“The soul was dreadfully alone now, alone with millions of winking stars, but it climbed on and on and on.
“Mynheer, no man has ever told how lonely the dead are; how they cry out in the darkness and stretch out their arms; where yesterday there was warmth and light and friendly hands and soft laughter there is only cold, emptiness, nothing. Oh, how lonely the dead are! How lonely the dead are!
“Men do not know how many months or years or centuries the soul climbed up through the swarming stars, but at last it came to the foot of battlements shooting up into space—battlements that rose like flames rooted in clouds, and burning so brightly that the strained eyes of the soul pinched with the bliss of gazing. And still the soul of Father Guido climbed and climbed and climbed.
“‘It’s too beautiful for purgatory; this must be heaven,’ said the soul to itself, ‘but there’s no door.’ And indeed, mynheer, there seemed to be no door, for the poor soul climbed up and up those topless cliffs, but found no entrance at all. ‘There’s no door! There’s no door! There’s no door!’ the soul of Father Guido repeated like a prayer as it climbed beside the battlements.
“‘God and Mary help us!’ it sobbed at last in despair; and no sooner had it said these words than it saw a little gate opening into the jewelled heights, and it flew up hopefully.
“Outside the doorway it paused. There was a door, half closed, and the soul was afraid. It felt conscious again of its nakedness, although the paunch was gone from constant exercise and hard muscles showed under its star-burned skin. ‘I’m a thin old codger, though; not presentable to St. Peter at all. I’ll wait behind the door-post until somebody appears.’ So it pressed its ribs close against the door-jamb and waited. An hour went by, or a minute, or an age; still nobody appeared. Father Guido’s soul grew anxious. ‘I’ll look inside—just one peek,’ it whispered. ‘One peek won’t matter.’ So it gently pried open the pearly door and looked in.
“An armchair, mynheer, carved of jewels, like the battlements, stood beside the door, but the chair was empty. The soul looked farther. ‘Hum!’ it said thoughtfully; ‘there’s no pater hospitalis here. I’m disappointed. And St. Peter’s left no substitute.’
“Father Guido, you must understand, mynheer,” said Odile, by way of parenthesis, “had been pater hospitalis in his monastery. He took care of the guests, he selected the wines, he was jovial in welcoming those who came and tearful in bidding adieu to those who went; so he was distressed that no one should meet him at the gate of heaven.”
I nodded sympathetically, and she went on: “A little weed grew in a crack in the golden pavement where the holy saint’s feet had worn the flagstone smoothest, and a green scurf of moss pushed out here and there in the golden gutters. ‘That’s strange; that’s strange indeed,’ said the soul of Father Guido; but it had little time to wonder at small things like these, for the whole of heaven towered before its eyes. Streets and mansions and gardens blazed with lights of a thousand colours; mansions of silver and amethyst and jacinth rose amid bowers of roses; towers and roofs and walls and lattices shone like jewels in changeless sunlight, and avenues of strange trees stretching farther than eye could see glowed green as emerald along streets of gold.
“But there was no sound anywhere, mynheer. Father Guido’s soul held its breath with holy awe and fear. In spite of the warmth of the eternal sunlight sluicing its bare limbs, cold perspiration came out on its neck and face, and goose-flesh pricked its legs. The soul hid itself in a rose hedge and waited breathlessly. Nothing appeared. Still there was no sound. Presently the soul crept out again and pattered cautiously up the golden avenue, picking little rose thorns from its sides and back as it marched.