The Historian (78 page)

―‗Paul,‘ she said, as if puzzled. ‗What are you doing here?‘ Then she seemed to struggle to sit up and discovered the disarray of her gown. She put her hand to her throat, while I watched in a speechless anguish, and drew it slowly away. There was sticky, drying blood on her fingers. She stared at them, and at me. ‗Oh, God,‘ she said. She sat upright and I felt a first hint of relief, despite the horror in her face; if she‘d lost a lot of blood, she would‘ve been too weak for even that much action. ‗Oh, Paul,‘ she whispered. I sat down on the edge of the bed and took her other hand in mine and gripped it hard.

―‗Are you completely awake?‘ I said.

―She nodded.

―‗And you know where you are?‘

―‗Yes,‘ she said, but then she put her head down over her bloody hand and broke into harsh low sobs, a horrifying sound. I had never before heard her cry out loud. The sound went through my body like a wave of bitter cold.

―‗I‘m here.‘ I kissed her clean hand.

―She squeezed my fingers, weeping, then tried to gather herself. ‗We must think what—is that my crucifix?‘

―‗Yes.‘ I held it up, watching her carefully, but to my infinite relief there was no sign of recoil in her face. ‗Did you remove it?‘

―‗No, of course not.‘ She shook her head and a leftover tear rolled down her cheek. ‗And I don‘t remember breaking it. I don‘t think they—he—would dare to, if the legend is accurate.‘ She was wiping her face now, keeping her hand carefully clear of the wound on her throat. ‗I must have broken it while I slept.‘

―‗I think so, judging from where I found it.‘ I showed her the spot on the floor. ‗And it doesn‘t make you feel—uncomfortable—to have it near you?‘

―‗No,‘ she said wonderingly. ‗At least, not
yet
. ‘ The cold little word made me catch my breath.

She reached out and touched the crucifix, at first hesitantly, and then took it in her hand. I let out my breath. Helen sighed, too. ‗I fell asleep thinking about my mother, and about an article I would like to write on the figures in Transylvanian embroidery—they are famous, you know—and then I didn‘t wake until now.‘ She frowned. ‗I had a bad dream, but my mother was mixed all through it, and she was—shooing away a great black bird.

When she had frightened it away, she bent over and kissed my forehead, as she used to when I was a little girl going to sleep, and I saw the mark‘—she paused, as if thinking pained her a little—‗I saw the mark of the dragon on her bare shoulder, but it seemed to me just a part of her, not something terrible. And when I received her kiss on my forehead, I was not so afraid.‘

―I felt the prickle of a strange awe, remembering the night I had apparently kept my cat‘s destroyer at bay in my apartment by reading through midnight about the lives of the Dutch merchants I had come to love. Something had protected Helen, too, at least to some degree; she had been cruelly injured but not drained of blood. We looked silently at each other.

―‗This could have been much worse,‘ she said.

―I put my arms around her and felt the trembling of her usually firm shoulders. I was shaking, myself. ‗Yes,‘ I whispered. ‗But we must guard you from anything else.‘

―She shook her head, suddenly, as if in wonder. ‗And this is a monastery! I can‘t understand it. The undead abhor such a place.‘ She pointed to the cross over the door, the icon and holy lamp hanging in the corner. ‗Here in the sight of the Virgin?‘

―‗I don‘t understand it, either,‘ I said slowly, turning her hand over in mine. ‗But we know that monks traveled with Dracula‘s remains, and that he was probably buried in a monastery. There is something strange in that already. Helen‘—I squeezed her hand—

‗I‘ve been thinking about something else. The librarian from home—he found us in Istanbul and then in Budapest. Couldn‘t he have followed us here, too? Could he have attacked you last night?‘

―She winced. ‗I know. He bit me once in the library, so he might want me again, might he not? But I felt strongly in my dream it was something else—someone much more powerful. But how could one of them get in, even if he was not afraid of a monastery?‘

―‗That part is simple.‘ I pointed to the nearest window, which stood slightly ajar five feet from Helen‘s cot. ‗Oh, God, why did I let you stay here alone?‘

―‗I was not alone,‘ she reminded me. ‗There were five other people sleeping in the room with me. But you are right—he can change shape, as my mother said—a bat, a mist—‘

―‗Or a great black bird.‘ Her dream had sprung up in my mind again.

―‗Now I have been bitten twice, more or less,‘ she said, almost dreamily.

