The Thibaults (121 page)

The priest had been on the point of alluding to M. Thibault’s death, but checked the impulse.

“Can you imagine what it’s like,” he continued, “coming to the brink of eternity without faith in God, without discerning, on the further shore, an almighty, merciful Father stretching out His arms in welcome? Do you realize what it means, dying in utter darkness, without a single gleam of hope?”

“All that,” Antoine put in briskly, “I know as well as you do.” He too had been thinking of his father’s death. After a momentary hesitation, he went on: “My profession, like yours, takes me to the bedside of the dying. I, perhaps, have seen more unbelievers die than you have, and I’ve such hideous recollections of those deathbeds, that I wish I could give my patients
in extremis
an injection of belief. I’m not one of those who feel a mystical veneration for the stoic’s way of facing death. And, quite sincerely, I wish for myself that, at that moment, I may be open to all the consolations faith can give. I dread a death without hope as much as a death-agony without morphine.”

He felt the priest’s hand touch his; it was trembling a little. Probably the Abbé was trying to construe this frank admission as a hopeful sign.

“How right you are!” The priest squeezed Antoine’s arm with a warmth that seemed almost akin to gratitude. “Well, take my advice, don’t seal up every way of approach to this Consoler whose help you’ll need, like all of us, one day. What I mean is: don’t give up prayer.”

“Prayer?” Antoine shook his head. “That blind appeal—to what? To that problematic Scheme of Things! To a deaf and dumb abstraction, that takes no heed of us!”

“Call it what you will, but that ‘blind appeal,’ believe me,
tells
. Yes, Antoine, whatever may be the name which for the moment you assign to it, whatever form this notion of an Immanent Will behind phenomena, a Law of which you have brief glimpses, may now take in your mind, you should, however much it goes against the grain, turn towards it—and pray. Ah, do anything, I implore you, anything rather than immure yourself in’ blank aloofness. Keep in touch with the Infinite, address it in whatever terms you can, even if for the moment there’s no reciprocity, if you seem to hear no answering voice. Call it what you like—inscrutable mystery, impersonal force, immeasurable darkness—but pray to it. Pray to the Unknowable. Only pray! Don’t disdain that ‘blind appeal,’ for to that appeal, as one day you will know, there answers suddenly a still small voice, a miraculous consolation.”

Antoine said nothing. “Our minds,” he thought, “are in water-tight compartments.” But, realizing the priest was deeply moved, he decided to say nothing further that might wound his feelings. In any case, they had reached his house and the car was slowing up.

The Abbé Vécard took Antoine’s proffered hand and clasped it. Before stepping out, he leaned forward in the darkness and murmured in a tone Antoine had not yet heard him use:

“The Catholic religion, my friend, is very different from what you think; believe me, it means far, far more than what you’ve been given to see of it up till now.”