XI

Ifell upon the bear’s ham and began gnawing and sucking the raw flesh, trying to appease my torturing hunger, and at the same time looked at my deliverer.

What had he on his head that looked the whole time like a wonderful sparkling ornament – I was unable to make out what it was and asked him.

“What have you on your head?”

“That is because you did not give me any money,” he answered.

I must admit I did not quite understand what he wanted to say, but continuing to look at him more attentively I discovered that his high diamond head gear was nothing more nor less than his own long hair. His hair was filled through and through with snowflakes, and had been blown about while he ran so that it had streamed out on all sides like wisps and become frozen.

“Where is your fur cap?”

“Thrown it away.”

“Why?”

“Because you gave me no money.”

“Well,” I said, “I forgot to give you money; that was wrong of me, but what a cruel man that master must be, who would not trust you, and took away your cap in this frost.”

“Nobody took away my cap.”

“What happened then.”

“I myself threw it down.”

He told me that he had walked all day following the signs and had at last come to a hut; in the but the carcass of a bear was lying, but the master was not there.

“Well?”

“I thought it would be long for you to wait, Bachka; you’d die.”

“Well?”

“I cut off the bear’s leg and ran back again, but I left him my cap.”

“Why?”

“That he should not think badly, Bachka.”

“But this master does not know you.”

“This one does not know me, Bachka, but the Other knows me.”

“What other?”

“That Master, Who looks from above.”

“Hm! Who looks from above?”

“Yes, Bachka, of course, He sees everything, Bachka.”

“He sees all, brother, He sees all.”

“Of course, Bachka, He does not like those who do wrong, Bachka.”

The reasoning was very much the same as that used by Saint Sirin, when seduced by a temptress, who tried to entice him into her house, but he invited her to sin with him before all the people in the market place, and she said: “We can’t there, the people will see us,” but he answered: “I don’t pay much attention to the people, but what if God should see us? It is better we separate!”

“Well, brother,” I thought, “you, too, are not walking far from the heavenly kingdom.” During my short reflections he had fallen down in the snow.

“Good night, Bachka; you grub. I want to sleep.”

And he began to snore in his own mighty fashion.

It was already dark: again the black sky was stretched over us, and on it again like sparks on pitch the rayless stars appeared.

By that time I began to revive, having swallowed a few small pieces of raw meat, and I stood with the bear’s ham in my hands, looking at the sleeping savage, and thinking:

“What an enigma is the journey of this pure, exalted soul in such a clumsy body, and in this terrible wilderness? Why is he incarnated here and not in lands more blessed by nature? Why is his understanding so limited that he is unable to have a broader and clearer conception of his Creator? Why, O God, is he deprived of the possibility of thanking Thee for enlightening him with Thy Holy Gospel? Why have not I the means in my hands to regenerate him with a new and solemn birth in Thy Son Christ? All this must be in accordance with Thy Will; if in his miserable condition Thou wishest to enlighten him with some divine light from above, then, I believe, that this enlightenment of his mind will be Thy gift. O Lord, how am I to understand it: let me not displease Thee by what I do; nor injure this Thy simple-hearted servant?”

Lost in these reflections, I did not notice the brightness that suddenly flamed up in the sky and bathed us in an enchanted light; again everything took on huge fantastic dimensions, and my sleeping savage appeared to me like a powerful enchanted fairy knight. I bent over him and began to examine him as if I had never seen him before, and what do you think? – he appeared to be beautiful. I imagined that this was he “in whose neck remained strength, he whose mortal foot never trod the path which no fowl knoweth, he before whom the horror fleeth,” which had reduced me to impotence, and had caught me as in a noose, in my own projects. His speech is poor – therefore he cannot console a sorrowful heart with his lips, but his words are as sparks from the beatings of his heart. How eloquent is his virtue, and who would consent to grieve him? Certainly not I. No, as the Lord liveth, Who has grieved my soul for His sake, I will not do it. May my shoulder fall off from my back, and my arm break off from the elbow, if I lift it against this poor man, and against his poor race. Pardon me, holy Augustin, even before I differed from thee, and now also I do not agree with thee that “even the virtues of the heathen are only hidden vices.” No, this saviour of my life acted from no other impulse than virtue, the most self-denying compassion, and magnanimity: he, not knowing the Apostle Peter’s words, “took courage for me, his enemy, and committed his soul to works of charity.” He threw away his fur cap and ran a day and a night in that frozen head-gear, being moved, of course, not only by the natural feeling of sympathy for me, but having also “religio,” prizing the reunion with that master “Who looks from above.” What can I do for him now? Am I to take from him this religion and destroy it, when I lack the means of giving him another and a sweeter one, “as long as words confuse the reason of mortals,” and it is impossible to show him works that could captivate him. Is it possible that I will force him by fear, or seduce him with the benefits of security. He will never be like Hamor and Shechem, who let themselves be circumcized for the sake of Jacob’s daughters and herds. Those who acquire faith for daughters and herds, acquire not faith, but only daughters and herds, and the offering from their hands will be for Thee like the blood of swine. But where are my means of educating, of enlightening him, when these means do not exist, and when it seems as if it had been decreed that they should not be in my hands? No, my Kiriak, is right: a seal is here and the hand that is not liberated will not be able to break it, and I remembered the words of the prophet Habakkuk: “Though it tarry, wait for it, because it will surely come, it will not tarry.” Come, Christ, come Thyself into this pure heart; come to this simple soul for as long as Thou tarriest none can force it… Let these snow-covered clods of His valleys be dear to him, and when his day comes let him cease to exist, let him cast off his life as a vine sheds its ripe fruit, as a wild olive tree sheds its blossoms… It is not for me to put his feet in the stocks nor to track his footsteps, when He Who Is has written with His finger the law of love in his heart and has led him aside from evil paths. Our Father, show Thyself to him who loves Thee and does not tempt Thee, and Thou shalt be praised for evermore as Thou hast always been praised, and through Thy mercy permit me and him and every one to fulfil Thy will, each as he can. There is no more confusion in my heart: I believe that Thou hast revealed Thyself to him as much as he requires it, and he knows Thee as all know Thee.

