Through the sacristy door the priests come, they kneel before the altar, kiss and don the purple stole of their office as they move out to the boxes through the gate in the wooden rails. You can hear your heart beating as the shutter rattles open on the first penitent. In fear and shame you are moving to the death of having to describe the real face of your life to your God in his priest, and to beg forgiveness, and promise, for there is still time.
There was an even flow that carried you nearer. You were sick and wanted to leave but you couldn’t. You tried to grasp in the memory your sins once more: lies four times, anger three, prayers not said five or six or eight times it hardly mattered. Sins of lust after women every day in your mind for the last three months, orgies of self-abuse, the mind flinched from admitting the exact number of times, two hundred times or more. You were steadily moving in the flow of the queue towards a confession of guilt, and the moment of confessing would be a kind of death.
Was the flow of time towards the hour of his execution different for the man in the condemned cell in Mountjoy? Vain effort of the cards and wardens to distract him through the night and then on the hour Pierrepoint and his two assistants come and it’s still not real and they are marching to Pierrepoint’s time. There’ll be strict formality and order now.
“Left, right. Left, right. Turn to the left. Mark time.
“Are you ready, sir?” Pierrepoint asks and moving to time the assistants handcuff the condemned hands behind.
“Follow me, sir,” Pierrepoint’s voice in the cell of his life for the last time and they go marching, “Left, right. Left, right. Left, right,” to the scaffold, the priest walking by his side and praying too in time,
“O, Jesus, who for love of me didst bear thy cross to Calvary, in thy sweet mercy grant to me to suffer and to die with thee, O, Jesus, who for love of me didst bear thy cross to Calvary, in thy sweet mercy grant to me to suffer and to die with thee.”
Here you’d only to move nearer in the queue and when it got to your turn draw the heavy curtain aside, no scream at the sight of the scaffold, and kneel in the darkness and wait. Though was it any different, were all waitings not the same, was it any different except in the sensitivity, the intensity.
The slide rattled open. Through the wire grille you saw the sideface inclined towards you.
“Bless me, father, for I have sinned,” the time had come and though you could hardly force the words out it was still the dreadful moment.
“How long is it since your last confession?”
“Three months, father.”
“Now tell me your sins, my child.”
“I told lies four times. I was angry three times. Eight or nine times I didn’t say my prayers—”
“Anything else, my child?”
It would be so easy to answer, “No, father. Nothing else,” but that would be worse than anything.
“Yes, father,” you didn’t know how you were able to admit it.
“Confess then, my child. You needn’t be afraid.”
“I had impure thoughts and did impure actions.”
“Were these impure actions with yourself or someone else?”
“With myself, father.”
“You deliberately excited yourself?”
“Yes, father.”
“Did you cause seed to come?”
“Yes, father.”
“How many times?”
“Sometimes seven or eight times a day and other times not at all, father.”
“Could you put a number on them?”
“More than two hundred times.”
“And the thoughts?”
“More times than the actions, father,” it was all out now, one pouring river of relief.
“That is all you have to tell, my child?”
“That’s all, father.”
“You must fight that sin, it’ll grip you like a habit if you don’t, if you don’t break it now you may never be able to break it. You must come often to confession. Never let yourself stay away more than a month. Come every week if you can. You must pray for grace. You must make up your mind to break that sin once and for all now, tonight. Confession is worthless if you’re not firmly decided on that.”
“I promise, father.”
Such relief had come to you, fear and darkness gone, never would you sin again. The pleasures seemed so mean and grimy against the sheer delight of peace, pure as snow in the air.
“For your penance say a rosary before the Blessed Sacrament.”
The hand was raised in absolution, with almost ecstasy you breathed out the poor words of the Contrition:
“O my God, I am heartily sorry for having offended thee and I detest my sins above every other evil—”
“God bless you. Say a prayer for me, my child,” and the world was woken by the banging across of the wooden shutter, just wire and wood before you now, the smell of cloves.
Dazed, you got up, and pulled aside the curtain. The world was unreal. All your life had been gathered into the Confession, it had been lost, it was found. Ο God, how beautiful the world was. The benches, the lamps, the people kneeling there, all washed in wonder, the sheer quiet mystery of their faces. How beautiful the world was, you wanted to say to them, and why did they not dance and smile back at you, sing and praise. Why did the candles in the candle-shrine not flame and dance, why didn’t the benches pound and dance, awkward wood dancing, and could the peoples’ hands not clap time.
Perhaps it was enough to know it was so and go quietly to an empty bench up the church and kneel and hide your face in trembling hands. There was such joy. You were forgiven, the world given back to you, washed clean as snow. You’d never sin again. The world was too beautiful a place to lose. You willed yourself to say the rosary, wanting new words that never were before. Afterwards, even in the very pitch of the coughing and shuffling, there were remote areas of pure silence to pray and wander in eternally.
You started with fright when your arm was touched, it was your father, and how in a moment one wave of violent hatred came choking over prayer and silence.
“You can’t be long more. I’ll wait for you out at the gate,” he leaned close to whisper.
You watched him away, he genuflected in the bloody glow of the sanctuary lamp, his head was bowed. What did he know whether you’d be long or short, you might pray all night yet, what did he know, and now he was waiting at the gate in the cold. And death shall have no dominion, rang in hatred and without reason in your mind.
You were in the state of grace, you remembered you were supposed to love everyone, and your father was waiting for you outside at the gate. You had no right to hate him, he was there to be loved too. So you mechanically rose, genuflected where he had genuflected and so many before both of you, and walked outside.
8
HE WAS WAITING AT THE GATE, PACING ABOUT IN THE COLD, examining the lost things that hung from the spikes.
“It’s a good job people’s arses are well tied on to them in this country or they’d leave them behind every time they sat down,” he remarked laughing by way of greeting.
They walked together, breaking time to avoid the pot-holes filled with water, where again and again a star shivered.
“It’s a great feeling after Confession. You feel everything’s put right. You have no cares any more,” Mahoney said.
“No. You have no cares,” he agreed, though loathing the direction of the words. He had his own joy. He didn’t want it confused in the generality of another’s confession. There never had been understanding or anything. But he was troubled by the intensity of the hatred, they were commanded to love, though the nerves bristled with hate at every advance or contact.