The Icon

Ioa

“The lesson was not necessary. Your point is understood, but your reasoning is false. Of course an icon is only wood and paint, worthless by itself. You ca

“My mistake. But why believe it’s genuine? There are at least two famous icons associated with the clothing Mary wore, both lost. This one doesn’t seem to match what I’ve read about either, so now we have a third one that nobody knows of?”

“It was known. The fragment of Theodoros I left you. The knowledge was lost.”

“Why does Theodoros the Blind know this story that nobody else does? Why does it not appear in other histories?”

“There are few histories for those times. Very often we must trust a single source.”

“And for that matter, why have I never read that passage before, when I’ve read Theodoros inside out?”

“It does not appear in the standard translations. It was found eighty years ago in a very old manuscript copy, somewhere in central Europe. Vie

Matthew nodded. The priest knew everything he did and a good deal more.

“And you read the pages at the monastery.”

“Yes.”

“OK. Let’s assume Theodoros was writing the truth as far as he knew it. This found piece of robe really is in the icon. We still have to trust that what Helena brought back from Jerusalem was the robe of Mary. There’s more than a three-hundred-year lapse. Who has been holding the robe all that time? Who can authenticate it? Who, having held it so long, is willing to surrender it to the mother of a pagan emperor?”

“The Arabs. What do they care for it?”

“Why would they have it?”

“They had the cross, which they did give to her.”

“If you choose to believe that story.”

The candle flickered wildly, and Matthew realized that it was his breathing causing it to do so. Ioa

“We go in circles. This argument begins to resemble a more basic one. The man of reason demands proof in exchange for his faith. The man of God may believe in reason also, but knows that it will only take him so far, that there will come a stepping-off point into the unknown. He thinks with his mind until he reaches that ineffable place of mystery. Then he thinks with his heart, pushing forward or retreating. You are a man of reason. Good. But tell me, when you stood before that image, when you touched that wood, did you not feel a special power? Speak the truth.”

Matthew had nearly suppressed the mesmerizing experience of being before the panel. There was art to it-the sad eyes, the dusky shadows-but with the image as damaged as it was, artistry alone could not explain his response. And he had known nothing of the robe or the history when he first encountered the work.

“I felt something. It’s difficult to describe, or to say what it means.”

“You need not try. I have felt it also.”

“You’ve seen the icon.”

“Yes, I know it very well.”

“How?”

“I grew up in the village where it lived. Just like your Papou, though I was much younger.”

“Then you knew him.”

“I thought I had said as much. Not well, he went to Athens when I was still a boy, and only returned to join the guerrillas after the Germans came. In fact, I don’t ever remember meeting him until the morning he caught my brother and me in the abandoned chapel.”

“Christ,” whispered Matthew, understanding coming at once,

“you’re Kosta’s brother.”

“So you know about that.”

“I know what my grandfather told me.”

“I would like to hear what he said. Please.”

“Your father burned the church and took the icon. Kosta killed Mikalis, the priest, when he tried to intervene. Then your father sent you and your brother to hide in the chapel while he…I don’t know what he intended to do. Make a deal for it, or sell it later when things died down. He told my grandfather where to find you once he realized that my godfather was going to get the truth out of him sooner or later. Assuming Andreas would spare you. Fotis killed your dad. My grandfather tracked you to the chapel, shot your brother, and retrieved the icon.”

The priest was silent as Matthew spoke, his large hands gripping the table edge. It occurred to Matthew that the older man might be hearing some of these things for the first time.

“I don’t know,” Ioa

“The atheist. Of course they would blame him.”

“Yes. I ca

“That must have been terrible to see.”

The priest nodded vigorously.

“I had seen the Germans shoot people, people I knew. And I was aware of the communists, the black marketeers, like my father, the collaborators, so I knew that our own people killed one another, but I had never seen that. Watching my brother die was, yes, it was terrible, but strange too. I had been hit on the head and felt sick and dizzy, so I wasn’t sure it was real at first. And then Kosta had been so badly burned, so badly, in the fire. He was in great pain. I don’t know if he would have wanted to live like that. What your grandfather did was merciful, I believe. Maybe even intentionally so. Which did not keep me from hating him for years.”

“It’s amazing that your brother made it to the chapel at all in his condition. You must have half carried him there.” “No, I could not touch him because of the burns. But he leaned upon me with one hand, and carried a long stick, like a staff, in the other. Moaning with every step. What a sight we must have been. Some mad prophet and his disciple, though I don’t believe anyone saw us. And I had the icon tucked under my arm, wrapped carefully. It was a clumsy bundle, and I carried it for hours, but it seemed to possess no weight. It was the lightest burden imaginable. I remember unwrapping it on the little altar table in the chapel, just after I lit the candle, and seeing those eyes, and falling into that space. I felt the strength in it then. Bigger than me by far, almost too great for man to experience. I was awed, frightened even. It was good preparation for what happened next.”