The Historian (72 page)

And he told us most frequently about the churches and monasteries of the city of Constantinople before the infidel troops of the sultan desecrated them. He described to us with reverence their priceless, miracle-working icons, such as the image of the Virgin in the great church of Saint Sophia, and her veiled icon in the sanctuary at Blachernae. He had seen the tomb of Saint John Chrysostom and of the emperors, and the head of the blessed Saint Basil in the church of the Panachrantos, as well as numerous other holy relics. How fortunate for him and for us, the recipients of his tales, that when he was still young he had left the city to wander again, so that he was far distant from it when the devil Muhammad built near it a diabolically strong fortress for the purposes of attacking the city, and soon after broke down the great walls of Constantinople and killed or enslaved its noble people. Then, when Stefan was far away and heard this news, he wept with the rest of Christendom for the martyred city.

And he brought with him to our monastery rare and wonderful books in his horse‘s pack, which he had collected and from which he drew divine inspiration, as he himself was a master of the Greek, Latin, and Slavic languages and probably others besides. He told us these many things and put his books into our library to bring glory to it forever, which, although most of us could read in only one language and some not all, they did. He gave these gifts saying that he too had ended his travels and would remain forever, like his books, at Zographou.

Only I and one other brother remarked that Stefan spoke not of his sojourn in Wallachia, except to say that he had been a novice there, and neither did he speak much of the Bulgarian monastery called Sveti Georgi, until the end of his life. For when he came to us, he was already sick, and suffered much from fevers in his limbs, and after less than a year he told us he hoped soon to bow before the throne of the Savior, if enough of his sins could be overlooked by the One who forgives all true penitents. When he lay in his last illness he asked to make a confession to our abbot, because he had witnessed evils that he must not die in the possession of, and the abbot, being very struck by his confession, asked me to require it of him again and write down all he said, because he, the abbot, wished to send a letter about it to Constantinople. This I did with all speed and without error, sitting by Stefan‘s bedside and listening with a heart full of terror to the tale he patiently told me, after which he was given holy communion and died in his sleep and was buried at our monastery.

The Tale of Stefan of Snagov,

Faithfully Transcribed by Zacharias the Sinner

I, Stefan, after years of wandering and also after the loss of the beloved and holy city of my birth, Constantinople, went in search of rest north of the great river that divides the Bulgarians from Dacia. I wandered into the plain and then the mountains, and at length I found my way to the monastery that sits on the island in Lake Snagov, a most beautifully secluded and defensible place. There the good abbot welcomed me and I took my seat at table with monks as humble and dedicated to prayer as any I had met in all my journeys.

They called me their brother and shared freely with me the food and drink of their meal, and I felt more at peace in the midst of their devout silence than I had in many months.

As I worked hard, and followed humbly every direction of the abbot, he soon granted me permission to stay among them. Their church was not large but was of surpassing beauty, with famed bells whose sound rang across the water.

This church and the monastery had received the utmost assistance and fortification from the prince of that region, Vlad son of Vlad Dracul, who was twice chased from his throne by the sultan and other enemies. He was also once long imprisoned by Matthias Corvinus, king of the Magyars. This prince Dracula was very brave, and in reckless battle he plundered or took back from the infidels many of the lands they stole, and of his battle spoils he gave to the monastery, and was constantly desirous that we should pray for him and his family and their safety, which we did. Some of the monks whispered that he had sinned through exceeding cruelty and also had, while prisoner of the Magyar king, allowed himself to be converted to the Latin faith. But the abbot would hear no ill word of him from anyone and had more than once concealed him and his men in the sanctuary of the church when other nobles wished to find and kill him.

In the last year of his life, Dracula came to the monastery, as he had been wont to do more often in earlier times. I did not see him then, because the abbot had sent me and one other monk on an errand to another church, where he had some business. When I returned, I heard that the lord Drakulya had been there and had left new treasures. One brother, who traded for our supplies with the peasants in that region and heard many stories in the countryside, whispered that Dracula was as likely to present a bag of ears and noses as a sack of treasure, but when the abbot heard about this remark he punished the speaker very soundly. Thus I never saw Vlad Dracula in life, but I did see him in death, which I shall report soon enough.

Perhaps four months later there came word that he had been surrounded in a battle and there caught and slain by the infidel soldiers, first killing more than forty of them with his great sword. Upon his death, the sultan‘s soldiers cut off his head and took it away with them to show their master.

All this was known by the men of Prince Dracula‘s camp, and although many hid away after his death, some of them brought this news and also his body to the monastery of Snagov, after which they also fled. The abbot wept when he saw the body lifted from the boat and prayed aloud both for the Lord Dracula‘s soul and for the protection of God, because the crescent of the infidel was now coming very near. He caused the body to be laid in state in the church.

It was one of the most dreadful sights I have seen, this headless corpse robed in red and purple and surrounded by many flickering candle flames. We sat in watches in the church, keeping the holy vigil, for another three days and nights. I sat in the first vigil, and all was peaceful in the church apart from the sight of the mutilated body. In the second vigil all was peaceful again—so said the brothers who watched that night. But on the third night some of the tired brothers dozed, and something occurred to strike terror into the hearts of the others. What it was they could not later agree, each having seen something different. One monk saw an animal leap from the shadows of the stalls and over the coffin, but could not ascertain what shape the animal had. Others felt a gust of wind or saw a thick fog enter the church, which guttered many of the candles, and they swore by the saints and angels and especially the archangels Mikhail and Gabriel that in the dark the headless body of the prince stirred and tried to rise. There was a great shrieking among the brothers in the church, who lifted their voices in terror, and by this the whole community was roused. These monks, running out, related their visions with bitter disagreement among them.

