The Cairo Diary (4 page)

“A long guided tour awaits us, are you ready?”

“Lead on.”

Sister Anne took the same door as her comrades and they slipped into the Mount's limbo.

They passed through the Devil's Dungeon, a modest room at the end of a staircase leading from the church level, which provided access to the Merveille.

A long corridor dotted with pillars stretched eastward: the promenade. At its far end, in the half-light, Brother Gilles was conversing in a low voice with another monk, whose identity could not be discerned because he had his back to Marion.

Brother Gilles noticed her from a distance and his gnarled hand rose suddenly from beneath his robe to grab hold of the other monk and lead him into the darkness, where they disappeared.

Marion sighed softly.

She had only been there twenty-four hours, and already internecine strife was becoming apparent.

The time spent on this granite mountain was going to be long.

Behind her, Sister Anne turned a heavy iron key in an age-old lock, which grated as its catch sprang back.

Then the door opened with a creak.

5

They spent all morning there.

Sister Anne moved about between these corridors with bewildering ease. In Marion's eyes, it was as if she had grown up here.

The two women carried out their tour to the sound of hammer blows, nailing plywood planks to the most fragile windows. Several times they encountered a brother or a sister in the midst of sealing a narrow window with the aid of large pieces of damp cardboard. The preparations were moving on apace. The storm that was rolling in their direction must be a monster to arouse so many fears.

Beyond a general impression that there were staircases everywhere, chambers in every nook and cranny, and convoluted corridors, Marion managed to retain a few essential facts.

First of all, the structure of the abbey could be divided into three levels, even if a multitude of intermediate rooms and slopes did swiftly truncate this point of reference. The upper level was that of the immense abbey church. The middle level contained the crypt of the Thirty Candles and a large number of small side chapels. Then the lower level, the one with the dungeons, had held Marion's amused attention, especially the one that provided easy access to the exterior of the north side, through the abbey's gardens. And then there was the Merveille. A fabulous construction on the northern slopes and adhering to the rest, which could also be divided into three levels: the vast storeroom with the chaplaincy at the bottom, in the middle the formidable Salle des Chevaliers with its powerful columns, next to the Salle des Hôtes, and finally the refectory and the cloister, which left Marion speechless.

The hanging garden and its calming greenery were surrounded by covered galleries, whose magical, staggered rows of columns, arcades, and carved crockets offered an endless approach to contemplation and meditation. The western slopes opened onto a triple picture window, which emphasized the fact that three elements mingled here: the earth for a foundation, the sea for life, and the air for the spirit.

Sister Anne explained that when there was high, thick mist, the cloister garden was reflected in it, creating the illusion of an accessible Eden, brought to the eyes of men by the breath of the angels.

Marion noted that the majority of the rooms they encountered had heavy, locked doors, whose passkeys Sister Anne kept with an almost ridiculous bunch of twenty keys, which were huge and clinked loudly. When the sister took her imposing key ring from a fold in her robe, Marion had the impression that it was far too heavy for those apparently delicate wrists. But Sister Anne seemed hewn from rustic leather, resilient and capable of being stretched at will.

And her limpid blue eyes pierced through everything they looked at.

The Mount in its entirety was divided into two parts: the village on the one hand, climbing up the southwest flank from the causeway to the south, and the abbey itself, on the summit, with the Merveille stowed away to the north. After walking up the rue Grande and a whole succession of steps known as the Grand Degré Extérieur, the great outer staircase, you eventually reached the barbican, the dividing point between the village and the abbey. The latter, which was gigantic, was guarded in its southern part by a very tall building: the abbot's residence; while the Grand Degré Intérieur, the great inner staircase, ran along the foundations of the abbey church and climbed as far as the forecourt: the western terrace.

Lunch was served in a shared room at the abbot's residence. Marion was struck by the simplicity of this room designed for living. Here there were no historic furnishings, nothing but exposed stone walls and Formica tables. She even stifled a grin as she picked up her stainless-steel knife, worthy of a school cafeteria; this was a long way from the mystical image she had retained from her morning visit.

