The Year of the Hare - Arto Paasilinna [28]
He hastened to the central aisle. There he stopped and pulled a Mauser pistol out of his cassock. He checked the magazine and released the safety catch, his eyes glinting in the dimness of the church, searching for the hare.
It was crouching near the altar. Catching sight of it, the pastor raised his pistol and fired. The hare leaped off in terror, while a smell of cordite floated down the central aisle. The pastor pounded around the flank; two successive reports crashed out. With the bullets whistling through the ecclesiastical air, Vatanen ducked behind his pew like a patron in a Wild West saloon.
The pastor made two circuits of the church, firing after the hare on both loops. Running up the central aisle again, he pulled up in shock to stare at the altar painting: a Mauser bullet had ripped through the canvas. It was a picture of the Redeemer on the Cross, and the bullet had pierced Christ’s kneecap.
The Mauser went off yet again—this time pointing downward and obviously by mistake. The pastor groaned and lifted his right leg. The smoking weapon slipped from his hand; he began to weep. Vatanen ran up to him and picked the gun off the floor.
The bullet had pierced the middle of the pastor’s black patent-leather shoe. Dark blood was dripping from the sole. There was a hole in the church floor at the point where the pastor’s foot had just been.
“I’m Reverend Laamanen,” he whimpered, standing on one foot and offering his hand to Vatanen. Vatanen shook him by the hand, being careful not to tip him over.
“Vatanen.”
Laamanen hopped along on one leg to the sacristy. At each hop, blood dripped out of his shoe onto the floor. Vatanen wiped it up with his handkerchief; the blood came away easily, being still wet.
“I got carried away, seeing that hare. I’ve had this gun since 1917. I was in the infantry, you see, a lieutenant. What possessed me? And a stray bullet’s pierced that painting! How can God ever forgive me, shooting His only Son in the knee, here in His own house!”
He wept. Vatanen was feeling pretty bad about it himself. He said he’d go to the parsonage and call for an ambulance.
“No, no! Be a good fellow and get this smell of cordite out. The town clerk’s daughter’ll be here any minute to get married. Let’s just put a bandage on. I’ve got to marry this couple first. And would you please be kind enough to gather up any cartridge cases you see lying around in the aisles? Kick them into a corner.”
Vatanen went around opening the church windows. The smell slowly vanished from the church. He found several empty cartridge cases and stuffed them in his pocket. In the sacristy he tore a small altar cloth into strips and put a temporary bandage on Laamanen’s foot. Laamanen was wearing insoles in his shoes. Vatanen changed them around, putting the blood-soaked one with its bullet hole in the good shoe, and the undamaged insole in the damaged shoe; that way, the shoes were almost restored. At any rate, for the time being, the insole would stop blood from seeping out of the bandage onto the floor.
Voices were already audible from the nave. The marital couple were arriving with their relatives. The clergyman hobbled to the sacristy door. Vatanen opened it and guided him toward the altar. Once in the chancel, Laamanen walked steadily, as if there were nothing wrong with his foot.
Vatanen settled down for the wedding at the back of the church; he found the hare pottering around there as well. It hopped into Vatanen’s lap and stayed there during the service.
Laamanen married the couple with practiced skill. After the ceremony, he delivered a short sermon. His eyes were moist, and several of the women, interpreting the moistness in their own way, began to sob. There was a moving atmosphere of utmost devotion. The men cleared their throats behind their hands as discreetly as possible.
“It was God Himself who created the institution of marriage, and our newly married friends here, like others, should hold fast to