Read Online Counternarratives by John Keene - Free Book Online Page A

gate and the façade, down
a curving, rutted, sandy path, leaned mean and squat, a single long storey. It was
impossible at that hour to discern its color, though it hardly looked as if it could
even under the brightest light be considered white. Its shutters, the ones he could
make out, listed from their hinges; bushes and small trees bowed, trailed by
monstrous shadows, away from its walls; its large battered wooden front door
appeared to have been cut by someone little acquainted with doormaking. Almost
invisible in the black cloak spreading from the lantern’s penumbra, what he took to
be buildings shimmered like foxfires in the landscape round it. He could not,
however, spot the monastery gate’s farther rims. Though he had not initially noticed
it, when he looked around and up to take it all in, he spotted a crucifix, barely
lit by the lantern’s dim light, which tilted off one end of the main building’s
roof. A heavy sea breeze, it seemed to D’Azevedo, might easily topple it. Not a
soul, priest or layperson, broke his line of sight.
    He opened the gate, which promptly tumbled from its hinges. The driver,
a withered type who had passed the entire trip in a barely controlled tremor,
did not help him unload his coffer, nor accompany him to the door, but as soon as
D’Azevedo had done so, the man sped off into the darkness at a clip far faster than
during the entire journey from the port. D’Azevedo stumbled down the path, dragging
his bindle and the heavy wooden box filled with other necessities behind him, and
knocked gently on the main door, so as not to wake anyone but the person who might
be keeping watch. When, after a great while had passed, there was no answer, he
rapped harder. Still, no one responded. He began to wonder if he had been brought to
the right building, for there were no addresses in this part of the world nor was
there any proof, save the lantern, that a living soul still occupied or visited this
building.
    Out of the corner of his eye he detected movement—a human? an
animal?—in the distance, the darkness wavering as if it were trying simultaneous to
conceal and reveal the perceived entity to him, and he turned, only to see nothing
but the shadows of shadows. Whether it was a person, a wild creature or a mere
phantasm he could not be sure, though it was common knowledge that although the
Portuguese had made great strides in civilizing the wilds of this vast terrain,
creatures beyond the knowledge of the wisest men in all of Europe still circulated
throughout it. He called out to the area where he had spotted, or thought he
spotted, someone passing, but there was no response, save a light echo of his own
voice. He considered walking around the building, but was unsure of its dimensions,
fearing he might get lost or plunge into a ditch once he left the lighted façade, so
he seated himself at the base of the main door, his luggage on either side of him,
and prayed, until even his sight, against his wishes, surrendered to the dark.
    He awoke on a cot in a room just larger than a cubicle, a
shuttered, unpaned window just above his head admitting thin razors of sun. The
barest minimum of stones paved the floor; the rooms walls sat barren of any
adornment except a table, a chair, a battered chamber pot, and a crude crucifix,
carved from tulipwood, that hung above the door. Brownish-black mold engendered, he
imagined, by the dampness that plagued the region, licked its tongues from the
corners to the ceiling. He had been undressed—he had not undressed himself, he could
not recall having done so—and placed on the cot, a thin knit blanket, fragrant with
sweat and mildew draped over him. He sat up and looked around for his personal
effects. The coffer, already pried open, sat in the corner, atop it his bindle, also
untied. His doublet, cassock and cincture hung from a hook beside the table. Beneath
them, his sandals. How had he not immediately noted them