With the exception of Sister Agathe and Brothers Gilles and Gaël, all the members of the community who had been introduced to her that morning were present at the table.

“It is my turn to serve,” declared Brother Christophe.

He spoke with a disconcerting slowness. She hadn't been mistaken in nicknaming him “Brother Anemia,” thought Marion.

Ravioli and cheese were served in a large pan.

“As you will notice, there are days when we have less time to prepare the meals and others when we are more … indulgent.”

Marion, whose face was buried in her plate, easily recognized the sweet, singsong voice of Sister Gabriela. The young woman was looking at her with a degree of anxiety at the thought that the newcomer might be put off by their lunch.

“This suits me very well,” she reassured the nun. “I'm no great cook myself, and I don't often have the time, either.”

Brother Wrong Way jumped at the opportunity. “And what do you do, if that's not indiscreet?”

Marion had no time to open her mouth. Sister Anne reprimanded her colleague's jovial curiosity in a scathing tone, “Brother Damien! Your question is inappropriate—”

“No, it's okay,” cut in Marion. “It's not a problem.”

She turned toward the forty-year-old man, who had just lost his jovial air. “I am … or I was”—she sighed—“a secretary at the Médico-légal Institute, in Paris.”

With amusement, she scanned the faces as the idea of what her daily duties might entail sank into each of their minds.

“The Médico-légal Inst—” began Sister Gabriela.

“Yes, that's right. The place where corpses are stored before autopsies.”

Eagle-faced Sister Luce raised her eyebrows. The old woman gazed fixedly at the food she was calmly ingesting.

“Don't be alarmed, the secretary isn't based in the dissection rooms, although that may have happened to me. My work is clearly less … incisive, if I can say that.”

“But you have relatively direct contact with death?” emphasized Sister Gabriela.

“In a way, yes.”

“Isn't that too heavy a burden to bear?”

“It's … at the start, I admit it's hard. Then as time progresses you get used to it. I think over the months and years, the sheer volume of deaths reduces the dramatic element.”

“The notion of the mortal individual becomes lost in a generic, less personal, more distant death?” suggested Sister Gabriela.

“Yes, that makes me think of that saying,” interjected Brother Damien, laying down his fork and raising an index finger. “If you kill a man you are a murderer, but if you kill several you are a conqueror.”

Marion blinked. She knew an additional part to this maxim: And if you kill them all, you are a god. The place and company weren't perhaps ideal for this extension.

“In a way,” she eventually conceded.

“It's a little crazy all the same,” the brother went on. “In the end, one becomes more moved by the death of a single individual than by genocide! If you look, one murder close to where we live makes the front page of the newspapers, but they're completely silent about what's going on in Africa, for example—”

Sister Luce put down her glass too quickly, and it almost shattered. “I do not think ruling on a dramatic scale of death is a very pious attitude, Brother Damien,” she reprimanded him, in a voice as sharp as a billhook.

“No, of course not. I am simply saying that death does not merit different degrees of feeling. It is always tragic without discrimination, it—”

“That is enough.”

The monk remained openmouthed for a brief moment, disappointed not to be able to correct this mistake. His gaze slid toward Marion.

Soon there was nothing left but the clinking of plates to lighten the atmosphere. Marion finished her food and addressed Sister Luce, “What does your daily life consist of?”

“That depends on the day. At the moment it involves preparing the Mount to withstand the coming storm. In fact, if you will kindly excuse me, there is still a great deal to do.”

Sister Luce collected up her cutlery and her plate, stood up to put everything on a tray, and left the room.

Marion nervously tapped her glass with her index finger. “That's a good start,” she muttered.

Sister Anne's look told her that she had sensed her uneasiness.

