The Fun of Shades

The sky was a deep pink, passing into gold, when I woke in the morning.

A haze in my head prevented from my appreciation of the bright morning, because the haze seemed evenly and heavily pressed on my brain. However, outside the windows, the weather was fine, and by the end of my morning meal I got better.

Our way was lying to the Nyoman side, which we reached by carriage. Going horseback, we could come quicker, but we were about to continue our way, by train, that's why we had our travel bags about. Leaving the civil parish, we went along the deep and shady Gorge, which was called a "valley" and bearing the name of the native poet laureate, who loved this site, hymning it in his epics. When moving along the Gorge, we descended to the Nyoman side, where the road ended in the long bridge towards the left bank. Crossing the river, our carriage began now flying up now diving dip, on the move over the high forested hills. The forests parted, here and there, and then, from the bird's-eye view, the familiar magnificent perspectives and views opened before our eyes. Really, my homeland was worth being revisited for those views alone. Soon, some steeples came into view.

(In the Middle Ages, every construction of a Cathedral or temple was a huge contribution to economy of the land. New investments and jobs: besides the workers there were needful more people as the workers' assistants, women, children, men. According as the Age, the workers and constructors had a huge stimulus, believing that when building a temple they made a wonder. A human's life was less than 30 years in average. Their world could be called a world of the young. Short childhood; short life. Those were my melancholic thoughts, on the approach to Nesvije Priory.)

The Priory set high on the top of a cliff above the Nyoman. Beautiful gardens around, and beyond the gardens, the woodland rose. The road went to a long white-stone fence, with rich old trees seen over the fence. The gates let our carriage in a small rectangular courtyard; on the right, a shady alley of venerable lime-trees led somewhere, and on the left, there were the second gates. Stating the essence of our request to the monk of the name of Father Romuald, saying that we want the confessor of Mme Leticia Lisnyak, we were asked to wait and offered to use the chance to see the territory. Feeling like a mere tourist, simple-hearted to this site and my ancestral religion, I loved the chance to see more.

Going through the second gates, Clem and I found ourselves in a large and exceptionally clean flower garden with straight pathways. Beyond the flowerbeds there rose the soft-pink and white building of the Roman Catholic temple with two long white galleries on sides. The liturgy finished and the congregation was dispersing. We went up the broad staircase and entered the temple.

It was spacious, with a number of old pictures of the Italian school. The Nesvije Priory's history sounded like a poetic legend. Bearing the geographical name of the location, founded in 1507 by one Mr Kristobald Pyast, the Chancellor of the Princedom, the Priory was conveyed to the sombrest of the Roman Catholic religious orders, Brothers of Silence, from Italy. By the official oath, the Brothers kept silence, always, unless greeting each other with two words "Memento mori!" But another story preceded the conveyance and the building.

The legend had it that the Chancellor Pyast lost his young wife and he grieved for her untimely deceased extremely and for a long time. Their only daughter was educated in Italy, and on the day of her return home, Chancellor Pyast was stunned by her striking resemblance to his late wife. The crazy man fell in love with his own daughter, and soon he began openly living with her in the illegitimate conjugal union. After he fathered a child, he wrote and sent a message to the Pope, asking the Pope's permission to get married to his own daughter. The household of the Pyast family castle began preparations for the wedding; the invited guests came; eventually, the nuncio came, the ambassador, who was expected so fervently. They gave a state reception in his honor, and at the reception, the nuncio gave the crazy tycoon the bull with the Pope's damnation. Furious, Mr Pyast tore the bull to pieces and announced that he could do without the Pope's blessing. But the scene made a painful impression upon his daughter-bride's mind; she began pining, fell ill and soon died. Her death broke Mr Pyast. He left his post of the Chancellor, isolated himself in his castle and began the construction of the Priory, on the top of the high cliff, the place which his beloved one used to visit so often. He became a monk there. The legend had it that the following ominous happening caused his ultimate decision. The architect of the construction had a weird dream.

