Supper over, the monks prepared to go off to the choir for the office of compline. They again lowered their cowls over their faces and formed a line at the door. Then they moved in a long file, crossing the cemetery and entering the choir through the north doorway.
We went off with the abbot. “Is this the hour when the doors of the Aedificium are locked?” William asked.
“As soon as the servants have finished cleaning the refectory and the kitchens, the librarian will personally close all the doors, barring them on the inside.”
“On the inside? And where does he come out?”
The abbot glared at William for a moment. “Obviously he does not sleep in the kitchen,” he said brusquely. And he began to walk faster.
“Very well,” William whispered to me, “so another door does exist, but we are not to know about it.” I smiled, proud of his deduction, and he scolded me: “And don’t laugh. As you have seen, within these walla laughter doesn’t enjoy a good reputation.”
We entered the choir. A single lamp was burning on a heavy bronze tripod, tall as two men. The monks silently took their places is the stalls.
Then the abbot gave a signal, and the precentor intoned, “Tu autem Domine miserere nobis.” The abbot replied, “Adiutorium nostrum in nomine Domnni”; and all continued, in chorus, with “Qui fecit coelum et terram.” Then the chanting of the psalms began: “When I call Thee answer me O God of my justice”; “I shall thank Thee Lord with all my heart”; “Come bless the Lord, all ye servants of the Lord.” We had not sat in the stalls, but had withdrawn into the main nave. From there, we suddenly glimpsed Malachi emerging from the darkness of a side chapel.
“Keep your eye on that spot,” William said to me. “There could be a passage leading to the Aedificium.”
“Under the cemetery?”
“And why not? In fact, now that I think about it, there must be an ossarium somewhere; they can’t possibly have buried all their monks for centuries in that patch of ground.”
“But do you really want to enter the library at night?” I asked, terrified.
“Where there are dead monks and serpents and mysterious lights, my good Adso? No, my boy. I was thinking about it today, and not from curiosity but because I was pondering the question of how Adelmo died. Now, as I told you, I tend toward a more logical explanation, and, all things considered, I would prefer to respect the customs of this place.”
“Then why do you want to know?”
“Because learning does not consist only of knowing what we must or we can do, but also of knowing what we could do and perhaps should not do.”
SECOND DAY
MATINS
Symbol sometimes of the Devil, sometimes of the Risen Christ, no animal is more untrustworthy than the cock. Our order knew some slothful ones who never crowed at sunrise. On the other hand, especially in winter, the office of matins takes place when night is still total and all nature is asleep, for the monk must rise in darkness and pray at length in darkness, waiting for day and illuminating the shadows with the flame of devotion. Therefore, custom wisely provided for some wakers, who were not to go to bed when their brothers did, but would spend the night reciting in cadence the exact number of psalms that would allow them to measure the time passed, so that, at the conclusion of the hours of sleep granted the others, they would give the signal to wake.
So that night we were waked by those who moved through the dormitory and the pilgrims’ house ringing a bell, as one monk went from cell to cell shouting, “Benedicamus Domino,” to which each answered, “Deo gratias.”
William and I followed the Benedictine custom: in less than half an hour we prepared to greet the new day, then we went down into the choir, where the monks, prostrate on the floor, reciting the first fifteen psalms, were waiting until the novices entered led by their master. Then each sat in his regular stall and the choir chanted, “Domine labia mea aperies et os meum annuntiabit laudem tuam.” The cry rose toward the vaulted ceiling of the church like a child’s plea. Two monks climbed to the pulpit and intoned the ninety-fourth psalm, “Venite exultemus,” which was followed by the others prescribed. And I felt the warmth of renewed faith.
The monks were in the stalls, sixty figures made indistinguishable by their habits and cowls, sixty shadows barely illuminated by the fire from the great tripod, sixty voices joined in praise of the Almighty. And, hearing this moving harmony, vestibule of the delights of paradise, I asked myself whether the abbey were truly a place of concealed mysteries, of illicit attempts to reveal them, and of grim threats. Because it now seemed to me, on the contrary, the dwelling of sainted men, cenacle of virtue, vessel of learning, ark of prudence, tower of wisdom, domain of meekness, bastion of strength, thurible of sanctity.
After six psalms, the reading of Holy Scripture began. Some monks were nodding with sleepiness, and one of the night wakers wandered among the stalls with a little lamp to wake any who had dozed off again. If a monk succumbed to drowsiness, as penance he would take the lamp and continue the round. The chanting of another six psalms continued. Then the abbot gave his benediction, the hebdomadary said the prayers, all bowed toward the altar in a moment of meditation whose sweetness no-one can comprehend who has not experienced those hours of mystic ardor and intense inner peace. Finally, cowls again over their faces, all sat and solemnly intoned the “Te Deum.” I, too, praised the Lord because He had released me from my doubts and freed me from the feeling of uneasiness with which my first day at the abbey had filled me. We are fragile creatures, I said to myself; even among these learned and devout monks the Evil One spreads petty envies, foments subtle hostilities, but all these are as smoke then dispersed by the strong wind of faith, the moment all gather in the name of the Father, and Christ descends into their midst.
Between matins and lauds the monk does not return to his cell, even if the night is still dark. The novices followed their master into the chapter house to study the psalms; some of the monks remained in church to tend to the church ornaments, but the majority strolled in the cloister in silent meditation, as did William and I. The servants were asleep and they went on sleeping when, the sky still dark, we returned to the choir for lauds.
The chanting of the psalms resumed, and one in particular, among those prescribed for Mondays, plunged me again into my earlier fears: “The transgression of the wicked saith within my heart, that there is no fear of God before his eyes. The words of his mouth are iniquity.” It seemed to me an ill omen that the Rule should have set for that very day such a terrible admonition. Nor were my pangs of uneasiness eased, after the psalms of praise, by the usual reading of the Apocalypse; the figures of the doorway returned to my mind, the carvings that had so overwhelmed my heart and eyes the day before. But after the responsory, the hymn, and the versicle, as the chanting of the Gospel began, I glimpsed just above the altar, beyond the windows of the choir, a pale glow that was already making the panes shine in their various colors, subdued till then by the darkness. It was not yet dawn, which would triumph during Prime, just as we would be singing “Deus qui est sanctorum splendor mirabilis” and “Iam lucis orto sidere.” It was barely the first faint herald of a winter daybreak, but it was enough, and the dim penumbra now replacing the night’s darkness in the nave was enough to relieve my heart.