―Helen!‗ I shook her. ‘I will never let you be alone again, not for an hour.‗

―‗Never an hour to myself?‘ Her old smile, sarcastic and loving, returned for a moment.

―‗And I want you to promise me—if you feel something I can‘t feel, if you feel something looking for you—‘

―‗I will tell you, Paul, if I feel anything like that at all.‘ She spoke fiercely now, and her promise seemed to rouse her to action. ‗Come, please. I need food and I need some red wine or brandy, if we can find it. Bring me a towel, there, and the basin—I will wash my neck and bind it.‘ Her passionate practicality was contagious and I obeyed at once. ‗Later we will go in the church and clean this wound with the holy water, when no one is looking. If I can tolerate that, we can hope a great deal. How strange‘—I was glad to see her cynical smile again—‗I have always felt all this church ritual is nonsense, and I still do.‘

―‗But apparently he does not think it is nonsense,‘ I said soberly.

―I helped her sponge off her throat, taking care not to touch the open lesions, and watched the door while she dressed. The sight of the wound up close was so terrible to me that I thought for a minute I would have to leave the room and give way to my tears outside.

But although Helen moved weakly, I could see the set determination in her face. She tied on her customary scarf and found a piece of string in her baggage with which to make a new chain for the crucifix—this one stronger, I hoped. Her sheets were hopelessly stained, but only in small spots. ‗We will let the monks think—well, that there have been women in their dormitory,‘ Helen said in her forthright way. ‗It is surely not the first time they will have washed out some blood.‘‖

―By the time we emerged from the church, Ranov was lounging in the courtyard. He narrowed his eyes at Helen. ‗You have slept very late,‘ he said accusingly. I looked carefully at his eyeteeth when he spoke, but they didn‘t appear any sharper than usual; if anything, they were ground down and gray in his unpleasant smile.‖

―Ihad found it exasperating that Ranov had been so reluctant to take us to Rila, but it was far more disturbing to see his enthusiasm about taking us to Bachkovo. During the car ride, he pointed out all kinds of sights, many of which were interesting in spite of his running commentary on them. Helen and I tried not to look at each other, but I was sure she felt the same miserable apprehension. Now we had József to worry about, too. The road from Plovdiv was narrow, and it curved along a rocky stream on one side and steep cliffs on the other. We were making our way gradually into mountains again—in Bulgaria, you could never be far from mountains. I remarked on this to Helen, who was gazing out the opposite window in the backseat of Ranov‘s car, and she nodded. ‗Balkan
is
a Turkish word for
mountain
. ‘‖

―The monastery had no grand entrance—we simply pulled off the road into a dirt lot, and from there it was a short walk to the monastery gate.
Bachkovski manastir
sat among high barren hills, partly forested and partly bare rock, close to the narrow river; even in early summer, the landscape was already dry, and I could easily imagine how the monks must have valued that nearby source of water. The outer walls were the same dun-colored stone as the hills around them. The monastery roofs were fluted red ceramic tile, like that I‘d seen on Stoichev‘s old house and on hundreds of houses and churches along the roadsides. The entrance to the monastery was a yawning archway, as perfectly dark as a hole in the ground. ‗Can we simply walk in?‘ I asked Ranov.

―He shook his head, meaning yes, and we stepped into the cool darkness of the arch. It took us a few seconds of slow progress to make our way into the sunny courtyard, and during those moments inside the monastery‘s deep wall, I could hear nothing but our footsteps.

―Maybe I‘d expected another grand public space, like that at Rila; the intimacy and beauty of the main courtyard at Bachkovo brought a sigh to my lips, and Helen murmured something aloud, too. The monastery church filled much of the courtyard, and its towers were red, angular, Byzantine. There were no gold domes here, only an ancient elegance—the simplest materials arranged in harmonious forms. Vines grew on the church towers; trees nestled against them; one magnificent cypress rose like a steeple.

Three monks in black robes and hats stood talking outside the church. The trees threw patches of shade on the brilliant sun of the yard, and a soft breeze had come up, moving the leaves. To my surprise, chickens ran here and there, scratching the antique paving stones, and a striped kitten was chasing something into a crevice in the wall.

―As at Rila, the inside walls of the monastery were long balconied galleries, stone and wood. The stone lower wall of some of the galleries, like the portico of the church, was covered in faded frescoes. Apart from the three monks, the chickens, and the kitten, there was no one in sight. We were alone there, alone in Byzantium.

