A Rainy June, and Other Stories

by Ouida

V

To Caris miracles were as possible as daily bread.

He knew little of them, but he believed in them with his whole soul. It seemed wonderful that the heavenly powers should create one for such a poor and humble creature as himself; but it did not seem in any way wonderful that such a thing should be.

The Divine Child was there in the earth, keeping away all evil things by its presence, and he could not doubt that the saints who were with Mary, or perchance his own mother's purified spirit, had called the image there to save him from the fiend.

He sank on his knees on the clay, and said over breathlessly all the Aves he could think of in his awe. They were few, but he repeated them over and over again, hoping thus to find grace and mercy for his sin for having broken into these sacred precincts and disturbed the dead in their rest.

But what of Santina? Would she believe him when he told her of this wondrous thing?

If he went to her with his hands empty, would she ever credit that he had courage to come upon this quest? He could hear, as it were, at his ear, her mocking, cruel, incredulous laughter.

She had said, 'Bring me the magic toys.' What would the tale of a miracle matter to her? She wanted treasure and knowledge. She would care nothing for the souls of the dead or the works of the saints—nothing.

He knew that her heart was set on getting things which she knew were evil, but believed were powerful for good and ill, for fate and future.

Suddenly a thought which froze his veins with its terror arose in him, and fascinated him with its wickedness and his daring. What if he took the holy image to her in proof that he had tried to do her will, and had been turned from his errand by powers more than mortal?

Since she had believed in the occult powers of his mother's divining tools, surely she would still more readily believe in the direct and visible interposition of the dead?

If he bore the Gesu to her in his arms, she could not then doubt that he had passed the hours of this night in the graveyard of St. Fulvo.

She could not, before its sacred testimony, be angry, or scornful, or incredulous, or unkind.

But could he dare to touch the holy thing? Would the image consent to be so taken? Would not its limbs rebel, its lips open, its body blister and blast the mortal hands which would thus dare to desecrate it?

A new fear, worse, more unspeakable than any which had moved him before, now took possession of him as he knelt there on the bottom of the pit which he had dug, gazing through the blackness of the darkness to the spot where he knew the silver body of the Christ Child lay.

The thing was holy in his eyes, and he meant to use it for unholy purposes. He felt that his hands would wither at the wrist if they took up that silver Gesu from its bed of earth.

His heart beat loudly against his ribs, his head swam.

It was still dark, though dawn in the east had risen.

He crawled out of the pit of clay with difficulty, holding the silver image to his bosom with one arm, and stood erect, and gazed around him.

If saints or friends were there beside him, they made no sign; they neither prevented nor avenged the sacrilege.

The sweet, sharp smell of the wet blowing grasses was in his nostrils, and the damp clinging sods were about his feet, dragging at the soles of his boots, that was all.

He began to think of the way in which he could, thus burdened, climb the wall.

The silver Christ was heavy in his hold, and he needed to have both hands free to ascend the height above him.

He knew it was an image and not a living god; yet none the less was it in his sight holy, heaven-sent, miraculous, potent for the service of the saints, and to take it up and bear it away seemed to him like stealing the very Hostia itself.

True, he would bring it back and give it to the vicar, and let it, according to the reverend man's choice, be returned to its grave or laid on the altar of the church for the worship of the people, and the continued working of miracles.

Yes, he said to himself, assuredly he would bring it back. He would only bear it in his arms most reverently to Santina, that she might see and believe, and become his; and then he would return hither with it and tell the priest the wondrous story.

Yet he shook as with palsy at the thought of carrying the blessed image as though it were a mere living human babe.

It seemed to him as if no man could do such a deed and live. The anointed hands of a priest might touch it, but not his—his so hard and rough and scarred with work, never having held aught better than his pipe of clay and his tool of wood or of iron, and the horn haft of his pocket-knife.

Nor was even his motive for taking it pure. He wanted through it to justify himself in the sight of a woman, and to find favour with her, and to gratify a strong and furious passion. His reasons were earthly, gross, selfish; they could not redeem, or consecrate, or excuse his act. That he knew.

All was still, dusky, solitary; the church was wrapt in gloom, the daybreak did not reach it; only above the inland hills the white light spread where he could not see; behind the high wall of the graveyard, beyond the ranges of the inland hills, the gray soft light of daybreak had arisen.

He thought he heard voices all around him, and amongst them that of his mother warning him to leave untouched the sacred Child, and get up on his feet and flee. But above these he heard the laughter of Santina mocking him as an empty-handed, white-livered fool, who came with foolish tales of visions to hide his quaking soul.

Better that his arms should shrivel, that his sight should be blinded, that his body should be shrunken and stricken with the judgment of heaven, than that he should live to hear her red lips laugh and call him a feckless coward.

With all the life which was in him shrinking and sickening in deadly fear, he stooped down, groped in the dark until he found the image, grasped its metal breast and limbs, and dragged it upward from the encircling earth.

It was of the size of a human child of a year old.

He plucked it roughly upward, for his terror made him rude and fierce, and held it in his arms, whilst he wondered in his great awe and horror that no judgment of affronted heaven followed on his desperate act.

All was still well with him; he saw, he heard, he breathed, he lived; the cool night air was blowing about him, the clouds were letting fall a faint fine mist-like rain.

He undid the belt about his loins—a mere piece of webbing with a buckle—strapped it around the body of the Gesu, and taking the ends thereof between his firm, strong teeth, sought in the dark for the place whence he had descended, and found it.

He climbed the wall with slow, laborious, and painful effort, the dead weight of the silver figure encumbering him as he mounted with cat-like skill, cutting his hands and bruising his skin against the rough, undressed stones.

He dropped carefully down on the earth beneath, and began the descent of the hill.

'When I can bring the little Christ back, I can get the tools,' he thought. It seemed a small matter.

He was forced to leave behind him his spade and pickaxe.