Dublin (27 page)

  As soon as this was done, the man from Ulster gave her a kindly smile, and in a clear voice announced:

  "Gratias agamus."

  Deirdre realised that this was Latin, but did not know what it meant.

  "Let us give thanks," Larine called out.

  So this, thought Deirdre, was Bishop Patrick.

  There was no mistaking his authority. He had a fine, aristocratic face. His eyes were very clear and sharp, but there was something special-she could see it at once-an aura of spirituality that seemed to radiate from him, and which was impressive. With two priests close behind him, he started on a little tour of inspection. First he went over to where two of the female slaves were still kneeling, briefly inspected their hands and their teeth, nodded, apparently satisfied, and proceeded to her brothers. He looked at them only briefly, then he moved on.

  He came to Morna and looked long and hard at him, while Morna blushed. Then he said something in Latin to Larine. Deirdre had not known the clever druid spoke Latin nowadays.

  "What does he say?" she demanded.

  "That your son has an honest face."

  Bishop Patrick was coming to her now. She was conscious that before he reached her, she had already been keenly observed. She was aware of his thinning grey hair as he bowed his head courteously before her.

  As he moved on to inspect two more of the slaves, Morna was standing at her side. She could see that the bishop had greatly impressed him.

  Bishop Patrick had completed his circle. He glanced across to Larine, nodded his head in a way that indicated that Larine should stay where he was, and then returned to Deirdre and Morna.

  "I am sorry for your trouble, Deirdre, daughter of Fergus," he said to her. He was speaking in her own tongue now. His eyes, looking out from under a thatch of grey eyebrows, seemed to see everything.

  "I hear you were a good daughter."

  "I was." She couldn't help it, whether the man was her enemy or not, she was touched.

  "And it's yourself, I should say," Bishop Patrick continued, "who holds everything together here. Isn't that so?"

  "It is," she said with feeling.

  "Thanks be to God for that." He smiled at her kindly. "You are afraid for your son's safety?" She nodded. "What good mother would not be?" He paused thoughtfully. "Tell me, is it God that you fear, Deirdre, or is it the druids?"

  "The druids."

  "You do not think that the God who made all things can protect your son?"

  She was silent; but he did not seem offended. Then he turned to Morna.

  "And so, young man." He was staring keenly into Morna's eyes.

  "You are the young man who this is all about. The kinsman of the High King."

  He took a step back as though to survey the youthful chief.

  "You have been summoned to him, have you not?"

  "It is true," Morna answered respectfully.

  Bishop Patrick appeared to be meditating. His eyes seemed to be half closed as he considered the subject before him. There was no question, she thought, he might have been some royal druid prince.

  Was he going to encourage Morna, or perhaps rebuke him? She had no idea.

  "And you would like to go to the High King's feis at Tara?"

  "I should." Morna wasn't certain whether this was the correct response, but it was the truth.

  "It would be a strange young man who did not," said Bishop Patrick.

  "And you have quarrelled with your mother?"

  "It is…" Morna was about to explain, but the bishop went on gently.

  Honour your mother, young man. She is the only one you possess. If it is God's will that you should do a certain thing, she will be led to understand the Tightness of it." He considered for a moment. "You wish to serve the one true God. Is that correct?"

  "I think so."

  "You think so." Bishop Patrick paused. "His service, Morna, is not always easy. Those who follow the Christian path have to try to do God's will, not their own. Sometimes we have to make sacrifices."

  At the mention of sacrifices, Deirdre tensed; but if Bishop Patrick saw this, he took no notice. "Are you prepared to make sacrifices to serve the God who gave His only Son to save the world?"

  "Yes." He said it quietly, but he did not seem to hesitate.

  "From those who follow me, Morna, I expect complete obedience. My followers have to trust me.

  These young men," he indicated the princes standing nearby, "obey my commands, which are sometimes hard."

  Morna glanced at them. They looked a noble group, the sort of group to which any young chief would be proud to belong. But having told him this, the bishop did not seem to be expecting any reply. For turning round abruptly, he went over to where one of the priests was holding his staff. Taking it from him, he held it firmly in his hand and in a clear voice addressed them.

  "This is the staff which gives me strength, for it is the staff of life, the staff of Jesus, the only Son of God the Father, who died for our sins.

  Jesus who sacrificed his life that each of us may live eternally. I, Patrick, bishop, humble priest, penitent sinner," he continued solemnly,

  "I, Patrick, come here not on my own authority-for I have none-but at the command of God the Father, made known to me through His Holy Spirit, to bear witness for His Son and to bring you the good news, that you, too, if you believe in Him, may have eternal life in Heaven and not perish into nothingness or the terrible fires of Hell. I shall not try to impress you with great learning, for my own is modest. I shall not persuade you with eloquent words, for I have no eloquence unless it be that given to me by the Holy Spirit. But listen to my poor words carefully, for I have come to save your souls."

  It was strange: Deirdre could not afterwards remember exactly what he had said. Some of it she recognised from what Larine had told her; but when Patrick spoke, it was different. He told them the story of Christ, and how he had gone to sacrifice. He described the cruel old island gods and explained that they were not real. They were stories, he told them, to give pleasure or to frighten children. How much greater, he explained, was the single, all-powerful God, who created the whole world.

  One part of the sermon she did recall in detail.

