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Ten times was this simple but painful litany repeated, with Brother Francis yelping his thanks to Heaven for
each scorching lesson in the virtue of humility, as he was expected to do. The abbot paused after the tenth whack.
Brother Francis was on tip-toe and bouncing slightly. Tears squeezed from the corners of clenched eyelids.
“My dear Brother Francis,” said the Abbot Arkos “are you quite sure you saw the old man?”
“certain,” he squeaked, steeling himself for more.
Abbot Arkos glanced clinically at the youth, then walked round his desk and sat down with a grunt. He
glowered for a time at the slip of parchment bearing the letters
“Who do you suppose he could have been?” Abbot Arkos muttered absently.
Brother Francis opened his eyes, causing a brief shed of water.
“Oh, you’ve convinced me,rs gold, boy, worse luck for you.
Francis said nothing, but prayed silently that the need to convince his sovereign of his veracity would not
often arise. In response to an irritable gesture from the abbot, he lowered his tunic.
“You may sit down,” said the abbot, becoming casual if not genial
Francis moved toward the indicated chair,buy silkroad online gold, lowered himself halfway into it, but then winced and stood up
again. “If it’s all the same to the Reverend Father Abbot?a”
“All right, then stand. I won’t keep you long anyhow. You’re to go out and finish your vigil.” He paused,
noticing the novice’s face brighten a little. “Oh no you don’t!” he snapped. “You’re not going back to the same
place. You’ll trade hermitages with Brother Alfred, and not go near those ruins again. Furthermore,maple story mesos, I command
you not to discuss the matter with anyone, except your confessor or with me, although, Heaven knows, the
damage is already done. Do you know what you’ve started?”
Brother Francis shook his bead. “Yesterday being Sunday, Reverend Father, we weren’t required to keep
silent, and at recreation I just answered the fellows’ questions. I thought?a”
?25 312168 3
“Well, your fellows have cooked up a very cute explanation, dear son. Did you know that it was the Blessed
Leibowitz himself you met out there?”
Francis looked blank for a moment then shook his head again. “Oh, no, m’Lord Abbot. I’m sure it couldn’t
have been. The Blessed Martyr wouldn’t do such a thing.”
“Wouldn’t do such-a-what thing?”
“Wouldn’t chase after somebody and try to hit him with a stick that had a nail in one and.”
The abbot wiped his mouth to hide an involuntary smile. He managed to appear thoughtful after a moment.
“Oh, I don’t know about that, now. It was you he was chasing, wasn’t it? Yes, I thought so. You told your fellow
novices about that part too? Yes,silkroad gold, eh? Well, you see, they didn’t think that would exclude the possibility of his
being the Beatus. Now I doubt if there are very many people that the Beatus would chase with a stick, but?a” He
broke off, unable to suppress laughter at the expression on the novice’s face. “All right, son-but who do you
suppose he could have been?”
“I thought perhaps be was a pilgrim on his way to visit our shrine, Reverend Father.”

look?”
“I never said he was?a”
“And this is your excuse for believing yourself to have a true vocation, is it not? That this, this?ashall we
call him a ‘creature’??aspoke to you of finding a voice, and marked a rock with his initials, and told you it was
what you were looking for, and when you looked, under it?athere THIS was. Eh?”
“Yes, Dom Arkos.”
“What is your opinion of your own execrable vanity?”
“My execrable vanity is unpardonable, m’Lord’n'Teacher.”
“To imagine yourself important enough to be unpardonable is an even vaster vanity,” roared the sovereign
of the abbey.
“M’Lord, I am indeed a worm.”
“Very well, you need only deny the part about the pilgrim. No one else saw such a person, you know. I
understand he was supposed to have been headed in this direction? That he even said he might stop here? That he
?24 312168 3
inquired about the abbey? Yes? And where would he have disappeared to, if he ever existed? No such person
came past here. The brother on duty at that time in the watchtower didn’t see him. Eh? Are you now ready to
admit that you imagined him?”
“If there are not really two marks on that rock where he?athen maybe I might?a”
The abbot dosed his eyes and sighed wearily. “The marks are there?afaintly,cheap world of warcraft gold,” he admitted. “You might have
made them yourself.”
“No, m’Lord.”
“Will you admit that you imagined the old creature?”
“Very well,buy sro gold, do you know what is going to happen to you now?”
“Yes,maplestory mesos, Reverend Father”
“Then prepare to take it.”
