“I’m a witness to this strange ceremony for the dead. Our patients.”
Several fire trucks and wagons moved around the closest pyramid. Dozens of men filled buckets from the fire-truck hose and passed them hand over hand to others, who struggled to carry them up the dangerously unsteady piles of timber and coffins. Unskilled mountaineers, many slipped and fell before dumping their buckets and slowly descending. Someone shouted at them in Russian and Chinese to hurry and get down.
“What are they pouring on the wood?” The Baron was mystified.
“Kerosene. The fire trucks carry kerosene, not water.”
Fire trucks circled a pyramid. Spray from their hoses was directed in a high arc over its sides, a bright veil that didn’t freeze. The trucks moved on, spraying other pyramids along the row.
At a pistol shot, a crowd of men carrying burning torches, dots of light like a moving necklace, surrounded the first pyramid. Another pistol shot and pale flame spread quickly as wind over the huge pyramid. A great shout from the crowd. The fire’s hunger increased and the color of the flames deepened. With a roar, the heat reached them, hot on their faces. Fur coats were opened and hats were abandoned in the searing cocoon of heat.
A man, drunk, ran to the flames to toss a vodka bottle on the pyre but was tackled and dragged back by his laughing friends. There were cheers from those watching.
Flames rose from the second pyramid. The photographer and his crew jerked the camera tripod from the snow and fled, comic silhouettes, hobbling figures weighed down by their awkward equipment.
The wind changed. Smoke rolled toward them, carrying a blizzard of particles, twirling specks of paper, bark, leaves, twisted threads from shrouds and clothing, an odor of wood and something foul. Panicked, the watchers pulled masks over their faces, fearing the spread of bacilli from the burning bodies. They fled as snow melted around their boots, trampling the sodden discarded clothing. A swarm of red sparks followed them like vengeance, directed by xiefeng, the evil winds that could strike mind and body.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Within minutes after she became chilled and her pulse raced, Dr. Maria Lebedev was swathed in blankets. By evening, her temperature rose and her face flooded with color as if she blushed. Her hand found Messonier’s hand. A sentinel at her bedside, he had stripped off his rubber gloves, unable to bear their thick clumsiness, the barrier to her skin. His mask, forgotten, dangled around his neck. When Maria slept and he could slip out, he wept in the next room, away from her eyes and ears. His anger was more difficult to hide because it made him reckless. Messonier had poured a bottle of her perfume, Jicky, all around the room, on the floor, pillow, and bed linens, to hide the odor of disinfectant. Maria was still lucid. She murmured a request to be taken to St. Nikolas Cathedral.
No, no, no. Messonier slid to the floor next to the bed, gripping the linen sheet as if to wring the fever from her body.
It seemed cruel to expose Maria to the cold, but he followed her wish. Messonier hired a sleigh and made a nest for her, a thickly swaddled figure, unrecognizable in blankets and furs in the back of the sleigh. It was a slow, halting procession to the church as the road was rough with ice under fresh snow.
The side door of St. Nikolas Cathedral had been left unlocked. The Baron and Messonier carried Maria on a stretcher into the building, followed by Li Ju and Chang.
It was only slightly warmer inside the church, faintly lit by the wavering pinpoints of candles on the altar. An odor of burning wax, the pressure of deep cold against wood. Maria was gently maneuvered to face the iconostasis, the royal gates, the towering gold screens hung with icons, that hid the altar. The gates had been specially opened for the service of extreme unction. The ceremony was usually performed by seven priests representing the seven churches, but only four men had been found at short notice. Each priest covered his mouth and nose with a protective mask.
They were uncertain if she was aware of her surroundings. “We’re in the church now, Maria. All of us.” Messonier’s whisper echoed in the space. He caressed her shoulder through the thick blankets.
The fine cloth placed over the lower half of Maria’s face rose and fell with her labored breathing. She had insisted on this caution for the others. Messonier, Chang, the Baron, and his wife stood behind Maria, as if her stretcher were a raft that they would help guide.
A priest paced around them, swinging a censer back and forth on clanking long chains, leaving a zigzag trail of incense, gray against the dim light. The candles held by the witnesses flickered as the priest’s full robes stirred the air.
In silence, Archpriest Orchinkin placed a dish of dry grain, symbolizing death and resurrection, on a small table covered with a white cloth before the royal gates. In memory of the Good Samaritan, a glass of oil and wine was set in the center of the dish. Tiny wooden sticks, their tips wrapped with cotton wool, were inserted in the dry grain and stood upright around the glass.
The priest read from James, chapter 5:
Is any sick among you? Let him call for the elders of the church; and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord.
Archpriest Orchinkin raised his voice over Maria’s coughing as he read the psalms, litany, and prayers of benediction. He dipped a stick in the oil and made the sign of the cross on Maria’s forehead, cheeks, nose, lips, and breast and over her folded hands. Her chest heaved with coughing and Messonier tenderly dabbed bloody foam from her mouth and face with gauze until she was quiet. The four priests surrounded Maria, one by one anointing her with oil as the Seven Epistles and Gospels for Unction from Romans, chapter 15, were read.
The mind governed by the flesh is death, but the mind governed by the spirit is life and peace.
Maria groaned softly. She clawed at the blanket around her shoulders and struggled to free herself. The Baron secured the mask over his face and helped Messonier lift her into a slightly inclined position on the pillow. Messonier held her shaking hand, making the sign of the cross. He nodded at the Baron, who placed something in Messonier’s outstretched hand. A shine of gold as Messonier slipped the ring on Maria’s finger and closed his hand over hers. She recognized his gift and her fingers moved, responding to his touch. The back of Messonier’s hand was wet with tears.
Each priest grasped a corner of the Book of the Holy Gospel and held it open over Maria’s head as they prayed.
You, however, are not in the realm of the flesh but are in the realm of the Spirit.
Messonier tenderly adjusted the pillow behind her back. Her coughing was louder, deeper, racking her body with spasms. Blood flecked the pages of the Bible above her. They waited.
“I ask for the priest’s blessing.” Maria’s words were torn by her gasping for breath.
Archpriest Orchinkin blessed her.
“I ask for everyone’s forgiveness.” Her voice was stronger now.
Everyone murmured consent for forgiveness.
Her eyes flickered with weariness and found Messonier. He bent to kiss her forehead, but with a flash of gold, her hand fluttered to stop him.
The space across Maria Lebedev’s grave was narrow, but the snow flew with such force—furious white sparks—that the mourners were visible only as faint featureless outlines to one another. In voluminous layered robes, so heavy the wind barely disturbed them, the priest swept his arm over the grave and poured oil and ashes of incense reserved from the service of extreme unction.
Rest with the saints, O Christ, thy servant’s soul, where there is no pain, nor grief, nor sighing, but life that endeth not.