A day long, the architect was busy, seen jumping over ditches and climbing scaffoldings, rain or shine, along with the stone masons and workers. The sound of mattocks slipped into the sound of hummers and hauling winch. Planned beams across cut stones. Extracted and trembling, roots of trees were placed in the new soil so that they could live again as the park. With the aid of oxen, the first statues were brought. Every single sunset, the shade of the Castle grew from the labour of the day. The architect got tired by night, and he could not be called an insomniac or neurasthenic -- and yet, he had a weird dream, one night.

In his sleep, he saw an unknown man coming out from a wall of the temple. Bare-headed, slender, the man was wearing in black, as a priest, maybe, but the architect was not sure, because the dress didn't look usual for his time, though it was black, long-sleeved and floor-long. Seeing the man, the architect, abed, wanted to rise, but he could not move his limbs; he merely could lift his head and turn it to follow the stranger with his eyes. The stranger walked quickly and with confidence by the bed, and the architect peered into the man's face, but he never saw it, because the stranger's light-brown wavy hair began moving to cover the man's face, like a living curtain, as he walked. Passing by the bed, silent and solemn, with the wavy hair covering his face, the stranger disappeared somewhere in the opposite wall. Then at the architect's pillow, another man appeared. Hairy all over, looking fearsome, the second man hang over the architect's face and said, slowly and hissing, "When you finish the construction of this priory, you'll see the face. When you see the face, you'll die!" (Truly fearsome, and it didn't sound like a fib from the architect who had a reason of his own to leave the work.) The architect woke in a cold sweat, as he told to his friends, and in several days, he left the place of his work, secretly, by night, for ever.

Then, the construction passed from hand to hand, several times. Employee turnover was constant, because various misfortunes took place periodically there. Finally, the last of the architects, young and brave, died on the day of consecration, being accidently smashed by a plank fallen from the last scaffolding. Today, those who want to see the personages of the antiquated tragedy can go to the right wing of the temple where two time-dimmed portraits of Mr Kristobald Pyast and his wife Krista-Belle are side by side on the white wall of the gallery. (Really, it looks like the two misfits were good-for-nothing Christians, with their weird love story, with the Chancellor's attitude towards the Pope's power, with his message and response to the reply, which suggests, in my view, either his utter naivety or his exceptional obsession or perverted frame of mind, and makes me think of a possibility that the mentioned pagan-like attitude towards the deadly sin of incest, the mentioned errancy, and naivety or whatever, used to be usual and acceptable or prevailing in Nyomanland, in the times, when the deviations and errancy had been forgotten or hardly possible in the Christian world. That's why the story seemed so interesting to me, and I've adduced it. On the other hand, the story could suggest that the remote land was happily up-to-date to the coming Renascence. Scarcely. The fact is that the buffer zone was always free of any witch-hunt.) Tourists like me, Clem and I, can visit the two ill-fated lovers, today. The monk Father Benedict with a candle in hand showed us the way to the cold and humid dungeon, where a big oaken coffin showed black on an eminence of the stone floor. The coffin had a thick glass on the top instead of a wooden lid. Through the glass, we could see two human skeletons, male and female, and a child's cranium between them. Initially, Kristobald Pyast was entombed in the temple's porch, by his own last will, in order that every comer could step on his remains. Later his remains were extracted and re-placed in the double coffin.

About dungeons, it must be said that they were numerous in the Priory, and some of them were long, going far. They were almost empty, in the time of our sightseeing, having merely some remains of the Brothers of Silence, which were not placed to the communal subterranean tomb, for some reason. Now, from the eternal night and cold, we returned to the light passage with the tall windows, sunlit and warm, and then we went out to the high porch.

On sides of the porch, at the wall of the temple, from the tall grass, crosses of some graves were seen. An abandoned cemetery? We saw the inscriptions on the gravestones in Russian. From the white wall between the temple and the garden, a small row of graves went; three massive gravestones of black and dove-blue marble. The gravestone next to the wall bore the name "A. F. Lvoff." Father Romuald, who approached us from behind, in company with another monk, explained that the mentioned deceased was a composer, author of the national anthem of the Russian Empire (1798-1870). The middle gravestone bore a name of Mr Lvoff's widow, and the third was his male cousin's. Lvoff was one of the local richest landowners, loving the Priory, and he was buried in this soil by his own last will. His funeral might be grandiose, but the mortals' memory, which "lives on forever," cannot outlive even the nettles on their graves. (Alas! Poor Yorick!) In the meantime, Father Romuald introduced us to his companion, the monk, who was the very confessor, who we wanted.