Trembling, the novice gathered up his habit about his waist and bent over the desk. The abbot withdrew a
stout hickory ruler from the drawer, tested it on his palm,cheap rs money, then gave Francis a smart whack with it across the
buttocks.
“Deo gratias!” the novice dutifully responded, gasping slightly.
“Care to change your mind, my boy?”
“Reverend Father, I can’t deny?a”
WHACK!
“Deo gratias!”

“Benedicamus Domine.”
“Deo? gratias?” asked Francis.
“Come in, my boy, come in!” called an affable voice, which, after some seconds of puzzling, he recognized
with amazement to have been that of his sovereign abbot.
?23 312168 3
“You twist the little knob, my son,” said the same friendly voice after Brother Francis had stood frozen on
the spot for some seconds, with his knuckles still in position for knocking.
“Y-y-yes-” Francis scarcely touched the knob,cheap rs gold, but it seemed that the accursed door opened anyway; he had
hoped that it would he tightly stuck.
“The Lord Abbot s-s-sent for?ame?” squawked the novice.
Abbot Arkos pursed his lips and nodded slowly. “Mmmm?ayes, the Lord Abbot sent for?ayou. Do come in
and shut the door.”
Brother Francis got the door closed and stood shivering In the center of the room. The abbot was toying
with some of the wire-whiskered things from the old toolbox.
“Or perhaps it would be more fitting,” said Abbot Arkos, “If the Reverend Father Abbot were sent for by
you. Now that you have been so favored by Providence and have become so famous, eh?” He smiled soothingly.
“Heh heh?” Brother Francis laughed inquiringly. “Oh n-n-no, m’Lord.”
“You do not dispute that you have won overnight fame? That Providence elected you to discover THIS?a”
he gestured sweepingly at the relics on the desk “?athis ]UNK box, as its previous owner no doubt rightly called
it?”
The novice stammered helplessly,maplestory mesos, and somehow managed to wind up wearing a grin.
“You are seventeen and plainly an idiot, are you not?”
“That is undoubtedly true, m’Lord Abbot.”
“What excuse do you propose for believing yourself called to Religion?”
“No excuse, Magister meus.”
“Ah? So? Then you feel that you have no vocation to the Order?”
“Oh, I do!” the novice gasped.
“But you propose no excuse?”
“None.”
“You little cretin, I am asking your reason. Since you state none,cheap silkroad gold, I take it you are prepared to deny that you
met anyone in the desert the other day, that you stumbled on this-this JUNK box with no help, and that what I
have been hearing from others is only-feverish raving?”
“Oh, no,wow power leveling, Dom Arkos!”
“Oh, no, what?”
“I cannot deny what I saw with my own eyes, Reverend Father.”
“So, you did meet an angel?aor was it a saint??aor perhaps not yet a saint??aand he showed you where to

Ten times was this simple but painful litany repeated, with Brother Francis yelping his thanks to Heaven for
each scorching lesson in the virtue of humility, as he was expected to do. The abbot paused after the tenth whack.
Brother Francis was on tip-toe and bouncing slightly. Tears squeezed from the corners of clenched eyelids.
“My dear Brother Francis,” said the Abbot Arkos “are you quite sure you saw the old man?”
“certain,” he squeaked, steeling himself for more.
Abbot Arkos glanced clinically at the youth, then walked round his desk and sat down with a grunt. He
glowered for a time at the slip of parchment bearing the letters
“Who do you suppose he could have been?” Abbot Arkos muttered absently.
Brother Francis opened his eyes, causing a brief shed of water.
“Oh, you’ve convinced me, boy, worse luck for you.
Francis said nothing, but prayed silently that the need to convince his sovereign of his veracity would not
often arise. In response to an irritable gesture from the abbot,buy runescape money, he lowered his tunic.
“You may sit down,” said the abbot, becoming casual if not genial
Francis moved toward the indicated chair, lowered himself halfway into it, but then winced and stood up
again. “If it’s all the same to the Reverend Father Abbot?a”
“All right, then stand. I won’t keep you long anyhow. You’re to go out and finish your vigil.” He paused,
noticing the novice’s face brighten a little. “Oh no you don’t!” he snapped. “You’re not going back to the same
place. You’ll trade hermitages with Brother Alfred, and not go near those ruins again. Furthermore, I command
you not to discuss the matter with anyone, except your confessor or with me,buy runescape gold, although, Heaven knows, the
damage is already done. Do you know what you’ve started?”