“Marion,” began the sister, “will you permit me to call you Marion? This afternoon, I shall show you round the village and—”

“I think there are more urgent matters,” she cut in. “If this storm is so fierce and there are so many things to do all over the place to protect the Mount from it, perhaps we could help?”

Marion then hastily added, with a hint of malice, “I think Sister Luce would appreciate it. And I must admit that a little activity would do me good.”

Sister Anne remained openmouthed for a moment, then agreed. Farther off, Sister Agathe burst out laughing and swiftly put a hand over her mouth.

Marion observed the sky through the window.

It was gray, a uniform gray, without relief.

If the storm was approaching, it was doing it very gently, crawling along like a predator preparing to pounce suddenly on its prey.

For three hours they dug in the northern garden to remove plants or shrubs, which they transplanted into terra-cotta pots before storing them in the Merveille's vast storeroom for a few days. Marion had tied back her hair with an old elastic band and spared no effort to get as much work done as possible. When the light began to fail, she could no longer feel her fingers.

From time to time she raised her head to scan the abbey's ramparts, looking for signs of life, but never distinguished more than a furtive shape. Mont-Saint-Michel had all the appearance of a wrecked ship. With no one left on board.

An arrogant yet divinely beautiful
wreck.

The sole sign of the approaching storm was the wind, which was now blowing harder. A stubborn wind, which eventually numbed the skin and bit into the flesh.

Marion entered and placed the last pot in the row of previous ones, then allowed herself to sink onto a bench, facing the door of the storeroom.

Outside the light was ashen, tarnishing the garden's last colors. Sister Anne joined her, tools in hand, and sat down beside her.

“Well, another bit saved,” she said finally.

“As you say.”

Sister Anne nodded toward the outside. “I hesitated to tell you when we were there, but now.… Did you know that we were digging the soil of the ‘jardin de pleine mer,' the garden of the open sea, and that before it was given that name, it was known as the ‘monks' cemetery'?”

“That's nice…”

“Nonjuring priests were buried here during the Revolution. They are still there,” added the nun, with a restrained laugh. “And the administrator of the Mount wants to organize cocktail parties and wedding breakfasts here, can you imagine?”

“All in the best possible taste.”

“Indeed.”

Marion almost remarked upon the apparent vitality of the plants that grew there, accompanied by a sordid joke about their roots, but decided against it; bad taste was decidedly in the air.

She contemplated the rows of pots, which ran for several feet. “Sister Luce will be pleased,” she commented. “We have spared her an additional job.”

New laughter lines appeared at the corners of Sister Anne's mouth. “Don't hold her slightly distant manner against her, she wasn't trying to hurt you. We are a small community here, we have our customs, and your arrival necessitates a few alterations to everyone's perceptions, like an old bachelor who finds he suddenly has to live as one half of a couple. It's very positive for everyone. And if she seems a little … sour-tempered at first sight, Sister Luce is a remarkable woman at heart, you will see.”

“If it requires you to make an effort, why did you agree to take me in?”

Sister Anne's smile grew less broad but did not disappear. “It's a little peculiar.… We are tenants here. The Mount belongs to the state, and is managed by an administrator. We pay rent, and provide certain services. As we did today, running about all over the place preparing for the storm—”

“Or as you do when you agree to hide people whom the state entrusts to you. It's imposed on you—”

Sister Anne shook her head gently. “Nobody is imposing on us. The question was asked four years ago, and after discussing it among ourselves, we agreed to provide this service. The Mount is our retreat, not our shrine.”

Marion lowered her eyes to her hands. They were covered in soil and scratched all over.

“Come along, I'll take you back to your house, where you can warm up and have a wash. I'll call for you this evening, so we can go to dinner—”

“I would prefer to remain alone this evening, if you don't see any problems with that. It's … getting my bearings. I've only just arrived.”

Sister Anne nodded. “Of course, I understand. We have filled your refrigerator, so you'll find something to eat. And if you need us, our telephone number is on the entrance table.”