From the talk with Leticia's confessor, we learned that he didn't know her whereabouts, last hearing from her about four years ago. His genuine look made me believe in his words. Why not? Besides, even if we didn't believe the monk, we could not do anything. Nothing but an impression, and the impression was in his favour.

Successful or not, mission accomplished. We had had the long walk about the beautiful precinct, breathing in the Past, to our heart content, and when we got outside the main gates, on a sunlit glade, we saw the Present in shape of two or three autocars puffing, on view. We went to our carriage, which was to take us to the railway station.

We took the train to Pskovsk, not long before the sunset. Outside the window, the familiar landscape spreading to the horizon looked like a greyish-brown steppe with a two-horned silhouette of a Gothic temple in the town seen on a hill. The cloudy weather and the greyish view caused a wish to return home or to make our business trip as quick as possible or to reach a blazing hearth as soon as possible. Beginning from the railway station, our way went deep or rather a little bit deeper into the Russian Empire; however, we were not in need of the Empire itself, unless some business in the vicinity of Pskovsk.

Next day, from the town of Pskovsk, our way lay to Dry Valley, which geographical name sounded confusing or highly inappropriate if to take into consideration the fact that the Monastery of St Sergius was set on an island in the middle of a big lake. But first, in Pskovsk, we took a room in a good inn to take care about our clothes, look, food and rest. Only afternoon, we willed ourselves to leave the embers crackling and blazing on the hearth, and our hired cab took us out of the town. After the last signs of suburbs were left behind, the landscape around seemed more and more deserted.

As the cab went along the road in the somber woodland, small streams and lakes, megaliths called a dragon's teeth, and ravines overgrown with thistles, and other picturesque sights of the sort graced the landscape, but the road was well-trodden and rather busy, inclusive some carriages, drays and walkers, which made it a bearable way to Dry Valley. Arriving, on the lake side, we saw something like a landing stage. The big misty lake looked like a brightest part of the site, dominating over some humble abodes, especially on the cloudy day like that; however, our intention was neither waiting for a ship nor finding a shelter in the nearby village. We hired a boatman's service.

The wind got stronger, and the head waves badly rocked the boat, that's why it was a kind relief, when we eventually moored to the island or rather the boat struck the shore head-on. We tried our best to be fast and careful, when disembarking. Chilly, in the wet raincoats and caps, Clem and I walked on the wet stones of the pathway up to the gates.

A door-keeper let us in; the dumpy and paunchy monk hastened to say that it was time of the divine service and visitors should show patience. We were ready to be patient, indoors; all we wanted was getting dried and some warmth at a room where we could take off our wet raincoats and gumshoes and to place our travel bags in a safe dry place. Given all this in the highly ascetic form, quite comprehensible, in a dwelling, a sort of an inn, we were seated on a big trunk in a deep niche.

The seat was stiff yet the place was off the draughts. No instrumental music at the Orthodox Christian temples; this divine service was heard as low distant sounds of booming male voices; now, one voice, now, a choir. We straightened our clothes and hair. Luckily, our tweeds were relatively dry; Clem and I disjoined our arms when the Door-Keeper came carrying a tray with two small bowls of some hot food for us.

Coming after, three young cats appeared at his feet to take a look at us; a moment after the three sat down and began watching us, the fourth cat, older, came in to join them. Quite comprehensible: mice. The hot food in our bowls looked like Hafermehlsuppe, an oatmeal soup, smelling obscure. A cup of coffee or tea was more preferable, but we were ready for any hot food. Spooning the soup, we saw it was an oatmeal brew with cabbage, onion and carrot, and it was too hot, that's why we never gave the bowls to the cats on the floor. We placed the bowls on the edge of the trunk and took our packed lunch out of our travel bags.

