9

A few months after the departure of Monsignor Aguerra, there came a second donkey train — with a full complement of clerks and armed guards for defense against highwaymen, mutant maniacs, and rumored dragons — to the abbey from New Rome. This time the expedition was headed by a monsignor with small horns and pointy fangs, who announced that he was charged with the duty of opposing the canonization of the Blessed Leibowitz, and that he had come to investigate — and perhaps fix responsibility for, he hinted — certain incredible and hysterical rumors which had filtered out of the abbey and lamentably reached even the gates of New Rome. He made it evident that he would tolerate no romantic nonsense, as a certain earlier visitor perhaps had done.

The abbot greeted him politely and offered him an iron cot in a cell with a south exposure, after apologizing for the fact that the guest suite had been recently exposed to smallpox. The monsignor was attended by his own staff, and ate mush and herbs with the monks in the refectory — quail and chaparral cocks being unaccountably scarce that season, so the huntsmen reported.

This time, the abbot did not feel it necessary to warn Francis against any too liberal exercise of his imagination. Let him exercise it, if he dared. There was small danger of the advocatus diaboli giving immediate credence even to the truth, without first giving it a thorough thrashing and thrusting his fingers into its wounds.

“I understand you are prone to fainting spells,” said Monsignor Flaught when he had Brother Francis alone and had fixed him with what Francis decided was a malign glare.

“Tell me, is there any epilepsy in your family? Madness? Mutant neural patterns?”

“None, Excellency.”

“I’m not an ‘Excellency,’“ snapped the priest. “Now, we’re going to get the truth out of you.”A little simple straight-forward surgery should be adequate, his tone seemed to imply, with only a minor amputation being required.

“Are you aware that documents can be artificially aged?” he demanded.

Brother Francis was not so aware.

“Do you realize that the name, Emily, did not appear among the papers you found?”

“Oh, but it—” He paused, suddenly uncertain.

“The name which appeared was Em, was it not? — which might be a diminutive for Emily.”

“I — I believe that is correct, Messér.”

“But it might also be a diminutive for Emma, might it not? And the name Emma DID appear in the box!”

Francis was silent.

“Well?”

“What was the question, Messér?”

“Never mind! I just thought I’d tell you that the evidence suggests that ‘Em’ was for Emma, and “Emma” was not a diminutive of Emily. What do you say to that?”

“I had no previous opinion, on the subject, Messér, but — ’

“But what?”

“Aren’t husband and wife often careless about what they call each other?”

“ABE YOU BEING FLIPPANT WITH ME?”

“No, Messér.”

“Now, tell the truth! How did you happen to discover that shelter, and what is this fantastic twaddle about an apparition?”

Brother Francis attempted to explain. The advocatus diaboli interrupted with periodic snorts and sarcastic queries, and when he was finished, the advocate raked at his story with semantic tooth and nail until Francis himself wondered if he had really seen the old man or had imagined the incident.

The cross-examining technique was ruthless, but Francis found the experience less frightening than an interview with the abbot. The devil’s advocate could do no worse than tear him limb from limb this one time, and the knowledge that the operation would soon be over helped the amputee to bear the pain. When facing the abbot, however, Francis was always aware that a blunder could be punished again and again, Arkos being his ruler for a lifetime and the perpetual Inquisitor of his soul.

And Monsignor Flaught seemed to find the monk’s story too distressingly simple-minded to warrant full-scale attack, after observing Brother Francis’ reaction to the initial onslaught.

“Well, Brother, if that’s your story and you stick to it, I don’t think we’ll be bothered with you at all. Even if it’s true — which I don’t admit — it’s so trivial it’s silly. Do you realize that?”

“That’s what l always thought, Messér,” sighed Brother Francis, who had for many years tried to detach the importance which others had attached to the pilgrim.

“Well, it’s high time you said so!” Flaught snapped.

“I always said that I thought he was probably just an old man.”

Monsignor Flaught covered his eyes with his hand and sighed heavily. His experience with uncertain witnesses led him to say no more.

Before leaving the abbey, the advocatus diaboli, like the Saint’s advocate before him, stopped at the scriptorium and asked to see the illuminated commemoration of the Leibowitz blueprint (“that dreadful incomprehensibility” as Flaught called it). This time the monk’s hands trembled not with eagerness but with fear, for once again he might be forced to abandon the project. Monsignor Flaught gazed at the lambskin in silence. He swallowed thrice. At last he forced himself to nod.

“Your imagery is vivid,” he admitted, “but we all knew that, didn’t we?” He paused. “You’ve been working on it how long now?”

“Six years, Messér — intermittently.”

“Yes, well, it would seem that you have at least as many years to go.”

Monsignor Flaught’s horns immediately shortened by an inch, and his fangs disappeared entirely. He departed the same evening for New Rome.

The years flowed smoothly by, seaming the faces of the young and adding gray to their temples. The perpetual labor of the monastery continued, daily storming heaven with the ever-recurring hymn of the Divine Office, daily supplying the world with a slow trickle of copied and recopied manuscript, occasionally renting clerks and scribes to the episcopate, to ecclesiastical tribunals, and to such few secular powers as would hire them. Brother Jeris developed ambitions of building a printing press, but Arkos quashed the plan when he heard of it. There was neither sufficient paper nor proper ink available, nor any demand for inexpensive books in a world smug in its illiteracy. The copyroom continued with pot and quill.

On the Feast of the Five Holy Fools, a Vatican messenger arrived with glad tidings for the Order. Monsignor Flaught had withdrawn all objections and was doing penance before an ikon of the Beatus Leibowitz. Monsignor Aguerre’s case was proved; the Pope had directed that a decree be issued recommending canonization. The date for the formal proclamation was set for the coming Holy Year, and was to coincide with the calling of a General Council of the Church for the purpose of making a careful restatement of doctrine concerning the limitation of the magisterium to matters of faith and morals; it was a question which had been settled many times in history, but it seemed to re-arise in new forms in every century, especially in those dark periods when man’s “knowledge” of wind, stars, and rain was really only belief. During the time of the council, the founder of the Albertian Order would be enrolled in the Calendar of Saints.

The announcement was followed by a period of rejoicing at the abbey. Dom Arkos, now withered by age and close to dotage, summoned Brother Francis into his presence and wheezed:

“His Holiness invites us to New Rome for the canonization. Prepare to leave.”

“I, m’Lord?”

“You alone. Brother Pharmacist forbids me to travel, and it would not be well for Father Prior to leave while I am ill.

“Now don’t faint on me again,” Dom Arkos added querulously. “You’re probably getting more credit than you deserve for the fact that the court accepted the death date of Emily Leibowitz as conclusively proved. But His Holiness invited you anyway. I suggest you thank God and claim no credit.”