call him St. Juan de Sahugún, from his birthplace, whilst he, Acracio, had first seen the light in Gallinejas. San Acracio Pérez, or San Acracio de Gallinejas, these were not names to inspire devotion!

He could change his name, but anxious to punish the weakness of even thinking to do it, he bore it as a spiritual hair-shirt. Never was he heard calling himself anything but “Pérez,” as it humbled him even more than “Acracio,” a word which, apart from its meaning, had rather a pleasing sound.

Although the air was still transparent on the grey mountain, shadows crept over the plain. And to-night the shadows did not seem to the gentle saint like a soft vapour exuding from the pores of the earth. They seemed to be creeping out from the dark rim of the horizon like horrible snakes, or even bike unspeakable worms oozing towards him with slimy, shapeless bodies. The little lights kindling down below were the eyes of dreadful monsters. The shadows drew near and writhed together. They were the tentacles of a squid whose smooth, repulsive head was still below the horizon. Next they became like a black wave beating against the mountain. The last long cloud, straight and scarlet, faded; the first star shone over the highest peak of the mountain, shivering as if the snow had touched it, but splendid and friendly, full of the comforting suggestion of the stars. Eyes of fire were fixed on the holy man across a clump of brushwood; but he saw them not.

His peaceful soul was bathed in the infinite softness of earth and skies. Black shadows were climbing up the mountain. Suddenly a double glowing ray pierced the darkness, reached the motionless hermit, and disappeared. It came from the lamps of a car travelling down in the city. And then it seemed to the hermit that a hot gust broke on him, and he heard the rapid and frightened flight of a flock of birds, perhaps pursued by a hunting nightfowl. A stone crashed on a heap, scattering other stones. The thousand small noises which fill the mountain when darkness comes, awoke. But suddenly everything was hushed; a silence deep and wide, strange, chill, and terrifying, reached the marrow of his bones. The holy man slowly turned his head.

On a mossy rock, three feet high, his chin resting on his hands, and his elbows on his knees, there sat Satan.

The hermit’s body stiffened at the shock. Then with his white hand, deliberately and firmly, he made the sign of the cross. Satan kept still, as if rooted to the rock. Ardent faith brought to the mind of the hermit St. Dunstan’s encounter, when he seized the Devil by the nose, or St. Anthony’s feat when he spat in the Devil’s face. He was filled with furious zeal, a burning desire to give battle to the Enemy with his own hands, as so many servants of God had done before him, and he reached out for his knotty staff.

But Satan took his hands from his cheeks, revealing his sad, but beautiful face. His voice and his huge bat-like wings seemed to quiver.

“Acracio,” he said, in a gentle pleading tone, “you have nothing to fear from me.”

“I do not fear you,” retorted the hermit.

“Then, put down your stick.”

“Get thee gone, tempter,” muttered the hermit.

Satan smiled bitterly.

“Acracio, I do not come to tempt thee. I give you my word. Put down your stick. Why do you wish to reproduce one of these stupid old quarrels of long ago? Do you think I have come in my old shape to fight a mortal with sticks and fists on this lonely hillside? Listen, and put down your stick, I beg you; I am so soured and bored that I don’t mind telling you that I am only just beginning to feel the hardness of my punishment. You have before you the most unhappy of beings. When I was thrust from Heaven, I didn’t suffer. Arrogance and rage blinded me to the misfortunes that might come. There was a proud satisfaction in having kept up a rebellion so mighty. But that is not all. You know very well, Acracio, that for centuries and centuries I was the master of the world. HE created man lovingly, but I made man prefer to worship Me. I threw against Heaven the most bitter injury—ingratitude. Humanity worshipped me in a thousand queer ways. I was the totem of savages, the stag, the bear, or the dog, worshipped by tribes. I was the sacred cow of the Brahmins, the Voodoo snake in Dahomey; the eagle-headed monster of Assyrian altars; the sun of the Aztecs; the fire fanned by the hands of the women of Iran at dawn; I was the multitude of spirits worshipped by the Chinese. I was then the master of the world. It was believed that HE was a drinker of human blood. To me Agamemnon sacrificed Iphigenia; it was in my service that the Jews, scattering death, entered the promised land. I was the tutor of the human race in its savage childhood. Later, much later, my shadow was still large on the earth. They sought me and they fled from me; legions of men brought against me hyssop and exorcisms, and legions of men came to sign horrible pacts with me, using the feathers of cocks dipped in their own blood. HE and I divided the earth, and no living creature refrained from enlisting on one side or on the other. In the dim woods and on the silent hills, millions of wretches assembled in the revelries of Sabbath eves, and I saw them prostrate at my cloven footprints. Masses were offered to me; and I also had my martyrs, burning in the fires of the Inquisition, writhing and blaspheming in tortures as cruel as those of the other camp. These were my epic days. The greatest poets sang of me, and every heart was graven with my terrible name.”

Satan breathed a heavy sigh.