Dry ration with no alcohol, but with two bars of Bligcken&Robinson chocolate. Seeing the Door-Keeper or anybody else was not about to disturb our solitude, I added some brash bread to the bowls of the soup, which was too hot no longer, then I placed the bowls back on the trunk and beckoned the cats, who readily used the chance, merely, we had to give more place for them, for the while they ate.

We were called only some time after the divine service finished.

The cell of Father-Superior was dim yet well-heated, and in the room there were several cats more lying in the dark corners, on the benches and baskets. Father-Superior invited us to sit at his table next to the small window and to have a cup of tea and jam. Clem could talk Russian only a little bit better than me, which made our speech rather laconic. We talked with our host in Russian but we were not Russians, and we could not correspond to the old man's wish to talk about this and that -- before talking on business -- about the prices for hay and bread in our part of the world and how the Governor was getting on. Taken aback, Clem didn't know what to reply. And I felt sleepy after having the glass of hot tea, which brew was quite usual and rather watery. The silvery-haired old man of middle stature looked hale and hearty, and he seemed to be fond of tea with strawberry jam, and he seemed rather talkative to visitors. Eventually, his disappointment in our Russian and our dreadful pronunciation made him stop his fashionable talk, and he said, "And, pray, how are you?" which question gave us a chance to explain the purpose of our visit.

In reply, Father-Superior said that his monastery never gave a shelter to a woman of the name of Leticia Lisnyak. About the second part of our request, the old man said all right and he called one of his monks to make inquiry about the name of the confessor of Clem's late father. If the monk was sent earlier, we could finish this business a while ago. Oh those eastern formalities… Now, the monk returned and said the name of the confessor.

"Ohh…" hearing the name, Father-Superior sighed and explained, "Father Antonius is unwell. Lying up. He has turned eighty, you know." He asked the monk if Father Antonius ready for receiving a layman. He was replied yes.

Then he said to us, "Father Kiryll will show you the way to Father Antonius's cell... I see you want to sleep," Father-Superior turned to me, and added, "Every guest gets a cell with bed and table to live in our Monastery, my lords. Go now."

It turned out that Clem knew the proper way to finish visits like this, because he was the first to approach the old man for receiving the priest's blessing and kissing on the priest's hand. Following his example, I had the chance to sense the warm smells of incense and some oils; however that may be, it was so nice of the old man not to reject the tourists of foreign congregation. A moment before I left the cell, it seemed to me that the fluffy yellow tail of King Lionheart the tomcat of my cousins gleamed among the cats in the cell. My sleepiness did the trick.

In the passage, Clem was led somewhere, and another monk showed me a way to my cell.

In my cell, my sleepiness was gone. After I changed my shirt, when sitting on the edge of the narrow bed, and winding up my wristwatch, by candlelight, I was surprised seeing it was not so late. The sunset had not faded outside the small window; neither drizzling rain nor freezing drizzle. I put on my raincoat and left the cell.

I was a tourist, after all, and I wanted some sightseeing. The timorous and obscure sounds of the past reading seemed flying underneath the high vaults of the temple. When the choir sang, the drawling chants filled all hollow spaces above, and then returned to humans from all sides, long and cold like dewy grass. Brown faces of saints watched me from above and from all sides. All the saints had long curly tresses, regular features and sever look; the stiff folds of their dresses didn't let see their bodies. Solemn and heavenly, they seemed frozen and at the same time in a perpetual process of rising, higher and higher, to the blue sky of the gilded dome, where the blond-curled Sabaoth, the God of the armies of Israel, in the cloud of golden stars, ruled the world. Several black shadows at the walls moved; the orange candle-flames twinkled; the air smelled of incense. Hopefully, my look of a layman and foreigner didn't confuse the monks too much, and one of them volunteered to show me a way outside.

We used the back porch, which looked over the courtyard with the smithy, the cooperage and the gate in the stone fence. Going through the gate, I saw the opposite shore of the lake was much closer than that on the side of the main gates. The sky cleared, the mist lifted, and the opalescent purple, which banded the entire horizon, outlined the belated beauty of the lake. A boat was on the way from the island, with the rower working hard taking his only passenger to the shore. Taking the air, I spent some time alone, before I heard a familiar male voice, "Will you go back to the dwelling-place, sir? As all the gates are to be locked up, after the sunset." It was the Door-Keeper, only he spoke German now, with his pronunciation funny, as funny as our Russian, maybe. Apparently, he had some relations to the neighbour lands like Nyomanland. I could see better now his greyish fan-like beard on his worn rusty vestment, his myopic blue eyes and turned-up nose. One of the Ostsee types. He went on, "Or else you'll have to get over the wall. Your dress is civil, and it could be damaged. In the walls, we have a small cemetery garden. You can spend time there, sitting on the graves."

