So it is that we return to the picture of Jacob dying in his bed. Dying is not what he thought he was doing and perhaps it is only in retrospect this can be said with assurance, but dying he was. His great heart could not pump much longer under the burden placed upon it and must give out. That he was brokenhearted in a less literal way was no less so.
Jacob had never been loved for himself alone by any woman or man. Neither had ever been in his bed, nor he in theirs. He was virgin, alone, beloved and tenderly cared for, but what he craved was passion; no, not the sexual experience itself (about which he felt little more than avid curiosity). Rather, a consuming connection of the heart to just one other was what he had never known and that which, he realized with overwhelming sadness, he would never know.
Unfortunately for Jacob, this grief made him all the more luminous, suffused his face with the glow of a martyr, made him seem to be standing in the sepulchral glow of a Renaissance painting of a saint. He couldn't help it, nor did he wish it, but it was so. Jacob knew what was whispered about him and it exasperated him, yet he never corrected the misguided people of the village and surrounding villages who considered him an icon, a saint, a martyr and a hero. He knew better, knew himself to be nothing more than a receptacle for pain, but knew also that their belief somehow sustained them and was loath to rob them of this small comfort.
For by now the astute reader will have guessed Jacob's secret, that some quirk of life had made him one who can channel the darkness of others' souls and convert it to energy which, in surplus, became the enormity reposing on this bed. Jacob chuckled to himself sometimes at the idea that he was even remotely a good man; if only all those poor benighted souls knew the truth, that he was more a privy for the off-loading of grief than a loving counselor. Never did it occur to him to think that his uncomplaining acceptance of his lot, his willingness to shoulder this burden, to open the door of his home to any and all who sought him out could be thought of as a supremely unselfish act and worthy of praise. Such was his humility that he only thought of this as his role, his calling and his very function, a calling perhaps, after all, from God.
Due to the generosity of Sir Ambrose, who made provision in his will for the mother and child, a legacy which continued when Anna died, Jacob never held a job or learned a trade. He was always at home and always ready to hear woes. Men would come to him furtively, but in nearly as great a number as the women, and women flocked to him in droves. It was not so much the telling of the tale that kept them coming back time and again, but the fact that, unlike other forms of confession, telling a sorrow to Jacob caused it to be entirely lifted from one's soul. Quite a nice little party trick, Jacob often told himself with a wan smile.
*********************************************************************
Mariam was a young, childless widow who cared for Jacob quite often. Having few responsibilities at home, she was free to spend time at his. She was quite cheerful there, cleaned and cooked and bathed Jacob until everything and everyone shone. Mariam was one of those most grateful to Jacob, for her confession had been dark indeed: in the midst of one of his frequent rages she had wished her volatile, violent husband dead and the next moment, he was. Though Jacob tried to soothe her, tell her that it could not possibly be her doing, she was convinced of her guilt both in the act and in the elation she felt at the doing of it. Jacob had relieved her of these and she was filled with gratitude and yearned to be able to show him that.
Their conversations became quite intimate and though weeks in the discovering, eventually it became clear to Mariam that Jacob had never known the physical love of a woman. Though she still had enough modesty to blush in the doing of it, she took it into her mind to give this gift to him before he died. This she did. The sheer physics of the act can only be guessed at, for his mass was indeed prodigious, but managed it was. In the post-coital interlude, Jacob shared with Mariam his deepest secret, that which made him what he was. But she assumed this was the raving of a dying man and paid it little heed. Jacob slept then and was never lucid again. He died a few days later with a smile on his face.
Chapter Seven is here.
Jacob had never been loved for himself alone by any woman or man. Neither had ever been in his bed, nor he in theirs. He was virgin, alone, beloved and tenderly cared for, but what he craved was passion; no, not the sexual experience itself (about which he felt little more than avid curiosity). Rather, a consuming connection of the heart to just one other was what he had never known and that which, he realized with overwhelming sadness, he would never know.
Unfortunately for Jacob, this grief made him all the more luminous, suffused his face with the glow of a martyr, made him seem to be standing in the sepulchral glow of a Renaissance painting of a saint. He couldn't help it, nor did he wish it, but it was so. Jacob knew what was whispered about him and it exasperated him, yet he never corrected the misguided people of the village and surrounding villages who considered him an icon, a saint, a martyr and a hero. He knew better, knew himself to be nothing more than a receptacle for pain, but knew also that their belief somehow sustained them and was loath to rob them of this small comfort.
For by now the astute reader will have guessed Jacob's secret, that some quirk of life had made him one who can channel the darkness of others' souls and convert it to energy which, in surplus, became the enormity reposing on this bed. Jacob chuckled to himself sometimes at the idea that he was even remotely a good man; if only all those poor benighted souls knew the truth, that he was more a privy for the off-loading of grief than a loving counselor. Never did it occur to him to think that his uncomplaining acceptance of his lot, his willingness to shoulder this burden, to open the door of his home to any and all who sought him out could be thought of as a supremely unselfish act and worthy of praise. Such was his humility that he only thought of this as his role, his calling and his very function, a calling perhaps, after all, from God.
Due to the generosity of Sir Ambrose, who made provision in his will for the mother and child, a legacy which continued when Anna died, Jacob never held a job or learned a trade. He was always at home and always ready to hear woes. Men would come to him furtively, but in nearly as great a number as the women, and women flocked to him in droves. It was not so much the telling of the tale that kept them coming back time and again, but the fact that, unlike other forms of confession, telling a sorrow to Jacob caused it to be entirely lifted from one's soul. Quite a nice little party trick, Jacob often told himself with a wan smile.
*********************************************************************
Mariam was a young, childless widow who cared for Jacob quite often. Having few responsibilities at home, she was free to spend time at his. She was quite cheerful there, cleaned and cooked and bathed Jacob until everything and everyone shone. Mariam was one of those most grateful to Jacob, for her confession had been dark indeed: in the midst of one of his frequent rages she had wished her volatile, violent husband dead and the next moment, he was. Though Jacob tried to soothe her, tell her that it could not possibly be her doing, she was convinced of her guilt both in the act and in the elation she felt at the doing of it. Jacob had relieved her of these and she was filled with gratitude and yearned to be able to show him that.
Their conversations became quite intimate and though weeks in the discovering, eventually it became clear to Mariam that Jacob had never known the physical love of a woman. Though she still had enough modesty to blush in the doing of it, she took it into her mind to give this gift to him before he died. This she did. The sheer physics of the act can only be guessed at, for his mass was indeed prodigious, but managed it was. In the post-coital interlude, Jacob shared with Mariam his deepest secret, that which made him what he was. But she assumed this was the raving of a dying man and paid it little heed. Jacob slept then and was never lucid again. He died a few days later with a smile on his face.
Chapter Seven is here.
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