Michael and he found himself thinking seriously about God on a regular basis. He began attending services at the barrack’s chapel, reading passages from the Bible that he had studied in Sunday school as a child. He read about the prophets and the stories about the disciples who went out into the world to spread the word of Christ. This somehow struck a chord with him. Although he did not know it at the time, the mysterious powerful soul within was coaching him inexorably to an intended goal. He gathered all the newspapers in the mess each day and read them, front to back. He was appalled when he read accounts of what had happened in the death camps in Nazi Germany. Throughout all this, Michael’s thoughts repeatedly returned to a question, put to him by the Druid’s mystical force. “What are you going to do?” it wanted to know.
The answer came early one morning near the end of his National Service. As Michael began to wake, he scratched an itch in his knee where the splinter had been. He had been dreaming of police cars careering round the streets of London and of gay parties at which gangsters drank champagne at the expense of the poor. Now, though, the scene changed and Michael found he was in a desert, following a tall man, dressed in a toga secured at the waist by what appeared to be a length of rope. The man’s long hair rippled like a field of ripe wheat and puffs of white sand billowed into the air each time his sandals disturbed the next swell. In time, the sand became puddles of rainwater on footpaths, then cracked paving slabs, rugged places, tall cities, then flat lowlands in a journey that seemed to encompass the world. With each change of scene, the man was surrounded by the same seven ghost-like figures, dressed differently on every occasion, and reaching out to him as if trying to grasp wisdom. The scene changed again and Michael found himself back in the desert.
The Druid stopped. Then he looked at Michael, his eyes seeming to suck in the desert heat-haze and return it to Michael in waves of energy that he understood.
“What do they represent, these same seven dead?” asked the man. “In a world where death is painless, their appearances change, yet they are not advanced by age. Who are they?”
Realising that he had not seen the man’s lips move, Michael found that he did not need to open his mouth in order to reply. “It is a riddle, sir. I do not understand.”
“They are seven because they represent the seven sins of Man: Pride, Wrath, Envy, Lust, Gluttony, Avarice and Sloth, to which every human being is susceptible, hence their change of dress. I represent the Harmony of the Spheres, which state of spiritual perfection I attained in life, and they reach out to me because in their hearts they are troubled. Man’s divine nature has not yet learned how to overcome his animal passions and desires when faced with temptation. You must keep faith until the time comes when all will be joined against the powers of darkness.”
“But who are you?” Michael insisted on knowing.
Michael received no further communication from the figure, which faded into the background, but he would recall the episode in pristine clarity each time the itch prompted him to scratch his knee while he was asleep.
With the mysterious soul’s memories now fully integrated into his psyche, Michael made the decision to make enquiries about how he could become a priest.
