The Holy Machine

66

And then I found that the closed door was already behind me and I was in a pale, stone-flagged corridor. The monk took my arm. There were many small blue doors down one side. I caught a glimpse of a bright tree glistening in an empty courtyard. Then many more doors.

I felt myself coming to from a labyrinthine dream of mountains, wars and roads… I woke up and remembered that reality was simply this: moving slowly along a corridor with calm blue doors. On and on. That was life. Why bother to open the doors? Why bother? Why not just carry on along here? It would be fine if it wasn’t so cold. It would be just fine.

I came to again. There were voices. Another monk had appeared, this one tall and sandy-haired. The two men were conferring about me. I couldn’t understand the words at first. I think I was trying to listen to them in the wrong language.

A blue door opened. I was a little afraid. But I went up into the sky and looked down from above, as if into a doll’s house.

In a small bare room with a single chair and a single bed, a monk was talking to a pale young man with bleeding feet. (‘Not him again!’ I thought. ‘Why is it always him?’)

‘Take off your wet clothes,’ the monk coaxed gently, ‘We’ll get you some dry things and something to eat, and we’ll dress these feet. Then you must rest. You have a very high temperature indeed.’

Another monk arrived. Another little monk down there in the doll’s house with miniature dressings and a tiny bowl of water.

‘We’ll have to undress him,’ said the first one. ‘I don’t think he can do it for himself.’

‘Are you sure he speaks Croatian?’

‘Yes. Well he spoke it clearly enough when he arrived. His name is George. He’s from the City.’

‘Alright then George,’ said the second monk. ‘We’ll just take off these pants…’

‘NO!’ the young man shouted. ‘No, leave me alone!’

His hand came out to push the monk away. ‘Easy, George, easy!’ said the monk.

Looking down from my high vantage point, I smiled.

‘Silly boy,’ I thought, ‘he thinks he’s going to get raped again. But really this is a totally different situation.’

So when the monks tried again to remove his clothes, the young man did not resist.

‘Blood here too,’ muttered the first monk.

‘My God, what’s happened to him?’

‘Easy, George, easy!’

I closed my eyes and sank into a dream. I was walking slowly past the blue doors. The cool quiet corridor stretched away into the distance. Why must we always open the doors and disturb things? But it occurred to me that even if I never opened any of them at all, there was no guarantee that one of them might not suddenly open of its own accord, suddenly, and without warning…

I woke up abruptly. I found I was sitting on the bed with bandages on both feet, wrapped in a clean woollen robe.

‘Here, drink this!’ one of the monks was saying. ‘It’ll warm you up. Then you should get into bed and have a proper sleep.’

I took the warm cup and lifted it to my lips. I was about to drink when I remembered what the old woman had told me in the square outside.

‘The Holy Machine!’ I whimpered. ‘I want to see the Holy Machine!’

‘Not now, my friend, not now. You are too tired and too sick. You can see him later. He isn’t going away.’