A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M. Miller Read Free Book Online

but-” Francis moistened his cracked lips and stared at a bug on a rock.
    “Oh, has it?” Cheroki’s voice was toneless
    “Yes, I think-but would it be a sin, Father, if when I first got it, I thought rather scornfully of the handwriting? I mean?”
    Cheroki blinked. Handwriting? Vocation? What kind of a question was-He studied the novice’s serious expression for a few seconds, then frowned.
    “Have you and Brother Alfred been passing notes to each other?” he asked ominously.
    “Oh, no, Father!”
    “Then whose handwriting are you talking about?”
    “The Blessed Leibowitz.”
    Cheroki paused to think. Did there, or did there not, exist in the abbey’s collection of ancient documents, any manuscript penned personally by the founder of the Order?-an original copy? After a moment’s reflection, he decided in the affirmative; yes, there were a few scraps of it left, carefully kept under lock and key.
    “Are you talking about something that happened back at the abbey? Before you came out here?”
    “No, Father. It happened right over there-” He nodded toward the left. “Three mounds over, near the tall cactus.”
    “Involving your vocation, you say?”
    “Y-yes, but-”
    “Of course,” Cheroki said sharply, “you could NOT POSSIBLY be trying to say that-you have received-from the Blessed Leibowitz, dead now, lo, the last six hundred years-a handwritten invitation to profess your solemn vows? And you, uh, deplored his handwriting?-Forgive me, but that’s the impression I was getting.”
    “Well, it’s something like that, Father.”
    Cberoki sputtered. Becoming alarmed, Brother Francis produced a scrap of paper from his sleeve and handed it to the priest. It was brittle with age and stained. The ink was faded.
    “Pound pastrami,” Father Cheroki pronounced, slurring over some of the unfamiliar words, “can kraut, six bagels-bring home for Emma.” He stared fixedly at Brother Francis for several seconds “This was written by whom?”
    Francis told him.
    Cheroki thought it over. “It’s not possible for you to make a good confession while you’re in this condition. And it wouldn’t be proper for me to absolve you when you’re not in your right mind.” Seeing Francis wince, the priest touched him reassuringly on the shoulder. “Don’t worry, son, we’ll talk it over after you’re better. I’ll hear your confession then. For the present-” He glanced nervously at the vessel containing the Eucharist. “I want you to gather up your things and return to the abbey at once.”
    “But, Father, I-”
    “I command you,” the priest said tonelessly, “to return to the abbey at once.”
    “Y-yes, Father.”
    “Now, I’m not going to absolve you, but you might make good act of contrition and offer two decades of the rosary as penance anyhow. Would you like my blessing?”
    The novice nodded, fighting tears. The priest blessed him arose, genuflected before the Sacrament, recovered the golden vessel, and reattached it to the chain around his neck. Having pocketed the candle, collapsed the table, and strapped it in place behind the saddle, he gave Francis a last solemn nod, then mounted and rode away on his mare to complete his circuit of the Lenten hermitages. Francis sat in the hot sand and wept.
    It would have been simple if he could have taken the priest to the crypt to show him the ancient room, if he could have displayed the box and all its contents, and the mark the pilgrim had made on the rock. But the priest was carrying the Eucharist, and could not have been induced to climb down into a rock-filled basement on his hands and knees, or to paw though the contents of the old box and enter into archaeological discussions; Francis had known better than to ask. Cheroki’s visit was necessarily solemn, as long as the locket he was wearing contained a single Host; although, alter it was empty, he might be amenable to some informal listening. The novice could not blame Father Cheroki for leaping