Brother Francis shook his bead. “Yesterday being Sunday, Reverend Father, we weren’t required to keep
silent, and at recreation I just answered the fellows’ questions. I thought?a”
?25 312168 3
“Well, your fellows have cooked up a very cute explanation, dear son. Did you know that it was the Blessed
Leibowitz himself you met out there?”
Francis looked blank for a moment then shook his head again. “Oh, no, m’Lord Abbot. I’m sure it couldn’t
have been. The Blessed Martyr wouldn’t do such a thing.”
“Wouldn’t do such-a-what thing?”
“Wouldn’t chase after somebody and try to hit him with a stick that had a nail in one and.”
The abbot wiped his mouth to hide an involuntary smile. He managed to appear thoughtful after a moment.
“Oh, I don’t know about that, now. It was you he was chasing,ffxi gil, wasn’t it? Yes, I thought so. You told your fellow
novices about that part too? Yes, eh? Well, you see,cheap lord of the rings gold, they didn’t think that would exclude the possibility of his
being the Beatus. Now I doubt if there are very many people that the Beatus would chase with a stick, but?a” He
broke off, unable to suppress laughter at the expression on the novice’s face. “All right, son-but who do you
suppose he could have been?”
“I thought perhaps be was a pilgrim on his way to visit our shrine, Reverend Father.”

look?”
“I never said he was?a”
“And this is your excuse for believing yourself to have a true vocation, is it not? That this, this?ashall we
call him a ‘creature’??aspoke to you of finding a voice, and marked a rock with his initials, and told you it was
what you were looking for, and when you looked,buy rs gold, under it?athere THIS was. Eh?”
“Yes, Dom Arkos.”
“What is your opinion of your own execrable vanity?”
“My execrable vanity is unpardonable, m’Lord’n'Teacher.”
“To imagine yourself important enough to be unpardonable is an even vaster vanity,” roared the sovereign
of the abbey.
“M’Lord, I am indeed a worm.”
“Very well, you need only deny the part about the pilgrim. No one else saw such a person, you know. I
understand he was supposed to have been headed in this direction? That he even said he might stop here? That he
?24 312168 3
inquired about the abbey? Yes? And where would he have disappeared to,ffxi power leveling, if he ever existed? No such person
came past here. The brother on duty at that time in the watchtower didn’t see him. Eh? Are you now ready to
admit that you imagined him?”
“If there are not really two marks on that rock where he?athen maybe I might?a”
The abbot dosed his eyes and sighed wearily. “The marks are there?afaintly,” he admitted. “You might have
made them yourself.”
“No,rs gold, m’Lord.”
“Will you admit that you imagined the old creature?”
“Very well, do you know what is going to happen to you now?”
“Yes, Reverend Father”
“Then prepare to take it.”
Trembling,buy runescape money, the novice gathered up his habit about his waist and bent over the desk. The abbot withdrew a
stout hickory ruler from the drawer, tested it on his palm, then gave Francis a smart whack with it across the
buttocks.
“Deo gratias!” the novice dutifully responded, gasping slightly.
“Care to change your mind, my boy?”
“Reverend Father, I can’t deny?a”
WHACK!
“Deo gratias!”

“Benedicamus Domine.”
“Deo? gratias?” asked Francis.
“Come in, my boy, come in!” called an affable voice, which, after some seconds of puzzling, he recognized
with amazement to have been that of his sovereign abbot.
?23 312168 3
“You twist the little knob, my son,cheap star wars galaxies credits,” said the same friendly voice after Brother Francis had stood frozen on
the spot for some seconds, with his knuckles still in position for knocking.
“Y-y-yes-” Francis scarcely touched the knob, but it seemed that the accursed door opened anyway; he had
hoped that it would he tightly stuck.
“The Lord Abbot s-s-sent for?ame?” squawked the novice.
Abbot Arkos pursed his lips and nodded slowly. “Mmmm?ayes, the Lord Abbot sent for?ayou. Do come in
and shut the door.”
Brother Francis got the door closed and stood shivering In the center of the room. The abbot was toying
with some of the wire-whiskered things from the old toolbox.
“Or perhaps it would be more fitting,” said Abbot Arkos, “If the Reverend Father Abbot were sent for by
you. Now that you have been so favored by Providence and have become so famous, eh?” He smiled soothingly.
