Latin America -- Fiction; Political fiction; Revolutions -- Fiction; Sailors -- Fiction; Sea stories
This memory did not make him shudder, but it had made of him what he was
in the eyes of respectable people, a man careless of common decencies,
something between a clever vagabond and a disreputable doctor. But
not all respectable people would have had the necessary delicacy of
sentiment to understand with what trouble of mind and accuracy of vision
Dr. Monygham, medical officer of the San Tome mine, remembered Father
Beron, army chaplain, and once a secretary of a military commission.
After all these years Dr. Monygham, in his rooms at the end of the
hospital building in the San Tome gorge, remembered Father Beron as
distinctly as ever. He remembered that priest at night, sometimes, in
his sleep. On such nights the doctor waited for daylight with a candle
lighted, and walking the whole length of his rooms to and fro, staring
down at his bare feet, his arms hugging his sides tightly. He would
dream of Father Beron sitting at the end of a long black table, behind
which, in a row, appeared the heads, shoulders, and epaulettes of the
military members, nibbling the feather of a quill pen, and listening
with weary and impatient scorn to the protestations of some prisoner
calling heaven to witness of his innocence, till he burst out, “What’s
the use of wasting time over that miserable nonsense! Let me take
him outside for a while.” And Father Beron would go outside after
the clanking prisoner, led away between two soldiers. Such interludes
happened on many days, many times, with many prisoners. When the
prisoner returned he was ready to make a full confession, Father Beron
would declare, leaning forward with that dull, surfeited look which can
be seen in the eyes of gluttonous persons after a heavy meal.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account