In Search of the Blue Tiger (33 page)

‘No, I don't think of God like that. It's only a word and a word is not always a person. God could just be G.O.D. Like the Great Out Doors. I think God is about beauty and goodness. It can be in things, in actions, in people,' says the Brother, picking up a statue of a saintly figure. ‘Like this wonderful fellow here. Saint Augustine. He was an amazing philosopher. Centuries ahead of his time. In fact, time was one of the topics he was most interested in. I've got all the books he ever wrote. Look over there,' he says, pointing to a stack of books by the door. ‘If you ever want to know some secrets of the universe, delve into my Saint Augustine pile.'

As he places the statue back in its place on the altar I look at the column of books and long for secrets ahead of their time.

Brother Moses taught me something very exciting. He said GOD does not have to be one thing. He said GOD could as easily be the Great Out Doors as anything else and that no one really knows exactly what GOD is. And I got to thinking and thought that GOD is the opposite of DID. And DID is the Dark In Doors. This sounds good to me, as the Great Out Doors is brighter and stronger than the Dark In Doors. And the Dark in Doors is how I remember a lot of the time in the House of the Doomed and Damned. So GOD is now and DID is then and GOD can be all it means to me. And I don't feel any of us are Doomed or Damned anymore and no one has all the right answers.

‘Are the books too heavy for you?' asks Brother Moses, peering over the top of the huge pile that he holds in his own arms.

‘No,' I say, as I wobble behind him, balancing the shifting stack, trying to follow him as we carefully ascend the spiral stairs leading to the depository on the mezzanine floor.

Following Brother Moses' directions to stack them according to size, I sort and shelve the volumes in their rightful places. It is peaceful and quiet in the room.

Silence is a nice place.

When we have finished, I sit down next to Brother Moses on a bench beside a table in the small bay window. He takes a bag from his pocket and offers me a toffee. I take one, stuck to another.

‘Go ahead, treat yourself,' he says, gesturing me to take both. ‘It's so nice to have someone to work with. But I don't know that much about you,' he adds, sucking on his sweet. ‘Tell me what you like.'

He must know all about Mr Fishcutter, they all must know. But no one here has made me feel bad. They have all been friendly to me, as if they understand I did not mean to do wrong.

‘I like reading and writing,' I say. ‘And I like walking with my dog. In the fresh air. I like turning corners in places I have never been and seeing what is there.'

‘And what do you like to read and write about?'

‘Tigers. Especially, I like anything to do with tigers.'

It is not yet time to tell Brother Moses that I want to be a Blue Tiger, but I do tell him about my scrapbook.

This morning a dream whispered in my ear, so I woke up. In the memory of the dream I was with Blue Monkey, who I have not seen since I've been on the island. We were in the monastery library and I was using a huge needle to sew the spine of a book where the pages had fallen apart. When I looked up, the stained-glass window of Saint George and the Dragon had come alive. The battle raged in the foreground, but it was the background that drew my attention. There stood the Blue Tiger on a distant ridge. He was looking past the warring man and dragon and into my eyes. His stare was strong and full of recognition. I lay in bed, listening to the birds waking me up, the image of the tiger fresh in my mind. So I got up, even though dawn had barely broken, dressed, took out my blue crayons and drew a picture of the Blue Tiger on the front page of my scrapbook (that you are now reading). If you turn to the front you will see it. That's the way he looked at me. Just the way he is looking at you now.

The monks treat me like a boy and it's nice. In the early evening we play tag in the cloisters. They always let me catch them, though I never let on that I know this. Brother Saviour sometimes ruffles my hair when I play well. I like him doing this, it makes me feel good inside, like sea-breeze and sleep and chocolate all rolled into one. He doesn't know, but when he does it, I freeze the moment. He has spoken with the Abbot, who says that Stigir can come and live with me here. He has arranged to pick him up from Mrs April at the end of the month when he goes to Tidetown.
Meal times are nice and I'm learning the rules. No one talks at dinner, so you watch the monk in front of you and take the same number of potatoes that he does. Today for dinner I had three potatoes, one piece of fish, a big leaf of cabbage and two carrots.

This island is unlike Tidetown. It has a different feel, a different taste to the air. The coast is softer, the clouds seem lighter, less threatening. I like the way the monks move through the courtyards and orchards, how they greet each other, a hand on a shoulder. There is no suspicion here, nothing nasty in the woodshed. I do miss Mrs April, but I know she will visit as soon as she is able and she sends me a postcard every week. I keep them by my bed so I can look at the pictures before I go to sleep. The one that came yesterday shows a beach with two children building sandcastles. On the back she wrote that Stigir was just fine and he knows he'll be coming to stay with me in a short while. She is busy planting celery in a trench by the back wall of her garden.

I wonder how Blue Monkey is and I even miss the strangeness of the House of the Doomed and Damned, which is so familiar to me. I think about my time in the cellar and my treasure trove of books and trunks of mysteries from the past. But I'm learning plenty already in the month I've been here. The library is full of wisdom and knowledge I've never dreamt of. One ancient book was written by a wise man who had suffered terrible things (like Job, but without the boils). He said he survived because he had found a purpose in his life. Brother Moses helped me understand by saying that people long for happiness, but it is purpose that is all-important. It was very late one night when we finished the book. Brother Moses toasted bread on the open fire. ‘What is your purpose, young Oscar?' he asked me. I said it was my search for the blue tiger, even though I wasn't really sure what I might find. He smiled, handed me some buttered toast, and said that searching for a blue tiger was purpose enough for anyone.

Saint Augustine was born on the 13th November 354 and died on 28th August 430. When he was 18 he had a son called Adeodatus. Saint Augustine marvelled at the mystery of life and the world around him. One thing that interested him a lot was time. He questioned whether the future or past really exist. To his mind only the present is real and yet it is almost too quick for us to grasp. Once it is here it is gone and the present that is about to come is the future. He answers the riddle by saying that the past can only be thought of as past if one is thinking about it in the present. He says there are three times. This is how he described these three times: ‘… a present of things past, a present of things present, and a present of things future … The present of things past is memory, the present of things present is sight, and the present of things future is expectation.'

These are my three times with Stigir, as today I stood in the door of my cell:

Present of things past: I remember flying the kite with him and Mrs April and how he tugged on the string.

Present of things future: I'm looking forward to showing him the strawberry patch and playing on the beach at Open Bay.

Present of things present: I hear the wheels of Brother Saviour's cart. I hear Stigir bark. I see him trotting across the cloister. I feel love in my heart and the wet lick of his tongue on my cheek.

So … I'm in the present past, present future, and present present, and Stigir is with me!!

The sky strains under the weight of a huge grey cloud that hangs just above the horizon. A small fishing boat moves slowly beneath it, hoping it can creep by without being noticed. Brother Saviour and I sit shelling peas on the beach. It was his idea to come down here.

‘If we're going to shell peas for lunch, we might as well do it with a view,' he had said.