  He had made much of the fact that, like so many of the gods from the ancient days, this Supreme Being had three aspects: Father, Son, Holy Spirit-the Three in One, he called it. Nor should this be surprising, he explained. All nature was full of triads: the root, stem, and flower of a plant; the spring, stream, and estuary of a river; even the leaves of plants, like that of the tripartite shamrock, for instance, showed this principle of Three in One. "This," he explained, "is what we mean by the Holy Trinity."

  But above all, it was the way he spoke that impressed her. He had such passion, such certainty, such warmth. He brought her a sense of peace. Even if she did not exactly understand why this God of love of whom he spoke should necessarily be all-powerful, she found that she wanted it to be so. The cruel old gods were being chased away, like dark clouds fleeing over the horizon. And good riddance to them, she thought. The sense of warmth emanating from the preacher enveloped her. His confidence told her that he must be right. She glanced across at Morna. His eyes were shining.

  By the time Bishop Patrick had finished speaking, the idea of do Wg as he wished did not seem so strange. When he asked if they Would join in fellowship with him and be baptised, she realised that she wished he could stay with them longer. She did not want him . to depart. Joining his new faith seemed a way of keeping his comforting presence with them. If she followed her heart, she was ready to do as he wished. But she had followed her heart once before, and so had Conall. The heart was a dangerous thing. Dangerous for Morna.

  "Baptise me," she suddenly cried out.

  "Baptise the rest of us. But spare Morna."

  She couldn't help it.

  "Spare him?" Bishop Patrick was glaring at her.

  "Spare!"

  She saw the terrible flash of anger in the old man's eyes. He took several steps towards her and for a moment she thought he might even be about to strike her, or curse her like a druid. Instead, to her surprise, he stopped in his tracks, shook his head, apparently at himself, and then, to her utter astonishment, went down on his knees in front of her.

  "Forgive me, Deirdre," he said. "Forgive my anger."

  "Why…" She didn't know what to say.

  "If I failed to touch your heart, the fault is mine, not yours. It is my own shortcomings that made me angry."

  "It was beautiful, what you said," she protested.

  "It's just…"

  He had got to his feet again and he cut her off with a gesture of his hand.

  "You do not understand," he growled. He turned to Morna. "It is you who are chief of the Ui Fergusa now," he said solemnly. "Is it your wish that your family should be baptised?"

  "It is," said Morna.

  "And if you accept baptism from my hands, will you submit to my authority in matters concerning religion, and follow my instructions, as these young princes do?"

  "I will," said Morna.

  "Come then," the bishop commanded, "and I will tell you what we must do."

  The baptism they were to undergo required a simple immersion in water. A glance at the shallows of the Liffey had convinced Bishop Patrick that the river was not a very convenient place. The three local wells, which he now briefly inspected and blessed, were not suitable either. But the dark pool of Dubh Linn would do very well, he decided, and he told them to assemble there at once.

  And so a little group of Deirdre, her two brothers, and Morna, dressed in only linen shifts under their cloaks and attended by their half-dozen slaves, trooped down on that fine but slightly chilly September afternoon to the edge of Dubh Linn to be baptised. And one by one they stepped into its dark waters, where Bishop Patrick was standing, and sank down under its surface for a cold moment to emerge back into the light, baptised by Patrick's own hand, in the name of Christ.

  They dried themselves quickly. Everyone except Deirdre seemed cheerful. And they were just starting back up towards the rath when they were brought to an unexpected halt by Deirdre's youngest brother, Rian. He had just thought of something.

  "Is it true that only Christians go to the good place?" he asked.

  "It is," they assured him.

  "And the others all go to the fiery place?"

  That was so, too, they said.

  "Then what about my dad?" he asked, with genuine concern. "That means he'll be going to the fire." And after a few moments of consultation with his brother, they both agreed. Their logic might be a little strange, but it was held with conviction. Their father was resting with the family's gods. Right or wrong in the visitors" eyes, those gods had always been there and, somehow, would protect their own. But if Dubh Linn and the rath of Fergus became Christian, then the family would have turned their backs on the gods. Insulted them. Fergus would be left, as it were, stranded. The old gods would probably want nothing more to do with him, while the Christian God, apparently, would consign him to hellfire.

  "We can't let that happen to him," he protested.

  His brother, Ronan, was looking worried, too.

  Yet if Deirdre felt embarrassed, she observed that none of the priests seemed in the least surprised.

  For this was by no means an uncommon problem for Christian missionaries. If we are to be saved, their converts would ask, then what is the fate of our revered ancestors? Are you telling us they were wicked? The normal answer to this question was that God would make at least a partial dispensation for those who, through no fault of their own, had not the opportunity of accepting Christ. Only for those hearing Christ's message and then refusing it could there be no salvation.

  It was a reasonable explanation, but it did not always satisfy. And it was typical of the great northern bishop that he had, upon occasion, employed a method of dealing with this problem which was all his own.

  "How long is he dead?" he asked.

  "Five days," they replied.

  "Then dig the man up," he ordered. "I'll baptise him now."

  And that is what they did. With the help of the slaves, the brothers disinterred their father from his mound down by the Liffey's edge. While the pale form of Fergus lay stiffly on the ground, looking remarkably dignified in death, Bishop Patrick splashed some water upon him and, with the sign of the cross, brought him into the Christian world.

  "I cannot promise you he will reach heaven," he told the brothers with a kindly smile, "but his chances have greatly improved."

  They reburied the old man in his mound, and Larine placed two pieces of wood, joined in the sign of the cross, above it.

  They had returned to the rath and were about to enter the big thatched hall where the fire was burning, when Bishop Patrick stopped and turned to the members of the family.