I said, "The location looks so beautiful, Father."

He looked round the fading horizon. "Many say so. The wife of the Governor came from the town, without her husband. She watched the water through her binoculars, then, by night, she boated to the opposite side to make a bonfire. Next day, she thanked our Father-Superior ever so much. 'Thank you,' she said, 'for the lovely landscape.' For us, the landscape is familiar and usual. Nothing special we can see in it."

I said, "Even the tastiest palls if it is served every day."

"How do you find our food, sir?" he said.

"Too bad," I was frank, "Uneatable. But we had a packed lunch about."

"Our cooks are good-for-nothing. Especially for you, who came from the big towns, where there are so many temptations and gastronomic entertainments. Restaurants, assemblies. Some monasteries have some foodstuffs, at least, cold, kept underneath the floor or in the windowsills. We have nothing of the kind, unless a tin of sardines or sprats as a kind donation." He sighed and said, "It's quiet here. Quietude. We are disturbed by our woes alone."

"Woes?"

"Yes, sir. A monk has lots of woes. You, laymen don't know how many they are."

"What kind of woes?"

"Various. Boots, for example."

"Is that a reason for a woe?"

"You in St Petersburg go to the shop or market if your boots are worn --no problem. And we here!.. No shoemakers in the surroundings. While we are waiting for a shoemaker's coming… and there you are…" He got his fingers in his beard, and began to scratch his facial hair energetically as though his beard had not seen a comb for the last several weeks, and at the same time, he began telling a long story about the latest making new boots for all the fraternity when he was taken in by his mate and remaining without new boots. By the moment, we both were sitting on a simple wooden bench.

Listening to the story, I asked, "You are a good storyteller, Father. Tell me if the Monastery is old."

"The Monastery is very old," he said simple-heartedly, "so old that nobody can remember anything of it. Forgotten. All I can say is that two years ago, one learned man came. Elderly, wearing spectacles. 'I am to write your Monastery's history,' he said, 'Your higher-ups' commission.' Our Father Librarian said to him, 'For goodness' sake, we never had any histories here!' In reply, the Learned Man only said, 'Where there are all records?' and he went to search. His work drove all mice away from the Library, and he himself got angry and said to us, 'Why don't you keep cats? All your records are mice-eaten!' But why cats for us? The mice lived in the Library alone, and in our cells we never saw them. And yet, our Father-Superior gave the order and sent to the village for kittens. Today, as you can see, we have a herd of them, because our Father-Superior forbids to get new-born kittens drowned, although the female sex ought to be removed, in my view."

"And so, the history of your Monastery never was written?"

"No, it was!" The Door-Keeper sighed.

"With no records?"

"Just so, with no records. By guesswork, mainly."

"What, the opus is published?"

"Yes, sir, it's published. With illustrations." Saying all these funny things, the Door-Keeper still looked genuine and simple-hearted. "Nobody knows when our Monastery was founded, and nobody knows who founded it. It's unknown who destroyed the oldest records and documents, and it's unknown who rebuilt the oldest buildings. The Learned Man got angry ever so much about the rebuilding. You see, formerly, we had a number of Fathers-Superiors who reconstructed. All of them cared about splendour. If they saw an old darkening iconostasis, they ask a benefactor to arrange a donation: to cover the iconostasis with gold. Old paintings over the walls were covered with new paintings. Seeing the walls, the Learned Man picked at the paintings, picked, picked, getting angrier and angrier. 'You,' he said, 'you are vandals! With the modern day daub, you covered the ancient ikon painting!' But how we could know that the ancient ikon painting was good? Dark with age, only eyes visible... He examined the altar too. 'The altar and the walls are of 16 or 15 century,' he said, 'What about your subterranean crypts? Show me a way!' You see, sir, our basement is our workshop. We make the herbal liqueur there. Tincture. Medicine. We have not a hospital, but illnesses we have, especially in autumn time. Father Librarian felt shy, hearing the Learned Man's demand. 'Our basement is quite uninteresting, sir,' he said, 'Let's go to the Bell Tower, where one interesting history took place.' One thunderbolt killed our toller there, you know. Only just the toller began to ring for Vespers -- a thunderclap -- and the toller was killed on the spot, only the rope got blackened. But the Learned Man got angry again. 'I want to go down and not upstairs!' he said. So, they went down. Father Librarian sought to cover up all those bottles with his own corpulent body, but he failed, the Learned Man noticed the bottles and shouted, 'The phenomenon must be of the current century! It must be explored!' And then… beginning from that day, he spent all nights in our basement."