“Heh heh?” Brother Francis laughed inquiringly. “Oh n-n-no, m’Lord.”
“You do not dispute that you have won overnight fame? That Providence elected you to discover THIS?a”
he gestured sweepingly at the relics on the desk “?athis ]UNK box, as its previous owner no doubt rightly called
it?”
The novice stammered helplessly, and somehow managed to wind up wearing a grin.
“You are seventeen and plainly an idiot, are you not?”
“That is undoubtedly true, m’Lord Abbot.”
“What excuse do you propose for believing yourself called to Religion?”
“No excuse,rs money, Magister meus.”
“Ah? So? Then you feel that you have no vocation to the Order?”
“Oh, I do!” the novice gasped.
“But you propose no excuse?”
“None.”
“You little cretin, I am asking your reason. Since you state none,final fantasy gil, I take it you are prepared to deny that you
met anyone in the desert the other day, that you stumbled on this-this JUNK box with no help, and that what I
have been hearing from others is only-feverish raving?”
“Oh, no,warcraft gold, Dom Arkos!”
“Oh, no, what?”
“I cannot deny what I saw with my own eyes, Reverend Father.”
“So, you did meet an angel?aor was it a saint??aor perhaps not yet a saint??aand he showed you where to

the very burlap cloth they hooded Blessed Leibowitz with before they hanged him. And with what for a belt? A
rope. What rope? Ahh, the very same?a” He paused, looking at Cheroki. “I can tell by your blank look that you
haven’t heard this yet? No? All right, so you can’t say. No, no, Francis didn’t say that. All he said was?a” Abbot
Arkos tried to inject a slightly falsetto quality into his normally gruff voice. “All Brother Francis said was?a’I
met a little old man, and I thought he was a pilgrim heading for the abbey because he was going that way, and he
was wearing an old burlap sack tied around with a piece of rope. And he made a mark on the rock, and the mark
looked like this.’ ”
Arkos produced a scrap of parchment from the pocket of his fur robe and held it up toward Cheroki’s face in
the candle-glow. Still trying, with only slight success, to imitate Brother Francis: ” ‘And I couldn’t figure out
what it meant. Do you know?’ ”
Cheroki stared at the symbols and shook his head.
“I wasn’t asking you,” Arkos gruffed in his normal voice. “That’s what Francis said. I didn’t know either.”
“You do now?”
“I do now. Somebody looked it up. That is a lamedh, and that is a sadhe. Hebrew letters.”
“Sadhe lamedh?”
“No. Right to left. Lamedh sadhe. An ell, and a tee-ess sound. If it had vowel marks, it might be ‘loots,”
‘lots,” ‘lets,” ‘lets,” ‘latz,guild wars gold,” `litz’-anything like that. If it had some letters between those two, it might sound like
Lllll?aguess-who.”
“Leibo-Ho, no!”
“Ho, yes! Brother Francis didn’t think of it. Somebody else thought of it. Brother Francis didn’t think of the
burlap hood and the hangman’s rope; one of his chums did. So what happens? By tonight, the whole novitiate is
buzzing with the sweet little story that Francis met the Beatus himself out there, and the Beatus escorted our boy
over to where that stuff was and told him he’d find his vocation.”
A perplexed frown crossed Cheroki’s face. “Did Brother Francis say that?”
“NOO!” Arkos roared. “Haven’t you been listening? Francis said no such things. I wish he had, by gum; then
I’d HAVE the rascal! But he tells it sweet-and-simple, rather stupidly,buy runescape gold, in fact, and lets the others read in the
meanings. I haven’t talked to him myself. I sent the Rector of the Memorabilia to get his story.”
“I think I’d better talk to Brother Francis,” Cheroki murmured.
“Do! When you first came in, I was still wondering whether to roast you alive or not. For sending him in, I
mean. If you had let him stay out there on the desert, we wouldn’t have this fantastic twaddle going around. But,
on the other hand, if he’d stayed out there, there’s no telling what else he might have dug out of that cellar. I think
you did the right thing, to send him in.”
Cheroki, who had made the decision on no such basis, found silence to be the appropriate policy.
“See him,eve isk,” growled the abbot. “Then send him to me.”
