A Canticle for Leibowitz (24 page)

He glanced around, for a soft murmur arose from the community.

“It will
be
so. We do not
will
it so.

“But
why?

“Ignorance is king. Many would not profit by his abdication. Many enrich themselves by means of his dark monarchy. They are his Court, and in his name they defraud and govern, enrich themselves and perpetuate their power. Even literacy they fear, for the written word is another channel of communication that might cause their enemies to become united. Their weapons are keen-honed, and they use them with skill. They will press the battle upon the world when their interests are threatened, and the violence which follows will last until the structure of society as it now exists is leveled to rubble, and a new society emerges. I am sorry: But that is how I see it.”

The words brought a new pall over the room. Dom Paulo’s hopes sank, for the prophecy gave form to the scholar’s probable outlook. Thon Taddeo knew the military ambitions of his monarch. He had a choice: to approve of them, to disapprove of them, or to regard them as impersonal phenomena beyond his control like a flood, famine, or whirlwind.

Evidently, then, he accepted them as inevitable-to avoid having to make a moral judgment.
Let there be blood, iron and weeping…

How could such a man thus evade his own conscience and disavow his responsibility-and so easily! the abbot stormed to himself.

But then the words came back to him.
For in those days, the Lord God had suffered the wise men to know the means by which the world itself might be destroyed…

He also suffered them to know how it might be saved, and, as always, let them choose for themselves. And perhaps they had chosen as Thon Taddeo chooses. To wash their hands before the multitude. Look you to it. Lest they themselves be crucified.

And they had been crucified anyhow. Without dignity. Always for anybody anyhow is to get nailed on it and hang on it and if you drop off they beat…

There was sudden silence. The scholar had stopped talking.

The abbot blinked around the hall. Half the community was staring toward the entrance. At first his eyes could make out nothing.

“What is it?” he whispered to Gault.

“An old man with a beard and shawl,” hissed Gault. “It looks like-No, he wouldn’t-”

Dom Paulo arose and moved to the front of the dais to stare at the faintly defined shape in the shadows. Then he called out to it softly.

“Benjamin?”

The figure stirred. It drew its shawl tighter about spindly shoulders and hobbled slowly into the light. It stopped again, muttering to itself as it looked around the room; then its eyes found the scholar at the lectern.

Leaning on a crooked staff, the old apparition hobbled slowly toward the lectern, never taking its eyes from the man who stood behind it. Thon Taddeo looked humorously perplexed at first, but when no one stirred or spoke, he seemed to lose color as the decrepit vision came near him The face of the bearded antiquity blazed with hopeful ferocity of some compelling passion that burned more furiously in him than the life principle long since due to depart.

He came close to the lectern, paused. His eyes twitched over the startled speaker. His mouth quivered. He smiled. He reached out one trembling hand toward the scholar. The thon drew back with a snort of revulsion.

The hermit was agile. He vaulted to the dais, dodged the lectern, and seized the scholar’s arm.

“What madness-”

Benjamin kneaded the arm while he stared hopefully into the scholar’s eyes.

His face clouded. The glow died. He dropped the arm. A great keening sigh came from the dry old lungs as hope vanished. The eternally knowing smirk of the Old Jew of the Mountain returned to his face. He turned to the community, spread his hands, shrugged eloquently.

“It’s still not Him,” he told them sourly, then hobbled away.

Afterwards, there was little formality.

21

It was during the tenth week of Thon Taddeo’s visit that the messenger brought the black news. The head of the ruling dynasty of Laredo had demanded that Texarkanan troops be evacuated forthwith from the realm. The King died of poison that night, and a state of war was proclaimed between the states of Laredo and Texarkana. The war would be short-lived. It could with assurance be assumed that the war had ended the day alter it had begun, and that Hannegan now controlled all lands and peoples from the Red River to the Rio Grande.

That much had been expected, but not the accompanying news.

Hannegan II, by Grace of God Mayor, Viceroy of Texarkana, Defender of the Faith, and Vaquero Supreme of the Plains, had, after finding Monsignor Marcus Apollo to be guilty of “treason” and espionage, caused the papal nuncio to he hanged, and then, while still alive to be cut down, drawn, quartered, and flayed, as an example to anyone else who might try to undermine the Mayor’s state. In pieces, the priest’s carcass had been thrown to the dogs.

The messenger hardly needed to add that Texarkana was under absolute interdict by a papal decree which contained certain vague but ominous allusions to
Regnans in Excelsis,
a sixteenth century bull ordering a monarch deposed. There was no news of Hannegan’s countermeasures, as yet.

On the Plains, the Laredan forces would now have to fight their way back home through the nomad tribes, only to lay down their arms at their own borders, for their nation and their kin were hostage.

“A tragic affair!” said Thon Taddeo, with an apparent degree of sincerity. “Because of my nationality, I offer to leave at once.”

“Why?” Dom Paulo asked. “You don’t approve of Hannegan’s actions, do you?”

The scholar hesitated, then shook his head. He looked around to make certain no one overheard them. “Personally, I condemn them. But in public-” He shrugged. “There is the collegium to think of. If it were only a question of my
own
neck, well-”

“I understand.”

