Chapter
Twenty-Five

Silence, thinks Abbot John, should be at least relatively simple. Surely a proliferation of words must always complicate things, introduce muddle, and set hares running. Silence must be the ultimate simplicity. Language is fundamental to human relationship and society, and the renunciation of it – albeit partial – ought to make space in the soul. It should foster serenity. It should be like the speechless soaring arches of the abbey church rising into the shadows at Compline, losing themselves in friendly dark.

But there’s nothing you can do to take the complication out of humanity. You can shut men up, but that won’t necessarily quieten their souls. Not of itself.

He thinks of the men he has nursed in the infirmary, more than he can count by this time, and their loud, struggling silences. He remembers caring for Father Peregrine after the seizure took his speech – the intense, drawn-out misery and frustration. He thinks back on the day William took refuge with them after the fire, sitting in the infirmary clad in nothing but a towel for his modesty, tense and trembling, lips drawn back from his teeth in a grimace of pain, as John carefully washed the grit and soot and mud from the scrapes and burns. That big burn on his shoulder. Ouch. Silent ouch. He remembers the same man sitting in the choir during the time when everything had started to unravel, motionless, pale, tears flowing unchecked down his face. And, kneeling in Chapter before the community after the ship had gone down, trying to confess what he had done, but the words would not come. He could only prostrate himself. He couldn’t speak. John had to tell them for him. But that mute prostration said everything.

Silence, he thinks, is by no means just nothing. Perhaps it is there to let what is real emerge; to suspend, for at least a little while, the brittle and the shallow. Like brushing dead leaves away from the place where clear water will come welling up from the body of the earth, if you give it a chance. If you don’t choke it with a debris of words.

Love loves silence. Still tugging at his conscience is his own silence in the refectory at the midday meal yesterday. He could not bring himself to throw that poor lad into confusion by stopping the reading, drawing attention to the error, making him say the sentence again. Already the boy was stammering, his knees shaking, his hands trembling as he turned the heavy page. It was his first time. Silence clothes with compassion the humiliation of small mistakes, refraining from tearing away every shred of ambiguity to expose them. Silence gives dignity to our frailty. Yet some of the custumals he studied at Cambridge, in preparation to take up the abbacy, made it plain the abbot is recommended to stop the reader, point out the mistake. What for, he wonders. To humble him? To break his pride? To foster a lowly and teachable spirit? The documents didn’t say. All that, probably. So maybe he was wrong to choose the gentle alternative of silently letting it pass. Who knows? Every single day brings questions he cannot answer, choices he cannot be sure are wise or sound.

Right now, he’s glad Theo is handling Collatio for him. Just at the moment his heart is too full to want to speak. Even more than he worries whether he did the right thing with Colin in the refectory, he searches his conscience again and again for some clue to how he might better have watched over their missing novice. Has he been too strict? Too negligent? Too preoccupied? Were there signs of turmoil or unhappiness he should have detected? What went wrong? He so hoped Brother Cedd would come back to them, but those hopes are wearing thin by this hour of the day. He imagined the young man coming to find him in the abbot’s lodge after Vespers, admitting his misgivings had caused him to waver but he’d had second thoughts. But now it is nearly time for Compline, and still no sign of him. Brother Cedd… a quiet, reticent boy. Not aloof, just lacking in confidence. He gave no indication of being so burdened he had to drop it all and leave. He must have done what seemed admirable to him – borne it in silence. If he’d listened to the reading of the Rule, he’d have grasped there is a time to speak; to trust his abbot enough to confide his apprehension and the faltering of his faith. Silence is a beautiful thing, but it’s not always a good idea.

By now, the community is gathered in this place alongside the chapel, the north walk of the cloister, for Collatio. How spacious, but how intimate – brotherly, indeed – is this silent coming together. John closes his eyes and in silence his soul reaches into the disciplined stillness of this family of brothers, this house of men who have each offered his whole life, one by one. To touch the hem of Christ’s robe. To abandon himself without reserve to the loving mystery of God in holy silence.

And when Theodore opens the book on the lectern there in the cloister, finding the place with his finger and beginning to read, the extract from John Cassian’s writings is about the perils of silence. How odd, thinks John, as he listens.

Cassian is warning of how silence can be misused. How a monk can fancy himself patient and forbearing because he has said nothing, when the cold look and sullen attitude say it all for him. Like a man who protested he didn’t push someone who is blind into the ditch. And he may not have done, but if he stood and looked on while the blind man stumbled and fell in, how is that better? Theo reads the part where Cassian writes of Judas Iscariot, in Gethsemane, identifying his Lord for the angry mob, singling him out with the wordless, lethal gesture of a kiss. This, thinks the abbot, is so depressing. The passage ends, pointing out how deep is the grief when somebody you trusted turns you in.

And the words hang on the air like a breath of frost, a grave-breath. Silence that pretended to be love, nothing more than a betrayal. It leaves a taste in the mouth of bitterest disappointment.

Thanks, John Cassian. Thanks, Theo. Thanks, Lord, he thinks, bitterly. The community receive the words in breathing, heart-beating silence; the abbot does what he can to feel his way to anything good.

