Chapter 54
Purcell had the Uzi, and he gave Vivian his reloaded pistol, and Henry retrieved one of the AK-47s. They slipped on their backpacks and walked away from the rock quarry, down the slope toward the giant cedar, and continued on toward the wall of tropical growth in front of them.
No one spoke, but then Mercado asked Purcell, “Did you take any food from the soldiers?”
“No.”
“We should go back.”
Purcell replied, “Put your hand into the hand of God, Henry. That’s why we’re here.”
Mercado stayed silent as they continued on, then said, “Yes… I will.”
Vivian said, “We are all in God’s hands now.”
Purcell did not have to look at his compass to know he was heading due west, with the cedar and the monolith behind him.
There was a worn black rock lying on the ground at the edge of the wall of trees, and beyond the rock he saw a trailhead. They crossed over the black threshold and entered the rain forest. Limbs and vines reached out overhead and immediately blocked out the sunlight.
The land sloped gently down, and the trees became taller, and the canopy became thicker. After a while, Purcell noticed that the ground was becoming soft and spongy as though they were entering a marsh or a swamp.
The trail was no longer defined by walls of vegetation, but it was discernible if you looked ahead and saw the slight difference in the ground where it had been walked on.
Mercado said, “I don’t see a stream.”
Purcell did not reply, and neither did Vivian. They continued on.
The ground was definitely spongy now, and Purcell could see changes in the landscape. Huge banyan trees started to appear, as well as swamp cedar and cypress, which he remembered from the swamps of Southeast Asia.
The land was sloping more steeply now, and Purcell guessed they were entering the bottom drainage basin from the Simien Mountains, which he’d noticed in the air and on the map but which they had not thought to consider as a place where the black monastery could be.
In retrospect, he realized that they had been… maybe mesmerized by Father Armano and his story, and the priest had given them information, but not knowledge. He had told them enough to put them on the trail, but not enough to bring them to the end of it. They had to do that on their own. And if indeed they were chosen, then they would be guided on the right path.
Purcell looked around him. The terrain appeared deceptively pleasant and sylvan, but he could now see pools of water filled with marsh fern on both sides of their disappearing path. Marsh gasses rose in misty clouds, and the air was becoming hot and fetid. Wispy strands of gray moss hung from the tree limbs, and he noticed that there were a lot of dead trees, and creeping marshwort ran over the deadwood on the wet ground. Huge, silent black birds sat on bare tree limbs and seemed to be watching them as they passed. He realized that the marsh was much quieter than the jungle, and there were almost no sounds from insects or birds. A sense of foreboding came over him, but he said nothing and they pressed on.
The land seemed to be bottoming out and becoming a true swamp, and Purcell wondered if this was passable. He also wondered if they were going in the right direction. The path had disappeared, but there was a meandering ribbon of spongy higher ground that passed through the swampy expanse of terrain. The mud was sucking at their boots, and Vivian took off her boots and socks and walked barefoot through the muck. Purcell and Mercado did the same.
Vivian noticed now that Purcell had blood on his pant leg, and she asked him, “Did you get hit there?”
“I’m fine.”
“Let me see that.”
“I’ve already seen it.”
She insisted they stop, and Purcell sat on the trunk of a fallen tree while Vivian knelt in the mud, extended Purcell’s leg, and examined his wound.
He said, “It’s really okay.”
She had an iodine bottle in her pocket and she dabbed some of it on his wound, then sat beside him on the tree trunk.
They looked around at the swamp. Without saying it, they all knew that Father Armano had never mentioned a swamp.
Vivian said to Mercado, “Sit down, Henry.”
He sat slowly on the tree trunk and grimaced in pain.
Purcell said, “I think I left a piece of metal in you.”
“Indeed you did.”
They all smiled, but it was a tired and forced smile. The shock and horror of what had happened was still very much with them, and it was time to say something.
Purcell said to them, “Edmund Gann was a very brave man.”
Mercado said, “He was a soldier and a gentleman… a knight.”
Vivian said, “I know that he is with Miriam now.”
“Indeed he is,” Mercado said.
Vivian put her arm around Purcell and squeezed him closer to her. “You are a very brave man, Frank Purcell.” She told Henry, “He threw himself over me when the hand grenade exploded.”
