‘And when you do,’ I said, ‘you’ll discover God. Uh, no doubt I’m putting it very clumsily. And besides, you’re no more than a child. But at least I can tell you this: you are setting off with your back turned on the world, for the world does not stand for revolt, but for submission, submission to lies, first and foremost. Go ahead for all you’re worth, the walls are bound to fall in the end, and every breach shows a patch of sky.’
‘Are you saying all this for the sake of talking-or are you-‘
‘It is true the meek shall inherit the earth. And your sort won’t try and get it from them, because they wouldn’t know what to do with it. Snatchers can only snatch at heaven.’
She was blushing deeply, and shrugged her shoulders.
‘You make me feel I could say anything. . . . I’d like to insult you. I won’t be disposed of against my will. I’ll go to hell all right, if I want to.’
‘I’ll answer for your soul with mine,’ I said impulsively.
She washed her hands under the kitchen tap, without so much as looking round. Then she quietly put on her hat, which she had taken off when she started working. She came slowly back to me. If I did not know her face so well, I might have said it looked tranquil, but the corners of her mouth trembled a little.
‘I’ll make a bargain with you,’ she said, ‘if you’re what I think you are.’
‘The point is I am not what you think I am. You see yourself in me, as you might in a mirror, and your fate as well.’
‘When you talked to mother I was hiding under the window. And suddenly her face became so-so gentle. I hated you then. I don’t believe much in miracles, not any more than I do in ghosts, but I did think I knew my mother. She cared no more about pretty speeches than a fish for an apple. Have you a secret, yes or no?’
‘It’s a lost secret,’ I replied. ‘You’ll rediscover it, and lose it again, and others after you will pass it on, since your kind will last as long as the world.’
‘My kind? Whatever do you mean?’
‘Those whom God sends on and on forever, who will never rest while the world remains.’
George Bernanos
