My Childhood - Maxim Gorky [23]
"What else is there?" she asked herself aloud, wrinkling her brows.
"O Lord, save all the faithful! Pardon me--accursed fool as I am!--Thou knowest that I do not sin out of malice but out of stupidity." And drawing a deep breath she would say lovingly and contentedly: "Son of God, Thou knowest all! Father, Thou seest all things."
I was very fond of grandmother's God Who seemed so near to her, and I often said:
"Tell me something about God."
She used to speak about Him in a peculiar manner --very quietly, strangely drawing out her words, closing her eyes; and she made a point of always sitting down and arranging her head-handkerchief very deliberately before she began.
"God's seat is on the hills, amidst the meadows of Paradise; it is an altar of sapphires under silver linden trees which flower all the year round, for in Paradise there is no winter, nor even autumn, and the flowers never wither, for joy is the divine favor. And round about God many angels fly like flakes of snow; and it may be even that bees hum there, and white doves fly between Heaven and earth, telling God all about us and everybody. And here on earth you and I and grandfather each has been given an angel. God treats us all equally. For instance, your angel will go and tell God: 'Lexei put his tongue out at grandfather.' And God says: 'All right, let the old man whip him.' And so it is with all of us; God gives to all what they deserve--to some grief, to others joy. And so all is right that He does, and the angels rejoice, and spread their wings and sing to Him without ceasing: 'Glory be unto Thee, O God; Glory be unto Thee.' And He just smiles on them, and it is enough for them--and more." And she would smile herself, shaking her head from side to side.
"Have you seen that?"
"No, I have not seen it, but I know."
When she spoke about God, or Heaven, or the angels, she seemed to shrink in size; her face grew younger, and her liquid eyes emitted a curious warm radiance. I used to take her heavy, satiny plait in my hands, and wind it round my neck as I sat quite still and listened to the endless but never tedious story.
"It is not given to men to see God--their sight is dim! Only the saints may look upon Him face to face. But I have seen angels myself; they reveal themselves sometimes to souls in a state of grace. I was standing in church at an early Mass, and I saw two moving about the altar like clouds. One could see everything, through them, growing brighter and brighter, and their gossamer-like wings touched the floor. They moved about the altar, helping old Father Elia, and supporting his elbows as he raised his feeble hands in prayer. He was very old, and being almost blind, stumbled frequently; but that day he got through the Mass quickly, and was finished early. When I saw them I nearly died of joy. My heart seemed as if it would burst; my tears ran down. Ah, how beautiful it was! Oh, Lenka, dear heart, where God is-- whether in Heaven or earth--all goes well."
"But you don't mean to say that everything goes well here--in our house?"
Making the sign of the cross grandmother answered:
"Our Lady be praised--everything goes well."
This irritated me. I could not agree that things were going well in our household. From my point of view they were becoming more and more intolerable.
One day, as I passed the door of Uncle Michael's room I saw Aunt Natalia, not fully dressed, with her hands folded on her breast, pacing up and down like a creature distraught, and moaning, not loudly, but in a tone of agony:
"My God, take me under Thy protection! Remove me from here!"
I could sympathize with her prayer as well as I could understand Gregory when he growled:
"As soon as I am quite blind they will turn me out to beg; it will be better than this, anyhow."
And I wished that he would make haste and go blind, for I meant to seize the opportunity to go away with him so that we could start begging together. I had already mentioned the matter to Gregory, and he had replied, smiling in his beard:
"That's right! We will go together. But I shall