Mercado nodded.
Vivian put her hand on Mercado’s shoulder. “What did you say to Getachu in Amharic?”
“The usual—that his mother was a diseased prostitute who should have smothered him at birth.”
Vivian said, “A bit rough, Henry.” She smiled.
Mercado said, “I hope he is now burning in hell.”
No one spoke for a minute, then Mercado asked Vivian, “Do you still have Father Armano’s skull?”
“I do.”
“Well, we are going to take him where he wanted to go.” He stood. “Ready?”
Vivian and Purcell stood, and Vivian assured them, “The stream is ahead of us.”
The ground was rising now, and the marshland was again turning to tropical jungle. What looked like a beaten path began to materialize in front of them.
Vivian suddenly stopped and said, “Listen.”
They stopped and listened, but neither Purcell nor Mercado could hear anything.
Mercado asked, “What do you hear?”
“Water.” She moved to her right and the men followed.
Running down the slope was a small stream, choked with water lilies and vines. It was, Purcell thought, a stream from the hills that emptied into the marsh basin.
Vivian knelt down and put her hand into the flowing water. She turned to Purcell and Mercado, silently inviting them to do the same.
They knelt beside the stream and let the water run over their hands.
Vivian said, “This is the stream. Do we follow it? Or do we follow the path?”
Purcell thought the path and the stream seemed to run parallel, but they might diverge.
Mercado said, “Ruscello. He said it twice. Il Ruscello. The stream.”
Vivian nodded and stood. They all stepped, still barefoot, into the cool, shallow water and walked upstream.
Without looking at his watch, Purcell knew they had been walking about five hours, and it was close to noon—a half day’s walk from the meeting place of the monks and the Falashas. And it had been mostly due west, even through the meandering path in the swamp. It seemed simple enough, after you’ve done it, and he tried to imagine Father Armano on his patrol with the sergeant named Giovanni, walking from the black rock—which the priest and the soldiers had no way of knowing was a meeting place of Coptic Christians and Jews. Giovanni had then taken his patrol to the giant cedar, and through the jungle, to the swamp, and to the stream, all of which the sergeant had found by accident on a previous patrol. And they had arrived again at the black monastery—but this time they entered by the reed basket, and only Father Armano came out of there alive.
And when the priest was healed of his wounds—by nature or by faith—he was given over to the Royalist soldiers and taken by the same route, or maybe another route, to his prison in the fortress, and there he remained for nearly forty years. And whatever he had seen in that monastery had sustained him, not only for all those years in his cell, but also for the hours he walked with a mortal wound on his way back to where he had experienced something so remarkable—or miraculous—that he had to return to that place, even as he was dying. He never made it back, but he had made it as far as the ruined spa, which was not even there when he had last been that way. And what he had found in the spa were three people who themselves were trying to find something. Trying to find the war. And Father Armano had asked them—or asked Vivian—Dov’è la strada? Where is the road?
Indeed, where is the road? There are many roads.
The jungle became thicker, and the stream became more narrow, and they could see smaller streams feeding into it from the higher ground. They also noticed more clusters of palm trees. None of them doubted that the black monastery was ahead, and that they were walking toward it. It was just a matter of hours, or maybe days, but it was sitting there, still hidden from the eyes of men, still unwelcoming to visitors, yet hopefully ready to receive them with a basket made of reeds.
The sun was setting ahead of them, and the few patches of sunlight were becoming dimmer. It was harder to see more than twenty or thirty feet ahead, but the stream guided them.
The jungle looked somehow different, Purcell thought, and it was more than the changing light that made it seem altered. Purcell noticed date palms and breadfruit trees, and trees that bore fleshy fruit, and other trees that he thought bore nuts, and black African violets covered the ground. This was tended land, a tropical garden such as Purcell had seen in Southeast Asia, barely distinguishable from the untamed jungle. He said, “The monastery is just ahead.”
Vivian, who was in the lead now, said, “I know.”
The stream bent sharply to their right, and they followed it for a minute, but then Vivian stepped out of the stream and walked between two towering palms.
Purcell and Mercado joined her.
To their front, about thirty feet away, rising above a twenty-foot-high thicket of bamboo, was a black wall.
Vivian stared up at the glossy stone. She said simply, “We are here.”