Then the abbot came forward and I saw in the light of the torch he held that he grew very pale and awed at the stories they related, crossing himself many times. He reminded all who were present that the soul of this nobleman was in our hands and that we must act accordingly. He led us into the church, relighting the candles there, and we saw that the body lay quietly as before in its coffin. The abbot caused the church to be searched, but no animal nor any demon was found in any corner. Then he bid us to compose ourselves and go to our cells, and when the hour for the first service came it was held as usual and all was calm.

But the next evening he called eight monks together, honoring me by inclusion among them, and said that we would only make a pretense of burying the prince‘s body in the church, but that it must instead be conveyed at once from this place. He said that he would tell only one of us, in secret, where we were to take it and why, that the others might be protected as long as possible by our ignorance, and this he did, selecting a monk who had been with him there for many years but telling the rest [of us] only to follow obediently and ask no questions.

In this way I, who had thought never to wander again, became a traveler once more and crossed a long distance, entering with my companions the city of my birth, which had become the seat of the infidels‘ kingdom, and I found much that was changed there. The great church of Saint Sophia was taken for a mosque and we could not enter it. Many churches had been destroyed or allowed to fall into ruins, and others turned into houses of worship for the Turks, even the Panachrantos. And there I learned that we were looking for a treasure that might hasten the salvation of the soul of this prince, and that this treasure had already been procured at terrible risk by two holy and brave monks from the monastery of Saint Saviour and taken secretly out of the city. But some of the sultan‘s Janissaries had become suspicious, and because of this we were placed in danger and forced to wander once more to find it, this time traveling into the old kingdom of the Bulgars.

As we passed through the country, it seemed that some of the Bulgarians knew already of this mission, for more and more of them came out along the roads, bowing silently to our procession, and some followed for many miles, touching our wagon with their hands or kissing the side of it. During this journey a most terrible thing occurred. While we were passing through the town of Haskovo, some of the guards of the town rode out to us and stopped us with force and harsh words. They searched our wagon, declaring they would find whatever we carried, and discovering two bundles, they seized them and opened them. When these proved to be food, the infidels threw them in the road with wrath and arrested two of our number. These good monks, protesting that they knew nothing and thus angering the evil ones, had their hands and feet cut off, salt being put in their wounds before they died. They let the rest of us live but dispatched us with curses and whippings. We were afterward able to secure the bodies and limbs of our dear friends and reunite them for Christian burial in the monastery of Bachkovo, whose monks prayed many days and nights for their devout souls.

After this event, we were very much saddened and terrified, but we traveled on, not much farther and without incident, to the monastery of Sveti Georgi. There the monks, although they were old and few, welcomed us and told us that indeed the treasure we sought had been brought to them by two pilgrims some months previous to this, and all was well. We could not think of returning to Dacia soon through so many dangers, and thus we settled there. The relics we had conveyed thither were secretly enshrined at Sveti Georgi and their fame among Christians brought many to worship there, and they also kept silence.

For some time we lived in peace at this place and the monastery was built up greatly by our labors. Soon, however, a plague broke out in the villages near us, although at first it did not infect the monastery. I learned [that it was no ordinary plague, but instead]

[At this point the manuscript is cut or torn off.]

―When Stoichev had finished, Helen and I sat mute for a couple of minutes. Stoichev himself shook his head now and then, drawing one hand over his face as if to wake himself from a dream. At last Helen spoke. ‗It is the same journey—it must be the same journey.‘

―Stoichev turned to her. ‗I believe it is. And surely Brother Kiril‘s monks were transporting the remains of Vlad Tepes.‘

―‗And this means that—except for the two who were murdered by the Ottomans—they reached a Bulgarian monastery safely. Sveti Georgi—where is it?‘

―It was the question I had most wanted to ask out of all the puzzles that pressed on me.

Stoichev put his hand to his brow. ‗If only I knew,‘ he muttered. ‗No one knows. There is no monastery called Sveti Georgi in the Bachkovo region, and no evidence that there ever was one there. Sveti Georgi is one of several medieval monasteries in Bulgaria that we know existed but which vanished during the early centuries of the Ottoman yoke. It was probably burned, and the stones scattered or used for other buildings.‘ He looked sadly at us. ‗If the Ottomans had some reason to hate or fear this monastery it was probably completely destroyed. Certainly they did not permit it to be rebuilt, as Rila Monastery was. I was very interested, at one time, in finding the location of Sveti Georgi.‘ He fell silent for a minute. ‗After my friend Angelov died, I tried for a while to continue his research. I went to
Bachkovski manastir
, and I talked with the monks and asked many people in the region, but no one knew of a monastery called Sveti Georgi. I never found it on any of the old maps I examined, either. I have wondered if perhaps Stefan gave Zacharias a false name for it. I thought that there would be a legend among the people of the region, at least, if the relics of such an important figure as Vlad Dracula had been buried there. I wanted to go to Snagov, before the war, to see what I could learn there—‘

―‗If you had, you might have met Rossi, or at least that archaeologist—Georgescu,‘ I exclaimed.

―‗Perhaps.‘ He smiled strangely. ‗If Rossi and I had indeed met there, perhaps we could have joined our knowledge then, before it was too late.‘

―I wondered if he meant,
Before the revolution in Bulgaria, before I was exiled here
; I didn‘t want to ask. A second later, however, he explained. ‗You see, I stopped my research rather suddenly. The day when I returned from the Bachkovo region, with my mind full of a plan to go to Romania, I came back to my apartment in Sofia to find an awful scene.‘