“Yes,” the younger man said, “next time I’m in that neighborhood I’ll consider it. But today is today and here is here, and since I’m here today and the hermit Josephus is located in these parts and I’ve heard so much good about him…”
“Good? What so commends this Famulus to you?”
“I like the way he doesn’t scold and make a fuss. I just like that, I tell you. I’m not a centurion and I’m not a bishop either; I’m just a nobody and I’m sort of timid myself. I couldn’t stand a lot of fire and brimstone. God knows, I don’t have anything against being treated gently — that’s just the way I am.”
“Treated gently — I like that! When you’ve confessed and done penance and taken your punishment and purged yourself, all right, maybe then it’s time to treat you gently. But not when you’re unclean and stand before your confessor and judge stinking like a jackal.”
“All right, all right. Not so loud — the others want to sleep.”
Suddenly the younger man chuckled. “By the way, I just remembered a funny story I heard about him.”
“About whom?”
“About the hermit Josephus. You see, after somebody’s told his story and confessed, the hermit blesses him and before he leaves gives him a kiss on the cheek or the brow.”
“Does he now? He certainly has peculiar habits.”
“And, you see, he’s so shy of women. They say that a harlot from the neighborhood once went to him in man’s clothing and he didn’t notice and listened to her lies, and when she was finished confessing he bowed to her and solemnly gave her a kiss.”
The old man burst into titters; the other hastily shushed him, and thereafter Joseph heard nothing more than half-suppressed laughter that went on for a while.
He looked up at the sky. The crescent moon hung thin and keen beyond the tops of the palm trees. He shivered in the cold of the night. It had been strange, like looking into a distorting mirror, listening to the camel drivers talking about him and the office which he had just abandoned. Strange but instructive. And so a harlot had played this joke on him. Well, that was not the worst, though it was bad enough. He lay for a long time pondering the conversation between the two men. And when, very late, he was at last able to fall asleep, it was because his meditations had not been fruitless. He had come to a conclusion, to a resolve, and with this new resolve fixed firmly in his heart he slept deeply until dawn.
His resolve was the very one that the younger of the two camel drivers had not taken. He had decided to take the older man’s advice and pay a visit to Dion, called Pugil, of whom he had heard for so many years and whose praises had been so emphatically sung this very night. That famous confessor, adviser, and judge of souls would surely have advice, judgment, punishment for him, would surely know the proper way for him. Josephus would go to him as a spokesman of God and willingly obey whatever course he prescribed.
He left while the two men were still asleep, and after a tiring tramp reached a spot which he knew was inhabited by pious brethren. From there he hoped he would be able to reach the usual caravan route to Ascalon.
The place he reached toward evening was a small, lovely green oasis. He saw towering trees, heard a goat bleating, and thought he detected the outlines of roofs amid the green shadows. It seemed to him too that he could scent the presence of men. As he hesitantly drew closer, he felt as if he were being watched. He stopped and looked around. Under one of the outermost trees, he saw a figure sitting bolt upright. It was an old man with a hoary beard and a dignified but stern and rigid face, staring at him. The man had evidently been looking at him for some time. His eyes were keen and hard, but without expression, like the eyes of a man who is used to observing but without either curiosity or sympathy, who lets people and things approach him and tries to discern their nature, but neither attracts nor invites them.
“Praise be to Jesus Christ,” Joseph said.
The old man answered in a murmur.
“I beg your pardon,” Joseph said. “Are you a stranger like myself, or are you an inhabitant of this beautiful oasis?”
“A stranger,” the white-bearded man said.
“Perhaps you can tell me, your Reverence, whether it is possible to reach the road to Ascalon from here?”
“It is possible,” the old man said. Now he slowly stood up, rather stiffly, a gaunt giant. He stood and gazed out into the empty expanse of desert. Joseph felt that this aged giant had little wish for conversation, but he ventured one more query.
“Permit me just one other question, your Reverence,” he said politely, and saw the man’s eyes return from his abstraction and focus on him. Coolly, attentively, they looked at him.
“Do you by any chance know where Father Dion, called Dion Pugil, may be found?”
The stranger’s brows contracted and his eyes became a trace colder.
“I know him,” he said curtly.
“You know him?” Joseph exclaimed. “Oh, then tell me, for it is to Father Dion I am journeying.”
From his superior height the old man scrutinized him. He took his time answering. At last he stepped backward to his tree trunk, slowly settled to the ground again, and sat leaning against the trunk in his previous position. With a slight movement of his hand he invited Joseph to sit also. Submissively, Joseph obeyed the gesture, feeling as he sat down the great weariness in his limbs; but he forgot this promptly in order to focus his full attention on the old man, who seemed lost in meditation. A trace of unfriendly sternness appeared upon his dignified countenance. But that was overlaid by another expression, virtually another face that seemed like a transparent mask: an expression of ancient and solitary suffering which pride and dignity would not allow him to express.
A long time passed before the old man’s eyes returned to him. Then he again scrutinized Joseph sharply and suddenly asked in a commanding tone: ““Who are you?”
“I am a penitent,” Joseph said. “I have led a life of withdrawal from the world for many years.”
“I can see that. I asked who you are.”
“My name is Joseph, Joseph Famulus.”
When Joseph gave his name, the old man did not stir, but his eyebrows drew together so sharply that for a while his eyes became almost invisible. He seemed to be stunned, troubled, or disappointed by the information he had received. Or perhaps it was only a tiring of the eyes, a distractedness, some small attack of weakness such as old people are prone to. At any rate he remained utterly motionless, kept his eyes shut for a while, and when he opened them again their gaze seemed changed, seemed to have become still older, still lonelier, still flintier and long-suffering, if that were possible. Slowly, his lips parted and he asked: “I have heard of you. Are you the one to whom the people go to confess?”
Abashed, Joseph said he was. He felt this recognition as an unpleasant exposure. For the second time on his journey he was ashamed to encounter his reputation.
Again the old man asked in his terse way: “And so now you are on your way to Dion Pugil? What do you want of him?”
“I would like to confess to him.”
“What do you expect to gain by that?”
“I don’t know. I trust him, and in fact it seems to me that a voice from above has sent me to him.”
“And after you have confessed to him, what then?”
“Then I shall do what he commands.”
“And suppose he advises or commands you wrongly?”
“I shall not ask whether it is right or wrong, but simply obey.”
The old man said no more. The sun had moved far down toward the horizon. A bird cried among the leaves of the tree. Since the old man remained silent, Joseph stood up. Shyly, he reverted to his request.