“Largior hic campos aether et lumene vestit Purpureo, solemque suum, sua sidera norunt!”

My memory recalled these words of Virgil – and bowing my head low beside my sleeping savage, I fell on my knees and blessed him, and covering his frozen head with the skirts of my cassock, I slept next to him, as I would have slept embracing the angel of the desert.

XII

Shall I relate to you the end? It was not less wonderful than the beginning.

When we awoke the savage arranged the snow shoes he had brought under my feet, cut me a staff, placed it in my hands and taught me how to use it, then he bound a rope round me and taking the end in his hand drew me after him.

You ask whither? First of all, to pay our debt for the bear’s meat. We hoped to find dogs there and to proceed further. But we did not go where my inexperienced plans had at first attracted me. In the smoky hut of our creditor another lesson awaited me, which had a most important influence on all my subsequent activity. The fact is, that the master for whom my savage had left his fur cap, had not been out shooting at the time that my deliverer had got there, but had been rescuing my friend Kiriak, whom he had found in the midst of the desert, abandoned by his Christian driver. Yes, gentlemen, here in this hut, lying near a dim stinking fire, I found my honest old monk, and in what a terrible heartrending condition! He had been quite frozen; he had been smeared with something and he was still alive, but the terrible stench that reached me when I approached him, told me that the soul that guarded this abode was leaving it. I raised the reindeer skin with which he was covered, and was horrified: gangrene had removed all the flesh from the bones of his legs, but he could still see and speak. Recognizing me, he whispered:

“Good day, Vladyko!”

With indescribable horror I looked at him, and could find no words.

“I was waiting for you, and now you have come. Thank God! You have seen the desert! What do you think of it? Never mind, you are alive, you have gained experience.”

“Forgive me, Father Kiriak, for having brought you here.”

“Enough, Vladyko! Your coming here will be blessed. You have gained experience, and can live. Shrive me quickly!”

“Very well,” I said, “directly. Where have you placed the Holy Elements? Were they not with you?”

“They were with me,” he announced, “but I have them no more.”

“Where are they?”

“The savage ate them.”

“What do you mean?”

“Yes, he ate them… Well, what of it?” he said. “He is an ignorant man… His His mind is confused… I could not prevent him… He said: ‘I shall meet a priest – he will forgive me.’ What is the use of speaking – his mind was quite confused.”

“Surely he did not eat the Chrism?”

“He ate everything, even the sponge, and carried off the pyx and deserted me… He believes that the priest will forgive him – what does it matter. His mind is confused. Let us forgive him, Vladyko – may Christ only forgive us. Promise me not to look for him – poor fellow – or, if you find him…”

“To forgive him?”

“Yes, I ask it for Christ’s sake… and when you come home, see that you say nothing about it to the little enemies, or perhaps the cunning people will wreak their zeal on the poor fellow. Please do not tell them.”

I gave him my word, and kneeling down near the dying man confessed him. At the same moment a gaily dressed sorceress rushed into the tent, which was now crowded with people, and began beating her tambourine; others followed her example, playing on wooden pitch-pipes and on another incomprehensible instrument of the type used in ancient times when the various tribes and races fell prone on their faces to the sound of pipes and other sorts of music before the idol of the Valley of Death – and a barbarous ceremony began.

These prayers were for us, and for our deliverance, though it might perhaps have been better if they had prayed for their own deliverance from us; and I, a bishop, had to be present at these supplications, while Father Kiriak was giving up his spirit to God, and was not exactly praying, nor exactly expostulating with Him like the prophet Jeremiah, or communing with Him like a true evangelical swine-herd, not in words but in inarticulate sighs:

“Have pity,” he whispered. “Take me now as one of your hired labourers. The hour has arrived… restore me to my former likeness and inheritence… do not let me be a wicked devil in hell – drown my sins in Christ’s blood, send me to Him… I want to lie at His feet. Say ‘So be it.’”

He breathed heavily and continued:

“O goodness – O simplicity – O love – O my joy! Jesus… I am running to Thee like Nicodemus through the night… Turn towards me – open the door… let me hear God moving and speaking… Now Thy garment is already in my hands… Thou mayest shatter my thigh… but I will not release Thee… before Thou dost bless everybody with me.”

I love this Russian prayer, as in the twelfth century it poured from the lips of our Cyril Zlatoust in Turov, and he bequeathed it to us. We must not only pray for ourselves, but for others, and not only for Christians but for the heathen, so that they too may be turned to God. My dear old Kiriak prayed in this way, he pleaded for all, and said: “Bless all or I will not release Thee.” What can you do with such an old original?

With these words he stretched himself – as if he were clinging to Christ’s garments – and flew away. It appears to me that he is still grasping and clinging to Him as He ascends, and still begging: “Bless all, or else I will not desist.” The insolent old man will, perhaps, get his way; and He, from goodness, will at the last not refuse him. All this we do, treating Christ in a homely way, in sancta simplicitate. Whether we understand Him, or not, of that you may argue as you like, but that we live with Him quite simply I think cannot be denied. And he loves simplicity greatly.