Seeing the amusing essence in the story of the Learned Man, I smiled, only smiled, because I was too tired to laugh out loud, and not because I I covertly scoffed at the narrator in the simple vestment. "I guess, your rules are rigid about liqueurs?"

Looking serious, which revealed his simple-heartedness once again, the Door-Keeper quizzed at my face and said, "How should I put it... Our liqueurs cure. If we take them reasonably, and saying prayers… If mortals take them hard, then that's no good, it goes without saying. Formerly, in the times of Father-Superior Methodius, the excesses did happen. Can you see the small village, over there, on the lake side?.. Some used to go there, for revelry, but the parties were not too noisy, far from it. And yet, one day, one Mikhail died by drowning. The unlucky man took it in his head to cover the distance by swimming. It's the only case of death. Actually, nobody dies here at our Monastery."

"How could it be?"

"All dying men are to be moved to other monasteries, and the seriously ill go to the hospitals in the town…" This reminded me a tale of Three Islands. On one of the islands, births were forbidden. On the second, deaths were forbidden. On the third, both births and deaths were forbidden. An ancient story. However, it could be my invention too. Not sure. In the meantime, the Door-Keeper went on, "…The constructor Father Methodius was about to arrange a school and hospital, but failed. He never got the permission."

"How so?"

"Why they never gave the permission to build a school and all that? By falling into doubt, you know. In those olden days, our Monastery was something like a penal company, for monks and priests sent into exile. Those men were deacons and priests of the sort that we didn't know where to put ourselves for embarrassment. One should be all eyes. To rule with rod of iron. But Father Methodius was possessed by the passion for construction. He looked through his fingers at much around. And temptation was great. Then, he was told to mind his constructions and nothing more, for he could not teach children anything good in our Monastery of the time -- and that's all."

"How many did he create?"

"Lots. Everything old was broken by his order. The Learned Man could not stand his very name. 'If I were one of your bosses,' the Learned Man said, 'I'd send him to Siberia! For penitence. He's worse than Batu Khan! The Khan acted as an aggressive conqueror, and your priest -- as a thoughtless thing!' True, Methodius more brake than built. More litter than constructions was in the Monastery. The windows in our temple were small and narrow as it was to be in old Russian churches, and he told to breach them wide. A chariot could drive in any of them. Then he designed a bath, big, for thirty men. The platform in the bath he wanted to make of lime-tree. But there was not proper wood in the surroundings. Before the problem was solved, he was transferred to another monastery, and the bath remained unfinished. Our next Father-Superior Gregory was not about to finish anything of the constructions. He turned the bath into the barn, and the budget he invested. Our Monastery purse got thicker, since he lent money to trustworthy men. This was a reason why he was transferred. Our next Father-Superior spent only a year and a half with us, and he cared about singing alone. The Inn was left neglected and the bedbugs increased in number so much that they should be exterminated, periodically, and quite unsuccessfully. Strangely, as soon as the Father-Superior left us, all bedbugs left too."

"Well what about the current Father-Superior?"

"He doesn't reside in the Monastery. He lives in the farm, two kilometres from here."

"How so?"