It was about nine on a bright Monday morning when Brother Francis rapped timidly at the door of the
abbot’s study. A good night’s sleep on the hard straw pallet in his old familiar cell,cheap rs money, plus a small bite of unfamiliar
breakfast, had not perhaps done any wonders for starved tissue or entirely cleared the sun-daze from his brain,
but these relative luxuries had at least restored him to sufficient clarity of mind to perceive that he had cause to
be afraid. He was, in fact, terrified, so that his first tap at the abbot’s door went unheard. Not even Francis could
hear it. After several minutes, he mustered the courage to knock again.

Cheroki had always maintained a formally cordial relationship with the ring and the pectoral cross, with the
office, of his abbot, but permitted himself to see as little as possible of Arkos the man. This was rather difficult
under present circumstances, the Reverend Father Abbot being fresh out of his bath, and padding around his
study in his bare feet. He had apparently just trimmed a corn and cut too deep; one great toe was bloody. Cheroki
tried to avoid noticing it, but felt very ill at ease.
“You do know what I’m talking about?” Arkos growled impatiently.
Cheroki hesitated. “Would you mind, Father Abbot, being specific?ain case it’s connected with something I
might have heard about only in confession?”
“Hah? Oh! Well, I’m bedeviled! You did hear his confession. I clean forgot. Well, get him to tell you again,
so you can talk?athough Heaven knows, it’s all over the abbey anyhow. No, don’t go see him now. I’ll tell you,
and don’t answer on whatever’s sealed. You’ve seen that stuff?” Abbot Arkos waved toward his desk where the
contents of Brother Francis’ box had been emptied for examination.
Cheroki nodded slowly. “He dropped it beside the road when he fell. I helped gather it up,cheap runescape gold, but I didn’t look
at it carefully.”
“Well,cheap guild wars gold, you know what he claims it is?”
Father Cheroki glanced aside. He seemed not to hear the question.
“All right, all right,” the abbot growled, “never mind what he claims it is. Just go look it over carefully
yourself and decide what you think it is.”
Cheroki went to bend over the desk and scrutinize the papers carefully, one at a time, while the abbot paced
and kept talking, seemingly to the priest but half to himself.
“It’s impossible! You did the right thing to send him back before he uncovered more. But of course that’s not
the worst part. The worst part is the old man he babbles about. It’s getting too thick. I don’t know anything that
could damage the case worse than a whole flood of improbable ‘miracles.’ A few real incidents,wow power leveling, certainly! It has
to be established that the intercession of the Beatus has brought about the miraculous?abefore canonization can
occur. But there can be too much! Look at the Blessed Chang?abeatified two centuries ago, but never canonized
?aso far. And why? His Order got too eager, that’s why. Every time somebody got over a cough, it was a
miraculous cure by the Beatus. Visions in the basement, evocations in the belfry; It sounded more like a
collection of ghost stories than a list of miraculous incidents. Maybe two or three incidents were really valid, but
when there’s that much chaff?awell?”
Father Cheroki looked up. His knuckles had whitened on the edge of the desk and his face seemed strained.
He seemed not to have been listening. “I beg your pardon, Father Abbot?”
“Well, the same thing could happen here, that’s what,runescape power leveling,” said the abbot, and resumed his slow padding to and
fro.
“Last year there was Brother Noyon and his miraculous hangman’s noose. Ha! And the year before that,
Brother Smirnov gets mysteriously cured of the gout?ahow??aby touching a probable relic of our Blessed
Leibowitz, the young louts say. And now this Francis, he meets a pilgrim?awearing what??awearing for a kilt
?22 312168 3

ceased to watch for his reappearance by the time he heard a distant bellow from the ruins far behind him. He
turned. He could make out the distant figure of the woodcarver standing atop one of the mounds. Fingo was
waving his arms and vigorously nodding his head in affirmation. Francis waved back, then hiked wearily on his
way.
Two weeks of near-starvation had exacted their tribute. After two or three miles he began to stagger. When
still nearly a mile from the abbey, he fainted beside the road. It was late afternoon before Cheroki, riding back
from his rounds, noticed him lying there, hastily dismounted, and bathed the youth’s face until he gradually
brought him around. Cheroki had encountered the supply donkeys on his way back and had paused to hear
Fingo’s account, confirming Brother Francis’ find. Although he was not prepared to believe that Francis had
discovered anything of real importance, the priest regretted his earlier impatience with the boy. Having noticed
the box lying nearby with its contents half-spilled in the road, and having glanced briefly at the note in the lid,
while Francis sat groggy and confused at the edge of the trail, Cheroki found himself willing to regard the boy’s
earlier babblings as the result of romantic imagination rather than of madness or delirium. He had neither visited
the crypt nor closely examined the contents of the box,guild wars power leveling, but it was obvious, at least, that the boy had been
misinterpreting real events rather than confessing hallucinations.
