Sister Pelagia and the Black Monk Read Online Free PDF Page B

God, then it is certain to happen, but if it is not pleasing to God, then I have no need of it.” But in practice he was guided more by the maxim “Trust in God, but commit no blunders yourself;” and it must be admitted that he rarely blundered and did not trouble the Lord excessively.
It need hardly be said that the bishop was immediately fired with enthusiasm to go to New Ararat himself, in order to bring people to their senses and put an end to this business (he absolutely refused to allow the probability of anything genuinely mystical and saw the Basilisk phenomenon as either a case of mass insanity or a piece of chicanery perpetrated by someone or other).
The cautious Matvei Bentsionovich tried to persuade the bishop not to go. He expressed the opinion that rumors were dangerous and hard to lay to rest. You couldn't stop everyone's mouth. Administrative intervention in such cases was about as effective as dousing a fire with kerosene—it only made the fire blaze even more fiercely. Berdichevsky's proposal was as follows: under no circumstances should His Grace go to the islands or give the slightest impression that anything out of the ordinary was happening there, but he should secretly send to New Ararat a sensible and tactful official, who would get to the bottom of everything, find the source of the rumors, and present an exhaustive report. It was clear that by a “sensible official” Matvei Bentsionovich meant himself, and he was demonstrating yet again his constant readiness to forget about all current business and even his family responsibilities, if only he could be of service to his spiritual mentor.
As for Pelagia, while agreeing with Berdichevsky that an episcopal inspection would be inappropriate for the case, the nun could not see any point either in sending a lay person to the islands since, in the first place, he would not be able to understand the subtleties of monastery life and monkish psychology, and in the second place … But no, we had better quote this second argument verbatim, so that the polemicist's own conscience may bear its full weight.
“In matters concerning incomprehensible phenomena that cause trepidation to the soul, men are too categorical,” Pelagia declared, clicking away rapidly with her knitting needles—after her third glass of tea she had taken out her knitting without asking the bishop's permission. “Men have no curiosity about anything that they regard as unimportant, but the unimportant often conceals the most essential. When something has to be built or, even better, demolished, then men have no equals. But if patience, understanding, and possibly even compassion are required, then it is best to entrust the business to a woman.”
“But at the first sight of a ghost a woman will faint away or, even worse, have a fit of hysterics,” the bishop teased the nun. “And nothing useful will come of it.”
Pelagia looked at the row of stitches that had gone awry and sighed, but she didn't unknit it—let it come out whatever way it would.
“A woman will never faint or fall into hysterics if there's no man there,” she said. “All women's fainting, hysterics, and weepiness were invented by men. You want to think of us as weak and helpless, and so we adapt to suit you. The best thing for this business, Father, would be for you to give me your blessing to take two or three weeks’ leave. I could go to Canaan, pray at the local holy places, and at the same time see what kind of ghost it is they have floating over the water there. Sister Apollinaria and Sister Ambrosia could take care of my girls in the college for the time being. One can take gymnastics and the other literature, and everything would work out very well.”
“It can't be done,” said His Grace, interrupting his spiritual daughter with evident satisfaction. “Or have you forgotten, Pelagia, that nuns are not allowed into Ararat?”
That immediately shut the nun up.
And it was true that under the strict