"I can't say exactly why he dislikes living here. No wonder, though. The farm is rich and the life is better there. Would you like to look at the shore, on the left. The hill. The farm is on the hill. Our Father-Superior is fond of agriculture… The cows, which he acquired, are breathtaking. Every cow is like a walking mount. And his hens… They are so shaggy, like wearing trousers. His pigeons are selected. He has wonderful starlings. What gardens he has! Fifteen hundred pound of each kind of berries."

"For sell?"

"No, sir. They make and preserve jam for him. I don't know what he does with the great amount of jam, as it's impossible to consume it. Lately, from St Petersburg, from the firm Schmidt&Schtoltz, a pound of gelatine came."

"What for?"

"For making the jam. The syrup is thicker and it never becomes sugared, with gelatin. Some say that very likely, there may be some manufacturing consideration, as it were, but I would say it's his boundless cordiality and hospitality. No one visitor will leave his dwelling-place without a jar of jam. To the archimandrite, to the bishop, he sends his jam to everyone, even to the capital. In the capital, we have the chapel, and in that basement there is lots of jam for benefactors."

"Nice," I said, "But, actually, how's it going, under the Father-Superior?"

"Fairly well. We have nothing to complain of. We now are free with our dwelling-place. He comes here only once a day."

The glitter of the water faded away; the opposite shore got hazy. Aha -- I thought to myself -- apparently, the boatman, who I saw, took the Father-Superior to the mainland. Here, we heard a male voice from behind, "Father! I close the gate!" It was a man wearing like a retired soldier, with big moustaches and a big key in hand. The rusty joint-hinges began squeaking as the man began closing the heavy gate. The Door-Keeper and I rose from the bench.

After we came in the gateway, the lock clicked two times. The old man crossed himself on four sides. The dark sky was velvety blue above. The night freshness generously spread in the air. The twinkled in the sky… The old man offered to show me a way to my cell.

The life in the solitary place, picturesque and romantic, seemed so prosaic. Snuff out the candle; it's time to go to bed, like elsewhere, merely with lesser comfort.

Next day, early in the morning, my first social urge was seeing Clem.

Monks are known early risers. Beginning from 4 a.m., a monk went round the cells, ringing a small bell in his hand. The sound was quiet and annoying like a lost soul's conscience, and in tune with the sound, another monk coughed and said in a voice, rustling like a rain, "Stand up for Morning Prayer!"

I looked at my watch, and remained abed, determined to get up in an hour. When I woke again, it took me some time to collect thoughts. Clem had been out of my sight for too long, in this prosaic yet so big and ancient building, where we both were strangers. No thoughts of a morning meal; I hastened to search for Clem's cell.

He was abed but not sleeping. His recently scarred forehead needed bondage no longer. I brushed the hair over his forehead to cover the scar and asked about last night.

"You should have your spiral notebook and pencil about," he said.

His narration about his last night he began while dressing before my eyes, and I got ready for listening to his report about his visit the cell of Father Antonius.

But no important news Clem heard in the cell of Father Antonius; other things in his narration made me get more and more surprised.

The old monk received him being bedridden. In a quiet voice, the monk talked to Clem, for a couple of hours, now in Russian, now in German, saying that Clem's late father was a good man. Soon after 10 p.m., Clem came in the cell where he was to spend the night.

There, alone, Clem heard a rustle behind the stove. Mice? Cats? Tired too much, he went to bed and fell asleep. It was past midnight, when he woke, for some obscure reason, and presently, he heard the same rustle, from the same corner. "An evil spirit?" he said in a laud voice, "Who's that?" Silence. It was darkness outside the window, but Clem peered out the window into the darkness, pressing his forehead on the sweaty windowpane. Seeing nothing, he remembered the talk with Father Antonius and the ill old man's words "...how funny you are…" The rustle was heard again. Clem turned his head and peered in the dark corner. Seeing nothing special, he went to the stove and thrust his right hand into the air-hole behind the stove. Nothing. Returning to the window, he was about to look out again, but he saw something moved on the bed. He stood still, seeking to make it out, and from the bed a voice was heard, "Say ave to me… please!"

"Well… Ave," Clem said.

A quiet laughter was heard from the bed, "Greetings, my dear!"

Clem said, "Pax! Pax! Go away!"

