The Oblate's Confession (2 page)

I have no more memories of that night. Did we go into church afterwards? Was that where the other monks had gone? Did Father leave the little snowman standing as he had created it, out in the middle of the garth? Or did he knock it down? I don’t know. I don’t remember. All I remember is Father Dagan standing in the middle of the cloister, tall and silent, a gray figure with his hood up, snow falling all around him. At his side stands a tiny form, equally still and mute, white and simple—my first snowman.

There are, of course, other memories from that first year at Redestone, though Father Dagan and the snowman remain my earliest. Working on this confession, trying to remember everything I can, I am sometimes surprised to find myself recalling what appears to be nothing more than a simple lump of wax, doubtless the trimmings from someone’s tabulum. The memory surfaces, when it surfaces, unattached to any other. I don’t know who would have given me such a thing or why the thought of it after all these years has the power to move me so, to make my mouth water as though I recalled not a useless bit of wax but a particularly choice piece of food. Perhaps, in the world of rules and obedience I had been dropped into, the thing’s magic lay in the fact that it was malleable, that warming it in the palm of my hand I could force it to adopt whatever shape I liked...though I think color played a part as well, the subtle changes in hue wax may undergo if you observe it closely in the light. At any rate, whatever the attraction—and though I know it would have been wrong of me—I think I must have kept the thing, hidden it away in my bed, for the memory is often accompanied by a dim recollection of the scent (old, familiar, comforting) of my first mattress, a smell replaced almost immediately by the lighter more volatile scent of the wax itself, a fragrance which, nowadays, I associate with words, tabula, the material upon which I scratch out this draft.

When I try to remember how the abbey itself looked in those first days, it is not at all as you would expect. When we picture Redestone, we see the cloister, don’t we, the green of the garth, the church on one side, the refectory, dortoir, and abbot’s lodge on the other? We create in our minds a clear, if simple, view of the place. But this is not the way a child sees it, or at least not a very small child. When I remember my first days at Redestone, I see not a grand plan of abbey and grounds, but, rather, a series of
seemingly insignificant images (the view from a window I was just tall enough to reach, a mossy bit of flagstone walk, the place in the church’s south wall where, at midmorning, the stones became warm and rosy), these were the reference points of my life, the little places that, in the aggregate, added up to my idea of the world. If the sun passed behind Modra nect each afternoon then as it does now, dousing the garth in shadow, I made no connection between the mountain and the change in light (if asked, I would have guessed, I suppose, that everywhere the world grew dim at the approach of Vespers). I must have been aware of the great terrace our monastery sits upon, must have seen the fields below, the village beyond, but I don’t remember ever looking at these things— at least not in that first year or two—certainly don't remember ever thinking about them. I thought about food. I thought about the place at table where I sat. I thought about my bed. I thought about the spot along the church wall that on sunny mornings grew warm and rosy in the light.

As using a stylus to scratch out my tale upon this wax has

reminded me of Father Dagan (the styli he used to make the arms on my first snowman), so, in a similar fashion, remembering my earliest images of Redestone brings Oftfor to mind, the absurd little tour I gave him the day we met, the things I said. As it happens, this is the same Oftfor that would eventually become so famous, though on the occasion I am remembering he was still just a boy like me, looking, as I recall it now, rather small and underfed. Though I can’t be sure, my guess is it was the day of his oblation. It makes sense. I have a vague memory of strangers having been at the abbey at that time, the intense interest I always felt in grownups that weren’t monks. And making it the day of Oftfor’s oblation would explain why the two of us were out there alone on the garth like that, unobserved by anyone but the young postulant set to watch over us. Doubtless everyone else was inside, in the church, participating in the rite of donation—something we would have been judged too young to understand. The postulant was, I believe.... Yes. Yes, of course it was. It was Dudda.

Dudda said we weren’t to run, which seemed unfair as we
hadn’t been running, only walking fast.

I looked back at the little boy. He looked happy. His cheeks were red, either from the cold or the exertion, and, if he wasn’t smiling, at least he wasn’t actively crying anymore either. I wished he would wipe his nose. He could get into trouble for that if Brother Baldwin saw him. But there was so much the boy could get into trouble for; he was really quite hopeless. And loud! The brothers were always complaining about how loud I was, but until today I hadn’t realized just how loud and noisy a little boy could be. I pointed at the refectory.

Oftfor looked at the building and then took two quick excited steps toward it. He stopped, looked back at me.

I shook my head.

He frowned, looked once more at the refectory, then back at

me.

Again I pointed at the building; then, flexing my hand at the knuckles while keeping my fingers straight, I made the first of the two signs. It looked more like a roof when Father Dagan did it.

Oftfor’s forehead grew surprisingly wrinkled, like an old man’s.

I frowned, shook my head:
Pay attention!
Again I made the roof-shape Father Dagan had taught me, then I brought my fingers to my lips, opening my mouth wide to make it clear what I was doing.

Oftfor’s eyes grew large. “What have you got?” he asked, the question booming off the cloister walls.

I tossed a quick glance over at Dudda and was relieved to see he was no longer watching us, was, instead, peering in at the church door. I looked back at Oftfor, shook my head. “No!” I whispered. “It’s how we’re supposed to talk.”

Puzzlement.

“With our hands!”