―Ranov went up to the monks and engaged them in conversation while Helen and I hung back a little. After a second he returned. ‗The abbot is away, but the librarian is here and can help us.‘ I didn‘t like that
us
, but I said nothing. ‗You can look in the church while I go find him.‘

―‗We will come with you,‘ Helen said firmly, and we all followed one of the monks into the galleries. The librarian was working in a room on the first floor; he rose from his desk to greet us as we entered. The space was bare, except for an iron stove and a bright rug on the floor. I wondered where the books were, the manuscripts. Apart from a couple of volumes on the wooden desk, I saw no sign of a library here.

―‗This is Brother Ivan,‘ Ranov explained. The monk bowed to us without offering his hand; in fact, his hands were tucked out of sight in his long sleeves, crossed over his body. It occurred to me that he didn‘t want to touch Helen. The same thing must have occurred to Helen, because she backed away and stood almost behind me. Ranov exchanged a few words with him. ‗Brother Ivan asks you to please sit down.‘ We sat obediently. Brother Ivan had a long, serious face above his beard, and he studied us for a few minutes. ‗You may ask him some questions,‘ Ranov said encouragingly.

―I cleared my throat. There was no help for it; we were going to have to ask our questions in front of Ranov. I would have to try to make them sound purely scholarly. ‗Would you ask Brother Ivan for us if he knows anything about pilgrims coming here from Wallachia?‘

―Ranov put this question to the monk, and at the word
Wallachia
, Brother Ivan‘s face brightened. ‗He says the monastery had an important connection with Wallachia beginning at the end of the fifteenth century.‘

―My heart began to pound, although I tried to sit quietly. ‗Yes? What was that?‘

―They conversed a little further, Brother Ivan waving a long hand toward the door. Ranov nodded. ‗He says that around that time the princes of Wallachia and Moldova began to give much support to this monastery. There are manuscripts in the library here that describe their support.‘

―‗Does he know why they did this?‘ Helen asked quietly.

―Ranov questioned the monk. ‗No,‘ he said. ‗He only knows these manuscripts show their support.‘

―‗Ask him,‘ I said, ‗if he knows of any groups of pilgrims coming here from Wallachia around that time.‘

―Brother Ivan actually smiled. ‗Yes,‘ Ranov reported. ‗There were many. This was an important stop on the pilgrimage routes from Wallachia. Many pilgrims went on from here to Athos or to Constantinople.‘

―I could have ground my teeth. ‗But a particular group of pilgrims from Wallachia, carrying a—some kind of relic, or searching for some relic—does he know any such story?‘

―Ranov seemed to be holding back a triumphant smile. ‗No,‘ he said. ‗He has not seen any account of such pilgrims. There were many pilgrims during that century.
Bachkovski
manastir
was very important then. The patriarch of Bulgaria was exiled here from his office in Veliko Trnovo, the old capital, when the Ottomans captured the country. He died here in 1404 and was buried here. The oldest part of the monastery, and the only part that is original, is the ossuary.‘

―Helen spoke up again. ‗Could you ask him, please, if he has a monk among the brothers here who used to be named Pondev?‘

―Ranov relayed the question, and Brother Ivan looked puzzled, then wary. ‗He says that must be old Brother Angel. He used to be named Vasil Pondev, and he was an historian.

But he is not—right in the head—anymore. You will not learn anything from speaking with him. The abbot is our great scholar now, and it is a shame that he is away while you are here.‘

―‗We‘d still like to talk with Brother Angel,‘ I told Ranov. And so it was arranged, although with much frowning on the part of the librarian, who led us back out into the glowing sunlight of the courtyard and through a second arched entryway. This brought us into another courtyard, which had a very old building in the center. This second courtyard was not as well-tended as the first, and the buildings and paving stones had a crumbling, derelict look. There were weeds underfoot, and I noted a tree growing from the corner of the roof; in time, it would be large enough to destroy that end of the structure, if they let it stay. I could easily imagine that repairing this house of God was not the Bulgarian government‘s highest priority. They had Rila as their showcase, with its ‗pure‘ Bulgarian history and its connections to rebellion against the Ottomans. This ancient place, beautiful as it was, had taken root under the Byzantines, invaders and occupiers like the later Ottomans, and it had been Armenian, Georgian, Greek—hadn‘t we just heard that it had also been independent under the Ottomans, unlike the other Bulgarian monasteries?