“You can finish your confession as soon as we get back,” he told the novice softly, helping him to climb up
behind the saddle on the mare. “I think I can absolve you if you don’t insist on personal messages from the saints.
Eh?”
Brother Francis was too weak at the moment to insist on anything.
4
“You did the right thing,” the abbot grunted at last. He had been slowly pacing the floor of his study for
perhaps five minutes, his wide peasant face wearing a thick-furrowed muscular glower, while Father Cheroki sat
nervously on the edge of his chair. Neither priest had spoken since Cheroki had entered the room in answer to his
ruler’s summons; Cheroki jumped slightly when Abbot Arkos finally grunted out the words.
“You did the right thing,” the abbot said again,gw gold, stopping in the center of the room and squinting at his prior,
who finally began to relax It was nearly midnight and Arkos had been preparing to retire for an hour or two of
?21 312168 3
sleep before Matins and Lauds. Still damp and disheveled from a recent plunge in the bathing barrel, he
reminded Cheroki of a were-bear only incompletely changed into a man. He was wearing a coyote-skin robe, and
the only hint of his office was the pectoral cross that nestled in the black fur on his chest and flashed with
candlelight whenever he turned toward the desk. His wet hair hung over his forehead, and with his short jutting
beard and his coyote skins,cheap guild wars gold, he looked, at the moment, less like a priest than a military chieftain, full of restrained
battle-anger from a recent assault. Father Cheroki, who came of baronial stock from Denver, tended to react
formally to men’s official capacities,buy l2 adena, tended to speak courteously to the badge of office while not allowing
himself to see the man who wore it, in this respect following the Court customs of many ages. Thus Father

“Wha-a-at?” Fingo swung a hairy shin over the jackass and dropped a few inches to the ground. He towered
over Brother Francis,rs gold, clapped a meaty hand on his shoulder, and peered down into his face. “What is it; the
jaundice?”
“No. He thinks I’m?a” Francis tapped his temple and shrugged.
Fingo laughed. “Well, that’s true, but we all knew that. Why is he sending you back?”
Francis glanced down at the box near his feet. “I found some things that belonged to the Blessed Leibowitz.
I started to tell him,fiesta gold, but he didn’t believe me. He wouldn’t let me explain. He?a”
“You found what?” Fingo smiled his disbelief, then dropped to his knees and opened the box while the
novice watched nervously. The monk stirred the whiskered cylinders in the trays with one finger and whistled
softly. “Hill-pagan charms, aren’t they? This is old, Francisco, this is really old.” He glanced at the note in the lid.
“What’s this gibberish?” he asked, squinting up at the unhappy novice.
“Pre-Deluge English.”
“I never studied it, except what we sing in choir.”
“It was written by the Beatus himself.”
“This?” Brother Fingo stared from the note to Brother Francis and back to the note. He shook his bead
suddenly, clamped the lid back on the box,swg credits, and stood up. His grin had become artificial. “Maybe Father’s right.
You better hike back and have Brother Pharmacist brew you up one of his toad-stool specials. That’s the fever,
Brother.”
?20 312168 3
Francis shrugged, “Perhaps.”
“Where did you find this stuff?”
The novice pointed. “Over that way a few mounds. I moved some rocks. There was a cave-in, and I found a
basement. Go see for yourself.”
Fingo shook his head. “I’ve got a long ride ahead.”
Francis picked up the box and started toward the abbey while Fingo returned to his donkey,fiesta power leveling, but after a few
paces the novice stopped and called back.
“Brother Spots?acould you take two minutes?”
“Maybe,” answered Fingo; “What for?”
“Just walk over there and look in the hole.”
“Why?”
“So you can tell Father Cheroki if it’s really there.”
Fingo paused with one leg half across his donkey’s back.
“Ha!” He withdrew the leg. “All right. If it’s not there, I’ll tell you.”
Francis watched for a moment while the gangling Fingo strode out of sight among the mounds; then he
turned to shuffle down the long dusty trail toward the abbey, intermittently munching corn and sipping from the
waterskin. Occasionally he glanced back. Fingo was gone much longer than two minutes. Brother Francis had