A Complete Story

New Zealand Tablet, Volume LII, Issue 32, 26 August 1925, Page 9

A Complete Story

p| The leper stirred in his sleep and moaned. The brief, distressed movement gave better play to the strong light that sifted through the canvas roofing above him. It revealed a face marked with brown patches, thinly bordered with white, a characteristic mark of it the . victim’s malady. Lank, lustreless hair % sprawled in untidy fringes over the blank white forehead. Lying passively on the coverlet were hands swollen at the joints into' >; discolored modules. The slack-lipped face of the sick man was disfigured into the '• strange leonine character which is one of £ leprosy’s fantastic touches. “The first-born of death,” Job had named leprosy, and the I sick man had progressed far on the road to death’s reality. . The face of the stricken sleeper contorted | and he groaned again in a weedy, broken g voice. The two men who stood above the bed looked at each other. The tall dark man nodded to his companion. “Better Avake him,” he advised, “he’s having bad dreams.” , _ The other thrust his hand under the crude cheese-cloth screening and dropped his hand forcefully on the sick man’s shoulder. The sleeper stiffened convulsively and gasped; then, as he recognised the anxious faces, he smiled sheepishly. He stretched his arms to their gaunt full length and painfully raised himself on his elbow. The tall man smiled down at him. “Another nightmare,” he accused. “What was it this time?” The face of the sick man darkened to a troubled frown. “Oh, Father,” he said wearily, “you know.” His perplexed eyes studied the two friendly faces. “While you were p over at the island,” he said slowly, “Joe fcv brought me a letter. It was from homeit was from my mother.’’ He lowered his head for some minutes and \B studied the pattern of the coverlet. When I? he looked up again his eyes were' misted. “My mother insists on coming to see me,” lie, whispered. “She says she has already : bought tickets to New York. Dear God, Avhat shall we do!” : *• * The two men, at, the bedside looked at each other in mute distress. They loved life, , these two, yet either would gladly have given up his robust vigorous health to lay down in the leper’s bed of pain to spare that frail, gentle lady, the leper’s mother, Avhose bowed shoulders could never bear the weight of . this cross. -- .. . ....... „.- ,' 'p _ ■ frhe pity of it X He was the youngest of-- ( three priests; \ appointed to the infant St\ Gabriel’s Mission in the Sudan, and .in

MARY’S ANSWER

the full tide of his vibrant, eager young life he had been struck down. So patient the dangerous effort to keep the awful intelligence from the anxious, questioning mother in far-off' America, so brave the cheerful equivocating letters he had sent homel and after all ~ . . failure. The sick priest toyed with the envelope. “You know,” he said, and his voice was so . low they had to stoop to hear him, “mother always had a half-morbid fear of sickness. 1 can see her now, her forehead wrinkled with distress, tying up the little cuts and bruises I got *as a child. Even- things like that worried her. When she knew I was coming to Africa her chief worry was about my health. She warned me a thousand times to beware of malaria. If she saw me like this” —the low voice broke —“it would kill her.” The leper looked steadily into the compassionate faces. The wistful look in the halfblind eyes penetrated the helplessness their faces betrayed, , f ' The tall priest broke from the look. His wavering glance roved about the stark canvas Avails, scanty insufficient walls, reinforced with sheets, a discarded cassock and articles of personal wear to shut out the cold, damp winds which stole in at night from the sea. For the hundredth time the tall priest wondered at the display suspended about the room. Everywhere about the room, either pinned to the Avails or hung from the fantastic wainscot-ting, were pictures of the Madonna. All the exquisite conceptions of Middle Ages’ genius were there, cheap prints but well copied and framed. There was Raphael’s Madonna and the Madonna of his gifted pupil. There was' the tender imagination of the spiritual Da Vinci and the bolder thought of Michael Angelo, and others, many others. Why? He wondered. The sick man caught his wondering glance and answered it,' nodding at the pictures. “My mother always had an extraordinary devotion to Mary,” he said. “She was a convert and attributed her grace of faith to Mary. She told me that before I was born she had my name selected. , She was going to call me Mary Bernadette.” He smiled whimsically, a broad boyish smile whibh wholly redeemed the ugliness of the misshapen face. “ “Poor mother, I disappointed her. There was never a Mary in our family and only one boy, only myself. When I left she promised that every night she > would pray* to the Blessed . Virgin to !

