The Water Devil Read Online Free PDF Page B

snobbery, pride, gluttony—” but Brother Gregory wasn't listening very hard. Godric always
had
been a prig, and besides, his knowledge of Aquinas was practically cursory. Why Brother Gregory himself would have made a better abbot…
    “I was very fond of that body—” said Brother Gregory.
    “But now, not that you deserve it in the least, look up, Brother Gregory.” Gilbert looked up. He saw rank upon rank of angels dressed in velvet and cloth of gold, gently waving their irridescent wings like butterflies at rest. Between the angels was a staircase made of light and he knew he was invited to climb it by the sound of enticing music that came from above. He put a foot on the staircase, then looked down at his body in the mud. All around the tree, piles of hailstones that looked almost like heaped snow were melting. A miserable death, in the French mud, undignified by honor, unshriven. He'd always planned on something a little better than that. But the music was more urgent, more inviting now. BrotherGregory looked up at the shining host of heaven. He thought hard. There was something he was struggling to remember.
    “I can't go just now,” he said,“Margaret's expecting me. I sent her a letter I'd be home.”
    Godric the former abbot looked disgusted. “Your earthly vows and promises are void now,” he said. “Go up.”
    “Oh, no, it's more than a promise. Margaret can't do without me. How will she manage? The children—my family. She'll have to go live with them, and they're very hard to get along with. And she must be out of money by now—” Looking up at the golden company, he said, “I really don't mean to be rude. I mean, this was what I always wanted. You know that I prayed for it all my life. But even though it's higher and better, and my soul's desire, well, you see—” He took a step back down the staircase again and looked regretfully at the cold, muddy place below the shattered tree. Would it hurt to jump so far? Suddenly he was surrounded by a blazing white light, and felt a strange warmth moving through him.
    “What are You doing that for? Look at what he's doing. Turning his back on Your heaven itself. Can't You see he is unworthy, just as I always told You?” Gilbert could hear the abbot's voice nattering somewhere distant.
    “On the contrary, that's exactly why he is worthy,” came a vast, vibrating voice in response. “Poor dried up, right-thinking Godric, you stand at the foot of my staircase and still do not understand that I exist in the past, the present, and the future all at one time. Brother Gregory is worthy because even before, he would be this, and when what will be is, he will be yet again otherwise. Could you make such a choice as he has done, holy man? When you have at last learned that there are many paths to the foot of My staircase, I will invite you, too, to mount up it.”Abbot Godric looked again and saw a crowd of people climbing up the staircase: priests and nuns, merchants and knights, horse traders and carpenters, fishwives and laundresses and…
    “There goes Brother Peter—I fasted much more strictly than
him
—and that horrible brewster who served ale on Sundays—”“Ah, Godric, Godric, you were the most virtuous of virtuous men. But where was love?” answered the Voice.
    GILBERT DE VILERS'S DEAD , staring eyes looked up into the frightened face of one of his crossbowmen. He blinked.
    “He blinked!” cried the soldier. “A miracle! He lives!”
    “Take off my helmet,” whispered Gilbert, “I've got the most terrible headache.” He saw they'd cleared his foot of the stirrup, pulled off his surcoat, and unbuckled his breastplate. Had the heralds already counted the dead? Had they been stripping his corpse? His leg throbbed. He hoped it wasn't broken. There lay Urgan, his harness covered in mud. “Oh, my God,” groaned Gilbert, “father's horse. I'm finished. I'll never live it down.” Gray clouds were scudding across the sky, but still it was