"How do I do it?" he heard in reply, "You know… No, you can't know. Know: my wish is to live and enjoy life. I have the wish, but you have the saps."

"What kind of saps?" Clem said.

"The kind which let me live, move and enjoy."

"Do you mean sucking anything from me?"

"In a way."

"But I don't want!"

"And I don't care. I've not got used to asking. Remember you said hello to me!"

"It's but hello."

"To say hello to a shade? Your greeting is your invitation."

"No, no, I meant nothing of the kind!"

"Did you! However, don't worry. You'll never get bored with me."

"Are you an evil spirit?"

"No."

"What's your name?"

"Clem."

"No, it's my name."

"Your name is mine."

"My alter ego?" On the bed, something dark began moving. A vestment. Clem said, "Stolen from a monk?"

"But it's the very vestment of your father. Look at it…" Dark in the dusk, the Shade waved arms.

Clem said, "Dear me! What's going on?"

"Nothing special." The Shade never changed its friendly tone on the verge of playfulness. "Don't worry. I can take a shape, after all, clarifying myself, as it were. Merely speak softly to me. More softly!"

"Softly?" Clem sounded rather sulky, "Take a shape, and be quick, for I'm tired, really, tired. If not, give me my bed, and I'll have a nap."

"Wait! Wait!" the Shade said cheerfully, "How could I take a shape at once? Tell me what kind of a shape you prefer!"

"Are you kidding?" Clem said to the Shade whose rants showed some Proteus-like intentions.

"You don't know. I'll help you then. Stroke gently my head… please!" Something dark was placed under Clem's hand, which made Clem recoil into the corner behind him.

But this dark took a human shape, or it only seemed to Clem that a shady human figure was sitting on the bed with hands around the knees. The face could not be seen because of the monk's head-dress, but the hands looked white or rather lurid. "Oh!.. You are a dead man!!" Clem said, "I'm not a credulous ignoramus!"

"Fine," the shady thing said, "But I've fooled you, oh incredulous! I never put my arms in the sleeves. Look at it!.." The shady thing jumped up, on the spot, and the vestment fell down to his feet.

Clem stepped back, deeper in the corner.

The shady thing asked, "Do you like me?"

"You look and sound like a rogue."

"So what?"

"I don't want to talk with rogues. Good beings don't do like that."

"Not good being? Am I! Whatever, but I am, and my being is not bad at all! Say you like me!"

Clem's back pressed on the wall; then he dashed forward to grab the shady thing's ankles. Apparently, seeing the glow of rage on Clem's face, the shady thing squealed, jumped over the head of the bed and hid in the dark space behind the bed.

Falling down across the bed, feeling weakness in his limbs and heaviness in his head, Clem went faint. When he lifted his head and looked round the room, the morning light came from the casement. Unsure whether the past vision was the night dream or reality, Clem looked in the corner, where the shady thing disappeared last night, but nobody was there. He looked underneath the bed. Nobody. He went to the stove and searched behind it. Nobody. Then he went to bed again, a short while before my coming in.

A nightmare or a fleeting harmless delusion? He felt unsure; me too. I asked, "How did you know that it was past midnight, when you woke?"

Clem said, "I looked at my watch… Yes, I remember, I looked at my watch."

"But you said it was dark outside the window. How did you see?"

"Ohh… I don't know. Unsure."

"That's it. It looks like the vision was but a dream, or… 'I had a dream, which was not all a dream.'"

"Byron," Clem specified despondently.

"Exactly. Whatever it was, we'll keep it into consideration, dear, both your vision and the probability that there is more wonderful things in this hoary place than the History of the Monastery, made by guesswork, yet published with illustrations."

"What are you talking about, Oscar?"

"Later on. We are taking the road… Keep your pecker up!"

Our talk finished long after the Morning Prayer, therefore a boat and boatman for as was not a problem when we asked about this kind of vehicle. The boatman's look of a retired soldier was familiar to me.

The morning was sunny. On the pigeonry, one of the monks, armed with a long stick with a rag on the tip, shouted to the pigeons and waved with his stick --the pigeons noisily took wing, flew skywards and there in the blue, the beautiful flock began flying around. We stopped for a moment to watch.