protect me. She had every confidence, mother . had, 'that while ’ she prayed’ no harm could come to me.” • .• •. V ' ; He wrinkled . his i brows ' thoughtfully I and looked off at the sea. Sunlight glanced on it ; here and "there ' under the urge of the wind tiny wavelets changed to a featured foam, shone silver for a moment, then turned again to blue. Blue at the coast and a blue-black off at sea. The sick man looked at it with pleasure. He had always been loyal to the sea. He loved blue water as St. Francis would have loved it had he not lived instead among the birds and trees and flowers of Assisi. Born on the Atlantic seaboard he had spent his carefree youth near the tonic waters. And now his friends had brought him from the germ-infested interior here to the coast as a last despairing recourse. - '' Somewhere on that magnificent tinted sea the Admiral Nelson was ploughing her way bringing his mother to Calcutta— heartbreak. The lean fingers contracted and clutched the coverlet! “Oh, Fathers,” he whispered, “Mary’s got to hurry; ... if she intends to save.” Neither of the two dared look at the other. One fumbled at the tent-drawings and stole out on tip-toe. The other followed him. Through the long night they debated, pondering how to avert the tragedy surely coming in a brief few days when mother and son should meet. Expedients proposed by one were rebutted by the other. The fantastic nature of the means proposed showed the utter hopelessness of the case. They fell silent after awhile and each knew that the other was praying. The restless days that followed brought no enlightenment. Incessant fretting and plotting left them without a sane solution.More and more frequently the sick man turned his brooding eyes inquiringly on them, and, sick with the sense of their own helplessness, they ignored the mute question. Came then at last the evening of the fateful fifteenth. The wind from the sea died down at evening and in the still, oppressive heat of the smothering night they lay awake, weakened by the heat, too dispirited even to talk. In the stillness they, could hear the,rustling of sheets as the leper turned and tossed in' a sleep which was only a fiction of rest. Dawn found them up and waiting. Painstakingly they made the pitifully inadequate preparations which were possible. They washed the wasted form and the leper suffered the torture without protest. In a last futile gesture they brushed the 1 wrinkles from his covering and folded it neatly about' him. After it all they stood back and appraised their handiwork. The leper looked at them, an anxious question in his eyes. As they surveyed him their hearts sank. The shrunken, twisted limbs were concealed but the immaculate linen of the pillow slip was no whiter than the mask of a face which it framed.,- Except for the wistful staring eyes the face was the face of one who had been dead for days. . " • But it was their best and, praying, they left him so. v • • , " ■

'...'Now and then one would start fearfully and stare up the , narrow road « obscured by Eucalyptus trees, The boat was to land at Calcutta, add* a native waggon would be used to bring the mother -up the coastwise road to their camp. ; ; h The 'sun rose higher and higher remorselessly, urging on the hours. Father Augustine drew on his,pipe. The acrid fumes bit at the roof ■of his parched throat. He struck it against the bench and stepped on the dottle, then posed, arms folded, staring up the road. , , - , ' It was almost with relief that they heard the clicking of wheels and the rustling of brush. Father Augustin© with grave courtesy extended his hand to the bright-faced old lady who was its only passenger. “I am Father Augustine, he said simply. She smiled and then they saw the resemblance to her son. She extended her hand to the squat little man, his companion, who accepted it solemnly. Then her face clouded, “John,” she questioned sharply, “Father John, where is he?” Father Augustine answered her. He drew hack the flap of the tent and motioned within. “In here,” he said gently. “He felt unwell and we made him"stay in bed.” When she entered he dropped the tent fold helplessly, then held his breath waiting for the mother’s despairing cry. He caught the other’s eye and lifted his shoulders in an expressive gesture of despair. From the tent came a raptuous cry of greeting, then a flurry of inarticulate conversationand only that. Unbelieving the two men stared at each other. The mother appeared in the opening. Tears were on her cheeks' but here eyes were smiling. ' “Come in,” she commanded gayly, “how you frightened me. Why, he isn’t sick at all.” Incredulously they stared at the mfin who, propped on his elbow, smiled at them from the bed. The eyes that smiled affectionately at them were clear and shining, the features were pinched a little but well defined and his voice as he introduced them was strong and resonant., . Outside the tent again the two looked at each other. 1 ' “Tell me,” said . the small companion. “My eyes may have tricked me but didn’t his face look like that of a man in perfect health?” The other nooded slowly. “Do you think,” the other persisted, “that it was a ?” 1 “Why not?” ' said Father Augustine, “They were both clients of Mary and Mary can surely work miracles.” “Besides,” he added softly, “isn’t Mary herself a, mother?”—Rev. J. S. Sexton, in The Magnificat.