Monsignor Quixote Read Online Free PDF Page B

the title of monsignor and I am leaving El Toboso in charge of that young priest.’
    â€˜The baker has a poor opinion of him and I’ve seen him myself in close talk with that reactionary of the restaurant.’
    Father Quixote insisted on taking the wheel. ‘Rocinante has certain tricks of her own which only I know.’
    â€˜You are taking the wrong road.’
    â€˜I have to go to the house once more. I have forgotten something.’
    He left the Mayor in the car. The young priest, he knew, was at the church. He wanted to be alone for the last time in the house where he had lived for more than thirty years. Besides, he had forgotten Father Heribert Jone’s work on Moral Theology. St John of the Cross was in the boot and so was St Teresa and St Francis de Sales. He had promised Father Herrera, although a little unwillingly, to balance these old books with a more modern work of theology which he had not opened since the days when he was a student. ‘Instinct must have a sound basis in belief,’ Father Herrera had correctly said. If the Mayor began to quote Marx to him Father Heribert Jone might perhaps prove useful in reply. Anyway it was a small book which fitted easily into a pocket. He sat down for a few moments in his armchair. The seat had been shaped by his body through the years and its shape was as familiar to him as the curve of the saddle must have been to his ancestor. He could hear Teresa move pans in the kitchen, keeping up the angry mutter which had been the music of his morning solitude. I will miss even her ill humour, he thought. Outside the Mayor impatiently sounded the horn.
    â€˜I’m sorry to have kept you waiting,’ Father Quixote said, and Rocinante gave a deep groan as he changed gear.
    They said very little to each other. It was as though the strangeness of their adventure weighed on their spirits. Once the Mayor spoke his thought aloud. ‘We must have something in common, father, or why do you go with me?’
    â€˜I suppose – friendship?’
    â€˜Is that enough?’
    â€˜We will find out in time.’
    More than an hour passed in silence. Then the Mayor spoke again. ‘What is upsetting you, friend?’
    â€˜We have just left La Mancha and nothing seems safe any more.’
    â€˜Not even your faith?’
    It was a question which Father Quixote did not bother to answer.

III
    HOW A CERTAIN LIGHT
    WAS SHED UPON THE
    HOLY TRINITY
    The distance from El Toboso to Madrid is not very great, but what with the faltering gait of Rocinante and the queue of lorries which stretched ahead the evening found Father Quixote and the Mayor still upon the road.
    â€˜I am hungry and thirsty,’ the Mayor complained.
    â€˜And Rocinante is very tired,’ Father Quixote replied.
    â€˜If only we could find an inn, but the wine along this main road is not to be trusted.’
    â€˜We have plenty of good manchegan with us.’
    â€˜But food. I must have food.’
    â€˜Teresa insisted on putting a parcel on the back seat. She told me it was in case of an emergency. She had no more trust, I’m afraid, in poor Rocinante than the garagist.’
    â€˜But this is an emergency,’ the Mayor said.
    Father Quixote opened the parcel. ‘Praise be to God,’ he said, ‘a big manchegan cheese, some smoked sausages, even two glasses and two knives.’
    â€˜I don’t know about praise to God, but certainly praise to Teresa.’
    â€˜Oh well, it is probably the same thing, Sancho. All our good actions are acts of God, just as all our ill actions are acts of the Devil.’
    â€˜In that case you must forgive our poor Stalin,’ the Mayor said, ‘for perhaps only the Devil was responsible.’
    They drove very slowly, looking out for a tree which would give them shade, for the late sun was slanting low across the fields, driving the shadows into patches far too thin for two men to sit in them at ease.