A Jest of God by Margaret Laurence Read Free Book Online

the gifts of healing – to another prophecy – to another divers kinds of tongues –”
    My hands are slippery with perspiration. Around me, the people stir – uneasily? Calla’s face is withdrawn, absorbed, not her outgoing look, something fixed and glazed, and I cannot look at her any more. Will she? Imagine having to see someone you know, someone you are known to be friends with, rise in a trance and say – what? What would she say? I cannot bring myself to think.
    The preacher has grown in stature. He actually seems taller. The pulpit has another step, maybe, and he has mounted it. Can that be it? He is all fervour now, and yet his voice is not loud. His arms are stretched, as though he knew there were something above and if he strained he might reach it – or else pull it down to his level. His voice no longer growls – it reaches out like arms of strength, to captivate. I must leave. I cannot stand this. But I cannot move. I see myself having to say “Excuse me – pardon me,” scraping and bumping past the other people in this row, feeling them glare at my discourtesy, having to push past this boulder of a man next to me, past hissolid pillars of legs and the huge unmoving hands clenched there. I can’t.
    “Saint Paul advises moderation – of this we are well aware. And that the gift of tongues should not replace the more usual forms of worship – of this we are well aware. But if we speak of ecstatic utterances, my friends, we must ask – ecstatic for whom? In the early Church, the listeners were ecstatic. Yes, the listeners as well as those gifted by the Spirit. Thus can we all participate – yes, participate – in the joy felt and known by any one of our brothers or sisters as they experience that deep and private enjoyment, that sublime edification, the infilling of the Spirit –”
    I feel so apprehensive now that I can hardly sit here in a pretence of quiet. The muscles of my face have wired my jawbone so tightly that when I move it, it makes a slight clicking sound. Has anyone heard? No, of course not. Their minds are on the preacher and – the hymn. The hymn? I can’t stand. I seem to be taken to my feet, borne ludicrously aloft, by the sheer force and weight of the rising people on either side of me.
    In full and glad surrender,
I give myself to Thee,
Thine utterly and only
And evermore to be.
    Can we at least sit down again, at last? Thank God. But someone will utter now. I know it. How can anyone bear to make a public spectacle of themselves? How could anyone display so openly? I will not look. I will not listen. People should keep themselves to themselves – that’s the only decent way. Beside me, Calla sighs, and I can feel my every muscle becoming rigid, as though I hoped to restrain her by power of will.
    A man’s voice. Suddenly, into the muffled foot-shuffling and the half silence, a man’s voice enters, low at first, thenlouder. I don’t know where he is. I can’t see him. He hasn’t risen. He is sitting somewhere in the blue-green depths of this room, and he is speaking. His voice is clear, distinct, measured, like the slow careful playing of some simple tune. He speaks the words like a child learning, imitating. Slowly, stumblingly, then gaining momentum, the pace and volume increasing until the entire room, the entire skull, is filled with the loudness of this terrifyingly calm voice. For an instant I am caught up in that voice.
    I see him. He is standing now. He is not old. His face is severe, delicate, and his eyes are closed, like a blind seer, a younger Tiresias come to tell the king the words that no one could listen to and live. The words. Chillingly, I realize.
    Galamani halafaka tabinota caragoya lal lal ufranti –
    Oh my God. They can sit, rapt, wrapped around and smothered willingly by these syllables, the chanting of some mad enchanter, himself enchanted? It’s silly to be afraid. But I am. I can’t help it. And how can anyone look and face anyone else, in