“But how is it now?” he continued sadly. “What am I to-day? Whose conscience do I trouble? Those two great armies whose battles used to shake the unhappy earth have signed a peace with no consideration for their Captains. They have turned disdainful backs on Us, and seem to have forgotten that We ever existed. If anyone does concern himself with HIM, it is to try to analyse HIM scientifically in the cold language of reason and the petulance of logic. But not even by these efforts can the investigators of the Divine gain the attention of the masses. As for me, myself, never could I have expected to be in a position so sorry, to suffer such insulting neglect. I was the Adversary—and now, I am ashamed to own it, I am hardly even an oath; if men didn’t require to interlard their words with interjections, would my name ever be mentioned? They call on me when they have dropped a stud, or had their corns stepped on, or as a mild retort to chaff. I am only a sound without meaning, like a grunt. People say ‘the devil,’ just as if they were saying ‘dash it all,’ or ‘dear me.’ Am I anything more? Alas, yes; I am also an ugly mask in carnival processions, and it pleases children to pull my forked tail, sticking out limply from my dirty finery. Unhappy fate; no one loves me, no one fears me, no one believes in me. If you were to tell them down in the city that you had seen me and spoken to me, they would shut you up in a lunatic asylum.”

Satan’s bitterness was deep and sincere. The holy man, in a voice made soft and pleading by his habit of prayer, forced himself to say:

“Your place is in Hell.”

Slowly the Evil One stretched out his arms.

“Hell is here; Hell is the crust of this planet on which human beings swarm; my punishment is that I cannot quit them, but must continue to witness their stupidities and pettinesses. Just think what a penance this is to one of my intelligence. Long ago when they did recognise me, my sorrow was less acute. The spirit is kept active by hate or by love addressed to it. When the world held many men like you, Acracio, I kept myself well amused, inventing temptations and trials. I contrived some sensational tricks. My word! Many a time when I had seen a disappointed witch rage at the prudery of a hermit who had spurned her offer of a lovely and lustful body, I laughed until the earth shook, and all the world heard the thunder of my guffaws. But now I suffer more than a dethroned king; I endure a unique martyrdom. I speak and am not heard; and I show myself and I am not seen. Homesickness and boredom darken my long idleness. But the round world holds no creature so worthy as you. I have searched all the deserts, the thickest forests, all the crannies of the earth, and you, alone in the world, keep up the fine old traditions, the customs of the good days, even faith itself. For ten years I have watched you, afraid that I was mistaken. At first I didn’t trust you; don’t get offended.... I’ll tell you what I’ve lately had to put up with. I had discovered a hermit in a corner of the Apennines. His life was blameless; he was dressed only in a coarse robe; his head was bare to the rain and the sun; he subjected his body to the hardest toil, and his food was fruits and roots. One night I appeared before him. He looked at me carefully, muttered ‘all right,’ and set himself to sketching me in a notebook. He was an English naturalist, testing his theories in that retreat.”

The Devil breathed heavily.

“What kind of world is this? I can make nothing of it. I have entered into the bodies of several persons by the classical methods; I hid in an orange which a youth ate, and in the wine for which a pregnant woman craved, and I have also slipped into the open mouth of a virgin who had fallen asleep without saying her prayers. Possessed by me, these persons writhed convulsively and spat out froth between their clenched teeth. No one in the olden times was more truly possessed by the Devil. But it was no good. The medical profession pronounced them cases of epilepsy.”

Satan again buried his face in his hands, so that his olive cheeks were hidden, and his gaze, sullen and sad, was fixed on the darkening air. The plateau and the mountain were now merged in shadow, but the distant horizon glowed as if the last light of sunset had lingered, forgotten by the mists, or as if some invisible conflagration imitated with its flames the dying agony of the sun. It was as if the sky had poured its blood into the purple rim of sunset, and now showed the pallor of exhaustion. Every night the same glowing stain kindled in the clouds, and dissolved at dawn. It was the distant city revealing its lights, everywhere shining with a pallid glow; the lights of the wide streets, of eyes starry with ambition, eyes glaring with lust, eyes glowing with anger, eyes shining with greed, and eyes to which pride lent a metallic glitter. Possibly also there was in the milky zenith, held back so that it should not ascend to God, the reflection of millions of human eyes, lighted with the sad fire of mortal sin.

The holy man, who pitied the pines when the hurricane twisted them, who helped a beetle to right itself if he found it waving its legs in the air and vainly struggling to turn over; the lonely soul, kindled with love for every living creature, felt growing in him a flicker of pity for the agony, naked and sorrowful, which the fallen majesty of the Enemy so strangely revealed. He bent his ragged grey beard towards his chest, shut his eyes, and stretched out his bony hand. His voice began to murmur firmly, but without anger:

“Get thee behind....”

Satan leapt from the rock to the ground. His wings covered him like a cloak which was a shroud.

“Stop!” he cried, and his voice shook with sorrow. “Stop! Never shall I try you with my temptations. Never shall I disturb your prayers. You alone of mortals remind me of what I was, and what I could do. I’ll do nothing to hinder the salvation of your soul; I am asking nothing from you.”

He joined his hands in a gesture of supplication.

“Only let me come to see you now and again, and talk about HIM.... For many long years I’ve found no one to discuss that topic... my only subject.”