NOT IN THE STARS BUT IN OURSELVES

 

When last we left Richard Blaine, he was wondering how he had been transported into a landing craft heading to Omaha Beach.

Let's be like the enigmatic Sentient and hurl his essence to the moment after his deadly meeting with the psychotic orphan, "Bent" Murcham back in pre-war New Orleans.

(For the details of that encounter and its mysterious aftermath, you will have to wait until my novel comes out.)

"Actions are the seeds of fate. Deeds grow into destiny." 

- Harry S. Truman

THE LOST GOSPELS OF JOHN THE LION

“The world is a dangerous place to live; not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people who don't do anything about it.” – Albert Einstein

 

The new Headmistress, Miss Tethers, looked pretty much the opposite of her name as she daggered me with a stern look.

“How many of your fellow orphans do you intend on killing, Mr. Blaine?”

I tried to look relaxed in the stiff-backed chair facing her scuffed desk. “I’m sure the Police Commissioner told you it was suicide.”

“I did not vote for him because I did not believe him then … or now.”

She dismissed the subject with an angry wave of her hand. “Be that as it may, it has been brought to my attention that you did not spend last night in the dormitory. That is two nights in a row. Where did you sleep, the library?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Your clothes look fresh.”

“I have stashes hidden here and there throughout the orphanage.”

“You are really certain that your fellow orphans would kill you in your sleep?”

Now, that question might strike you as odd. But not here at St. Marok’s. Here, life only mattered if its loss had significance in its consequences … say like witnesses or no food on the table. One less orphan meant more food in a place where there was never enough.

The law you ask. In this part of the French Quarter there was no law. The Depression hadn’t gone anywhere. Everyone here was scrambling for a loose piece of change or something to pawn for much, much less than it was worth.

One look through the bars of this place at the ragged, starving orphans told anyone with any sense that there was nothing worth stealing here. Those too stupid or too desperate who climbed over the gate at night were not missed when they never returned.

Stupid, desperate thieves contributed nothing to be missed.

I actually felt Miss Tethers impatient stare. I sighed and cleared my throat. I decided to tell her the truth.

“Not without Headmaster Stearns to frighten them, ma’am. No disrespect meant for you, but you have as yet given them a reason to fear you.”

She nodded thoughtfully. “Truth to say, Mr. Blaine, I do not feel safe enough myself to spend the night in Stearns’ quarters. In fact, I have not even entered them. I do not need to what with my own home to which to return.”

A strange scent suddenly filled the room. I later learned it to be cherry blossoms mixed with pineapple. And yes, it had to do with the Voice.

Miss Tethers twisted in her padded chair, opened a drawer with an ornate set of keys, and reached in. She straightened and tossed me an antique-looking gold key.

“Here! You may spend the nights in his quarters.”

As I started to protest, she snapped “I cannot have you spending the nights in the library. I will not have Miss Mayfair’s reputation sullied by her stumbling into the library with you sleeping in it. It might lead to talk that you and she spent the evenings there as well.”

And that was how an orphan got his very own room in an orphanage … along with a lifelong enemy. Oddly enough, I also played chess with this one, too. I didn’t let him win though. Merde. It was hard enough just to win honestly against him.

I know what you’re thinking. If I had an I.Q. of 400, how could that be? It is worse than you think. I came to believe that it was him that was letting me win. Of course, me being me, it was worse than even that.

He hadn’t been playing chess with me at all … but with the Voice.

Goes to show you that there is a difference in being intelligent and in being smart. Intelligence is what you know, understanding is what you do, and wisdom is what you become. What did Steven Leacock write: Life, we learn too late, is in the living, the tissue of every day and hour.

Life is like a game of cards. The hand you are dealt is determinism. The way you play it is free will.

All in all, I should have kept on sleeping in the library.

Besides, I like libraries. It makes me feel comfortable and secure to have walls of words, beautiful and wise, all around me. I always feel better when I can see that there is something to hold back the shadows.

There was a sharp rap on Tethers’ door. Without being asked to come in, Sister Ameal walked in promptly as if she had been invited.

She fixed me with her arsenic blue eyes like a hawk sizing up a poor field mouse for a possible snack. “Mr. Blaine, how many more orphans are you going to send to  their eternal damnation?”

There was no point trying to explain to her about the Voice taking control of my body when I didn’t even know how it had been done myself. “As few as possible, sister.”

“Zero more is the right answer, young sir.”

She jerked her brilliantly white habit to the door. “Now, get up. I will walk you to the library once again to make sure that there are no further deaths. But do not expect this to become habitual. I actually have important rounds to make in this parish.”

“I expect nothing.”

I snorted, “Maybe that’s why I usually get it.”

“At least you are never disappointed.”

I shrugged. “The ‘nothings’ in life are merely steps on the path. You accept them and move on.”

“To the next ‘nothing’?”

I shook my head. “You read me all wrong. Everyone does. No big deal. I’m used to it.”

I took a deep breath. “When you expect nothing from the world - not the light of the sun, the wet of the morning mist, nor the air to breathe - everything is a wonder and every moment a gift.”

Sister Ameal stopped and studied me for a long moment. “Then, you are truly free. You ask nothing, expect nothing, depend on nothing … and so you have everything."

“There's nowhere you can be that isn't where you're meant to be...”

― John Lennon