The Beautiful Mystery

What followed was a litany of how every generation of monks had screwed up the monastery in their own special way. Not spiritually. Frère Raymond didn’t seem too concerned with that. But physically. Adding stuff, taking down stuff. Adding it again. Changing the roof. All disasters.

“And the toilets. Don’t get me started on the toilets.”

But it was too late. Frère Raymond was started. And Beauvoir began to understand why Frère Charles was almost maniacally pleased to have someone come between him and Brother Raymond. Not because of the voice, but what that voice was saying. Nonstop.

“They messed those up,” said Brother Raymond. “The toilets were—”

“A disaster?” asked Beauvoir.

“Exactement.” Raymond knew he was in the company of a kindred spirit.

The last few monks arrived and took their seats. Chief Superintendent Francoeur paused in the doorway. The room grew quiet, except for Frère Raymond, who couldn’t seem to stop the locomotive of words.

“Shit. Great holes of it. I can show you if you like.”

Brother Raymond looked at Beauvoir with enthusiasm, but Beauvoir shook his head and looked over at Francoeur.

“Merci, mon frère,” he whispered. “But I’ve seen enough shits.”

Frère Raymond snorted. “Me too.”

And then he grew quiet.

Superintendent Francoeur had a way of dominating a room. Beauvoir watched as one by one the monks turned to the Superintendent.

He’s fooled them too, thought Beauvoir. Surely men of God would see behind the fake front. They’d see the meanness, the pettiness. They’d see he was a nasty piece of shit. A disaster.

But they didn’t seem to. Just as many in the Sûreté didn’t either. They were fooled by Francoeur’s bravado. His manliness, his swagger.

Beauvoir could see the testosterone-filled world of the Sûreté being taken in. But not the quiet and thoughtful monks.

But they too seemed in awe of this man, who’d arrived so swiftly. Flying in and landing, almost on top of them. Nothing effete, nothing tentative about Francoeur. He’d practically fallen from the sky. Into their abbey. Into their laps.

And judging by the look on their faces, they seemed to admire him for that.

But not all of them, Beauvoir realized. His blueberry-picking companion from that morning, Frère Bernard, was looking at Francoeur with suspicion, as were a few others.

Perhaps these monks weren’t quite as naïve as Beauvoir had feared. But then he had it. The abbot’s men were looking at Francoeur with wariness. Their faces polite but veiled.

It was the prior’s men who were practically swooning.

Francoeur’s gaze swept the room and came to rest on the abbot. And the empty chair beside him. The air seemed to leave the room as all eyes swung from the Superintendent to the chair. Then back again.

Dom Philippe sat perfectly still at the head of the table. Neither inviting the Superintendent to join him, nor discouraging it.

Finally Francoeur gave a small, respectful bow to the monks and walked purposefully down the long table. To the head. And took his place, on the right-hand side of the abbot.

The prior’s seat. Filled. The void filled, the vacuum filled.

Beauvoir returned his attention to Frère Raymond and was surprised to see a look of admiration on the lean and weathered face as he too watched the Superintendent.

“The prior’s place, of course,” said Raymond. “The king is dead. Long live the king.”

“The prior was king? I thought the abbot would be considered that.”

Frère Raymond gave Beauvoir a keen, assessing look. “In name only. The prior was our real leader.”

“You’re one of the prior’s men?” asked Beauvoir, surprised. He’d have thought this man would be loyal to the abbot.

“Absolutely. I can only take incompetence so long. He,” Frère Raymond jerked his shaved head toward the abbot, “is ruining the abbey. The prior was going to save it.”

“Ruining? How?”

“By doing nothing.” Raymond kept his voice low, but his annoyance scraped out anyway. “The prior had handed him the means to make all the money we’d ever need, to finally fix the abbey, so that it’d stand a thousand years, and Dom Philippe turned it away.”

“But I thought lots of work had been done. The kitchens, the roof, the geo. The abbot wasn’t exactly doing nothing.”

“But he wasn’t doing what was really needed. We could’ve survived just fine for a while without a new kitchen, or geothermal.”