Oftfor looked at me as if I’d told him hot was cold, cold hot.

“Because of the silence!” I said aloud, wishing Dudda
would
look over here now, see how hard this was, how hard I was working to bring the new boy into line.

“The silence?”

I smiled, a teacher proud of his pupil’s first success. “Yes. The silence.” I began to whisper again. “We can’t talk because of the silence, so we have to use our fingers.”

The boy frowned. “Why can’t we talk?” he asked, whispering himself now. “Have we done something wrong?”

“No, of course not. Unless we talk.”

Oftfor looked suddenly frightened, as if I’d said something mad.

“No, no, it’s all right!” Why was this so difficult? Why did it make perfect sense when Father Dagan said it and none at all when I did? “We can’t talk because we’re monks, because monks don’t talk, they chant. It’s what monks are for.”

“We’re not monks. We’re little...”

“No, no I know. I mean I know we’re not monks, we’re oblates.”

“We’re...?”

“Oblates,” I said, proud of the ease with which I now

pronounced the word.

“What’s a...an....”

But I hurried on before Oftfor could finish that question (let Father Dagan answer that one). “Monks don’t talk because they chant instead. That’s what monks are for.”

“Monks are for chanting,” Oftfor said dubiously, a child repeating his lessons.

“Chanting and praying.”

The boy cast a wide-eyed glance over at Dudda. “That’s all they do!?”

“Well no, of course not. I mean they work too. Listen, do you want to learn this or not?”

“What?”

“The signs!” I said, “The way we talk with our hands!” I indicated the cloister with what seemed to me a particularly grownup sweep of the arm.

Oftfor flinched as if from a blow.

“What? Did you think I was going to hit you?!”

Oftfor just looked at me, chin thrust forward bravely but dimpled now, quivering.

“No, it’s all right,” I said, confused by this, the unexpected feelings it engendered (Father had said I was to look after this boy, that he was now, in a sense, my little brother). “Look, it’s simple. The way you make a building’s name is by making first the sign for roof, and then the sign for whatever you do in that building.”

Still on the verge of tears but trying hard to be a good little boy, Oftfor gave me a bit of a nod.

“We
eat
in the refectory,” I said, watching him closely now, not at all sure he was following this. “So the way you say ‘refectory’ is....” I made the roof-shape again, then, careful to make the movement seem non-threatening, brought my fingers to my lips. “See...? Like someone eating?”

Oftfor looked from my hand to my mouth and then back at my hand again, utterly bewildered.

“So this,” I said, repeating the signs a second time, “means
‘refectory’!”

Oftfor watched my hand a moment longer, as one might a snake, then, frowning, looked back at the refectory. “The reflectory,” he said thoughtfully.

What could you do?

But I didn’t give up, wouldn’t give up (Father expected this of me!). Since the boy was clearly slow, I’d have to start with something a little easier. I pointed at the church. “You know what that is, don’t you?”

Oftfor looked at the great stone building, the breathy sound of the chant just then rising from its interior. “The church?” he said.

“Right. The church. So the sign for it is.... Remember? First you make the sign for roof....” I did so. “Then you make the sign for what you do beneath that roof....” I brought my hands together, palm-to-palm, before my lips. By my calculation even the dullest of boys must know the sign for prayer.

For the first time, Oftfor smiled. “The church!” he said with a little laugh.

I held a finger up but smiled too. “Yes,” I whispered, more

sure of myself now, “the church.”

Once more I made the two signs and, this time, Oftfor repeated them for me. The boy’s roof looked more like a turtle than a roof, but, still...Father Dagan was going to be so proud of me!

“All right, now look back at the refectory,” I said, thinking it was time to try something a little more difficult.

Oftfor turned and looked.

“See the building next to it?”

Oftfor glanced from the refectory to the dortoir and then, uncertainly, back at the refectory. I had never noticed before how much the two buildings resembled each other.

“The refectory’s the one on the right, the one on the left’s the one I’m talking about. It’s the dortoir.”

“The....”

“The dortoir.”

For a moment or two Oftfor studied the dortoir’s simple earthen façade as one might a great mystery, then, apparently growing tired of this, let his attention wander to the diggings

next-door. “Why’s there that hole?” he asked.

“Oh, that,” I said, pleased to show off my newfound knowledge. “That’s where they’re going to put the abbot’s lodgings.”

“What are those?”

Truth be told, I hadn’t a clue. When I’d first heard the phrase, something about the way it had been said made me think of hurdles (then, as now, no one liked making hurdles), but since they’d dug this surprisingly square and shallow hole I’d begun to wonder if “lodgings” might not mean something else, a kind of food maybe, something only abbots got to eat, a category of nourishment so delicate and delicious it had to be stored, like grain, in its own special pit. “Wouldn’t you like to know,” I said. “But it’s the building next to the hole that we’re talking about.”

“The reflectory.”

“No, the reflec...the
refectory
is the other building, the building on the right. The building on the left is the dortoir.”

“The....”

“The dortoir’s where we sleep. So the sign for dortoir is....

Remember? First we make the sign for roof....” I did so. “Then we make the sign for what we do beneath the roof....” Once more I brought my hands together palm-to-palm; then, making sure Oftfor could see what I was doing, I placed the sign for prayer against my right ear, turning it into the sign for sleep.