“May I venture an opinion in confidence?”

“Of course.”

“Then someone ought to warn New Rome against making idle threats. Hannegan’s not above crucifying several dozen Marcus Apollos.”

“Then some new martyrs will attain Heaven; New Rome doesn’t make idle threats.”

The thon sighed. “I supposed that you’d look at it that way, but I renew my offer to leave.”

“Nonsense. Whatever your nationality, your common humanity makes you welcome.”

But a rift had appeared. The scholar kept his own company afterward, seldom conversing with the monks. His relationship with Brother Kornhoer became noticeably formal, although the inventor spent an hour or two each day in servicing and inspecting the dynamo and the lamp, and keeping himself informed concerning the progress of the thon’s work, which was now proceeding with unusual haste. The officers seldom ventured outside the guesthouse.

There were hints of an exodus from the region. Disturbing rumors kept coming from the Plains. In the village of Sanly Bowitts, people began discovering reasons to depart suddenly on pilgrimages or to visit in other lands. Even the beggars and vagrants were getting out of town. As always, the merchants and artisans were faced with the unpleasant choice of abandoning their property to burglars and looters or staying with it to see it looted.

A citizens’ committee headed by the mayor of the village visited the abbey to request sanctuary for the townspeople in the event of invasion. “My final offer,” said the abbot, after several hours of argument, “is this: we will take in all the women, children, invalids, and aged, without question. But as for men capable of bearing arms, we’ll consider each ease individually, and we may turn some of them away.”

“Why?” the mayor demanded.

“What should be obvious, even to you!” Dom Paulo said sharply. “We may come under attack ourselves, but unless we’re directly attacked, we’re going to stay out of it. I’ll not let this place be used by anybody as a garrison from which to launch a counterattack if the only attack is on the village itself. So in case of males able to bear arms, we’ll have to insist on a pledge-to defend the abbey under our orders. And we’ll decide in individual cases whether a pledge is trustworthy or not.”

“It’s unfair!” howled a committeeman. “You’ll discriminate-”

“Only against those who can’t be trusted. What’s the matter? Were you hoping to hide a reserve force here? Well, it won’t be allowed. You’re not going to plant any part of a town militia out here. That’s final.”

Under the circumstances, the committee could not refuse any help offered. There was no further argument. Dom Paulo meant to take in anyone, when the time came, but for the present he meant to forestall plans by the village to involve the abbey in military planning. Later there would be officers from Denver with similar requests; they would be less interested in saving life than in saving their political regime. He intended to give them a similar answer. The abbey had been built as a fortress of faith and knowledge, and he meant to preserve it as such.

The desert began to crawl with wanderers out of the east. Traders, trappers, and herdsmen, in moving west, brought news from the Plains. The cattle plague was sweeping like wildfire among the herds of the nomads; famine seemed imminent. Laredo’s forces had suffered a mutinous cleavage since the fall of the Laredan dynasty. Part of them were returning to their homeland as ordered, while the others set out under a grim vow to march on Texarkana and not stop until they took the head of Hannegan II or died in trying. Weakened by the split, the Laredans were being wiped out gradually by the hit-and-run assaults from Mad Bear’s warriors who were thirsty for vengeance against those who had brought the plague. It was rumored that Hannegan had generously offered to make Mad Bear’s people his protected dependents, if they would swear fealty to “civilized” law, accept his officers into their councils, and embrace the Christian Faith. “Submit or starve” was the choice which fate and Hannegan offered the herdsman peoples. Many would choose to starve before giving allegiance to an agrarian-merchant state. Hongan Os was said to be roaring his defiance southward, eastward, and heavenward; he accomplished the latter by burning one shaman a day to punish the tribal gods for betraying him. He threatened to become a Christian if Christian gods would help slaughter his enemies.

It was during the brief visit of a party of shepherds that the Poet vanished from the abbey. Thon Taddeo was the first to notice the Poet’s absence from the guesthouse and to inquire about the versifying vagrant.

Dom Paulo’s face wrinkled in surprise. “Are you certain he’s moved out?” he asked. “He often spends a few days in the village, or goes over to the mesa for an argument with Benjamin.”

“His belongings are missing,” said the thon “Everything’s gone from his room.”

The abbot made a wry mouth. “When the Poet leaves, that’s a bad sign. By the way, of he’s really missing, then I would advise you to take an immediate inventory of your own belongings.”

The thon looked thoughtful “So that’s where my boots-”

“No doubt.”

“I set them out to be polished. They weren’t returned. That was the same day be tried to batter down my door.”

“Batter down-who the
Poet?”

Thon Taddeo chuckled. “I’m afraid I’ve been having a little sport with him. I have his glass eye. You remember the night he left it on the refectory table?”

“Yes.”

“I picked it up.”