Father Theodore adds words of his own. Listening to him, John catches sadness in his voice. Theo, too, is mourning the loss of his straying lamb.

“The silence to which we are called, brothers, is more than mere refraining from words. I mean, it’s something better than accusations or complaints unspoken. It’s receptive, understanding. Silence that sees and forgives. Companionable. Loving. Warm. So that when he is with us, a man would feel he has come home.”

John looks up, hearing the small sounds of movement, to see Brother Conradus treading cautiously into their midst from the kitchen buildings, along the east walk. He’s going softly, stepping light, taking care to disturb the time of reflection as little as he can. When he reaches the assembled community, he so positions himself as to catch the abbot’s eye, among the monks with their cowled heads, their hands folded into their wide sleeves. John watches him.

Brother Conradus looks very directly at his abbot and lifts his right hand, extending the forefinger and middle finger just behind his ear, his thumb and other fingers pressed into his palm. This is a word from the monastic sign language of the silence: “novice”. He lowers his hand, pauses, then lifts it again, this time in a repeated motion of the first three fingers towards his mouth, to denote eating. He lowers his hand. With the slightest smile, discreetly, he now moves his fingers, a little curved, fluttering upward, like a ripple of wings: “Hallelujah”. His eyes still fixed on his abbot, he nods. Then his hands come to rest. He tucks them into his wide, black sleeves. He bends his head.

Abbot John feels joy spreading through his whole being like the warm headiness of wine. Hoping Father Theodore has also seen, he glances across to his novice master, just in time to catch the luminous radiance of the biggest grin on Theo’s face in the moment before recollecting himself to impassivity as he steps away from the lectern.

The abbot closes his eyes. Thank you, he whispers in the silence of his heart. Thank you.

As the community forms up to process into the choir for Compline, before they set off, the abbot pushes through to Father Clement’s side. “Brother Cedd is home,” he murmurs in his ear. Relief so sudden and sharp it is almost like pain. As the old man turns his head in a quick glance of grateful acknowledgment, the abbot sees there are tears in his dim blue, bleary eyes.

“Compline bell,” remarks Brother Tom, wiping his mouth and hands free of grease on the big linen napkin. “By heck, that was good. Brother Conradus must be pleased to see us home. Worth coming back for, eh? Have you had enough?”

Two hearty suppers have awaited them on their return, covered in dampened cloths so the food won’t dry out. They’ve already eaten with Madeleine and William, but after the long journey, what they had at Caldbeck recedes into the past. An egg for each of them, bread from today’s baking with some fresh butter and a modest wedge of cheese with a generous dollop of spicy plum preserve. Really good cheese; creamy, with a sharp, full, tangy flavour and little salt crystals within it. A handful of crisp herb salad, a bowl of apples and a jug of ale. The kitchener ushers them into his domain with a smiling welcome. He’s laid two places for them at the big work table where the servers and readers eat. He looks unsurprised to see Brother Cedd and makes no comment on his absence at all. Neither did Brother Martin in the porter’s lodge when he came out to admit them. Conradus uncovers the food for them, fetches the ale jug, and pours a big mugful for each of them, then leaves them to their supper.

Brother Tom polishes off his second supper with appreciation. Truth be told, though he accepts gratefully the food Brother Conradus gives him, Brother Cedd struggles to eat it. Apprehension about what comes next makes him feel a bit sick.

“I’m not sure what to do.” He looks to Brother Tom for his advice. “Am I just meant to go into Compline as if nothing had happened, and then go to bed in the usual way?”

Tom, picking a bit of sorrel from between his teeth, considers this question.

“Father John will know you’re back,” he says. “I don’t think he’ll wait until the morning; he’ll want to see you after Compline, silence or not. I suggest you come into chapel with me – just as you said, as if nothing has happened – then wait at the end until everyone else has gone. My guess is that Father Abbot will do the same. If I were you, I think what I’d do next is go and kneel by his stall and see what he says. He’ll tell you what he wants you to do – which will be either go back to his house with him to let him know what’s been happening in your addle-pated head, or else he’ll ask you to come and explain yourself in the morning after Chapter.”

Tom contemplates the novice, who looks shivery and scared. “You don’t need to be afraid of Father John. He looks a bit grim at times, I know, but he’s kind. He’s seen all possible permutations of doubt and despair in the infirmary. He’s on your side; he’s not interested in punishment or humiliation. Besides which, he’s had too many struggles of his own to think badly of yours. He’s a man you can trust, is our abbot. He’ll help you get to the root of things, put your finger on what’s important. Don’t be frightened of him. He’ll have spent this entire day grieving over you, wondering whether or not you are coming home. He won’t be angry.”

“Grieving over… really? Over me?” Brother Cedd gapes at Tom, incredulous.

“Over you. Yes. Really. I’d put money on it. Well now, I should say they’ve been ringing that bell long enough. No need to ruffle the abbot’s feathers by coming in late. Shall we go? Take our plates to the scullery, there’s a good lad. I’ll just cover this ale and put it away, and the butter.”