The thon opened his pouch, groped in it for a moment, then laid the Poet’s eyeball on the abbot’s desk. “He knew I had it, but I kept denying it. But we’ve had sport with him ever since, even to creating rumors that it was really the long-lost eyeball of the Bayring idol and ought to be returned to the museum. He became quite frantic after a time. Of course I had meant to return it before we go home. Do you suppose he’ll return after we leave?”

“I doubt it,” said the abbot, shuddering slightly as he glanced at the orb. “But I’ll keep it for him, if you like. Although it’s just as probable that he’d turn up in Texarkana looking for it there. He claims it’s a potent talisman.”

“How so?”

Dom Paulo smiled. “He says he can see much better when he’s wearing it.”

“What nonsense!” The thon paused; ever ready, apparently, to give any sort of outlandish premise at least a moment’s consideration, he added: “Isn’t it nonsense-unless filling the empty socket somehow affects the muscles of
both
sockets. Is that what he claims?”

“He just swears he can’t see as well without it. He claims he has to have it for the perception of ‘true meanings’-although it gives him blinding headaches when he wears it. But one never knows whether the Poet is speaking fact, fancy, or allegory. If fancy is clever enough, I doubt that the Poet would admit a difference between fancy and fact.”

The thon smiled quizzically. “Outside my door the other day, he yelled that I needed it more than he did. That seems to suggest that he thinks of it as being, in itself, a potent fetish-good for anyone. I wonder why.”

“He said you needed it? Oh ho!”

“What amuses you?”

“I’m sorry. He probably meant it as an insult. I’d better not try to explain the Poet’s insult; it might make me seem a party to them.”

“Not at all. I’m curious.”

The abbot glanced at the image of Saint Leibowitz in the corner of the room. “The Poet used the eyeball as a running joke,” he explained. “When he wanted to make a decision, or to think something over, or to debate a point, he’d put the glass eye in the socket. He’d take it out again when he saw something that displeased him, when he was pretending to overlook something, or when he wanted to play stupid. When he wore it, his manner changed. The brothers began calling it ‘the Poet’s conscience,’ and he went along with the joke. He gave little lectures end demonstrations on the advantages of a removable conscience. He’d pretend some frantic compulsion possessed him-something trivial, usually-like a compulsion aimed at a bottle of wine.

“Wearing his eye, he’d stroke the wine bottle, lick his lips, pant and moan, then jerk his hand away. Finally it would possess him again. He’d grab the bottle, pour about a thimbleful in a cup and gloat over it for a second. But then conscience would fight back, and he’d throw the cup across the room. Soon he’d be leering at the wine bottle again, and start to moan and slobber, but fighting the compulsion anyhow-” the abbot chuckled in spite of himself “-hideous to watch. Finally, when he became exhausted, he’d pluck out his glass eye. Once the eye was out, he’d suddenly relax. The compulsion stopped being compulsive. Cool and arrogant than, he’d pick up the bottle, look around and laugh. “I’m going to do it anyhow,’ he’d say. Then, while everyone was expecting him to drink it, he’d put on a beatific smile and pour the whole bottle over his own head. The advantage of a removable conscience, you see.”

“So he thinks I need it more than he does.”

Dom Paulo shrugged. “He’s only the Poet-sirrah!”

The scholar puffed a breath of amusement. He prodded at the vitreous spheroid and rolled it across the table with his thumb. Suddenly he laughed. “I rather like that. I think I know who does need it more than the Poet. Perhaps I’ll keep it after all.” He picked it up, tossed it, caught it, and glanced doubtfully at the abbot.

Paulo merely shrugged again.

Thon Taddeo dropped the eye back in his pouch. “He can have it if he ever comes to claim it. But by the way, I meant to tell you: my work is nearly finished here. We’ll be leaving in a very few days.”

“Aren’t you worried about the fighting on the Plains?”

Thon Taddeo frowned at the wall. “We’re to camp at a butte, about a week’s ride to the east from here. A group of, uh-Our escort will meet us there.”

“I do hope,” said the abbot, relishing the polite bit of savagery, “that your escort-group hasn’t reversed its political allegiance since you made the arrangements. It’s getting harder to tell foes from allies these days.”

The thon reddened. “Especially if they come from Texarkana, you mean?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“Let’s be frank with each other, Father. I can’t fight the prince who makes my work possible-no matter what I think of his policies or his politics. I appear to support him, superficially, or at least to overlook him-for the sake of the collegium. If he extends his lands, the collegium may incidentally profit. If the collegium prospers, mankind will profit from our work.”

“The ones who survive, perhaps.”

“True-but that’s always true in any event.”

“No, no-Twelve centuries ago, not even the survivors profited. Must we start down that road again?”

Thon Taddeo shrugged. “What can I do about it?” he asked crossly. “Hannegan is prince, not I.”

“But you promise to begin restoring Man’s control over Nature. But who will govern the use of the power to control natural forces? Who will use it? To what end? How will you hold him in check? Such decisions can still be made. But if you and your group don’t make them now, others will soon make them for you. Mankind will profit, you say. By whose sufferance? The sufferance of a prince who signs his letters X? Or do you really believe that your collegium can stay aloof from his ambitions when he begins to find out that you’re valuable to him?”