The Name of the Rose (68 page)

We could have taken him calmly, but we fell on him with violence; he writhed, clasped his hands on his chest to defend the volume; I grasped him with my left hand while with my right I tried to hold the lamp high, but I grazed his face with the flame, he sensed the heat, let out a muffled cry, almost a roar, as bits of paper spilled from his mouth, and his right hand let go of the volume, darted toward the lamp, and abruptly tore it from me, flinging it away. . . .

The lamp fell right on the pile of books that had been knocked from the table all in a heap, lying open. The oil spilled out, the fire immediately seized a fragile parchment, which blazed up like a bundle of dry twigs. Everything happened in a few moments, as if for centuries those ancient pages had been yearning for arson and were rejoicing in the sudden satisfaction of an unfulfilled thirst for ecpyrosis. William realized what was happening and let go of the old man, who, feeling himself free, stepped back a few paces. William hesitated an instant, most likely too long, uncertain whether to seize Jorge again or to hasten to put out the little pyre. One book, older than the others, burned almost immediately, sending up a tongue of flame.

The fine gusts of the wind, which might have extinguished a weak flicker, encouraged the stronger, livelier flame, and even carried sparks flying from it.

“Put out that fire! Quickly!” William cried. “Everything will burn up!”

I rushed toward the blaze, then stopped, because I was unsure what to do. William again moved after me, to come to my aid. We held out our hands as our eyes sought something to smother the fire. I had a flash of inspiration: I slipped my habit over my head and tried to throw it on the heart of the fire. But the flames by now were too high; they consumed my garment and were nourished by it. Snatching back my scorched hands, I turned toward William and saw Jorge, who had approached again, directly behind him. The heat was now so strong that the old man could feel it very easily, so he knew with absolute certainty where the fire was; he flung the Aristotle into it.

In an explosion of ire, William gave the old man a violent push. Jorge slammed into a case, banging his head against one corner. He fell to the ground. . . . But William, whom I believe I heard utter a horrible curse, paid no heed to him. He turned to the books. Too late. The Aristotle, or what had remained of it after the old man's meal, was already burning.

Meanwhile, some sparks had flown toward the walls, and already the volumes of another bookcase were crumpling in the fury of the fire. By now, not one but two fires were burning in the room.

William, realizing we would not be able to put them out with our hands, decided to use books to save books. He seized a volume that seemed to him more stoutly bound than the others, more compact, and he tried to use it as a weapon to stifle the hostile element. But, slamming the studded binding on the pyre of glowing books, he merely stirred more sparks. Though he tried to scatter them with his feet, he achieved the opposite effect: fluttering scraps of parchment, half burned, rose and hovered like bats, while the air, allied with its airy fellow element, sent them to kindle the terrestrial matter of further pages.

As misfortune would have it, this was one of the most untidy rooms of the labyrinth. Rolled-up manuscripts hung from the shelves; other books, falling apart, let pages slip from their covers, as from gaping mouths, tongues of vellum dried up by the years; and the table must have held a great number of writings that Malachi (by then unassisted for some days) had neglected to put back in their places. So the room, after the spill Jorge caused, was invaded by parchments waiting only to be transformed into another element.

In no time the place was a brazier, a burning bush. The bookcases themselves also joined in this sacrifice and were beginning to crackle. I realized the whole labyrinth was nothing but an immense sacrificial pyre, all prepared for the first spark.

“Water. We need water!” William was saying, but then he added, “But where can any water be found in this inferno?”

“In the kitchen, down in the kitchen!” I cried.

William looked at me, puzzled, his face flushed by that raging glow. “Yes, but by the time we've gone down and come back up . . . The Devil take it!” he then cried. “This room is lost, in any case, and perhaps the next one as well. Let's go down at once. I'll find water, and you rush out to give the alarm. We need a lot of people!”

We found the way toward the stairs: the conflagration lighted the subsequent rooms as well, but more and more faintly, so we crossed the last two almost groping again. Below, the moon dimly illuminated the scriptorium, and from there we went down to the refectory. William rushed into the kitchen; I to the refectory door, fumbling to open it from the inside. I succeeded after a fair amount of labor, for my agitation made me clumsy and inept. I stepped out onto the grass, ran toward the dormitory, then realized I could not wake the monks one by one. I had an inspiration: I went into the church, hunting for the access to the bell tower. When I found it, I grabbed all the ropes, ringing the alarm. I pulled hard, and the central bell rope, as it rose, drew me up with it. In the library the backs of my hands had been burned. My palms were still unhurt, but now I burned them, too, letting them slip along the ropes until they bled and I had to let go.

By then, however, I had made enough noise. I rushed outside in time to see the first monks coming from the dormitory, as I heard in the distance the voices of the servants, who were appearing at the doors of their lodgings. I could not explain myself clearly, because I was unable to formulate words, and the first that came to my lips were in my mother tongue. With bleeding hand I pointed to the windows of the south wing of the Aedificium, at whose alabaster panes there was an abnormal glow. I realized, from the intensity of the light, that the fire had spread to other rooms while I had come down and rung the bells. All the windows of Africa and the whole façade between it and the east tower now flickered with irregular flashes.

“Water! Fetch water!” I shouted.

At first no one understood. The monks were so used to considering the library a sacred and inaccessible place that they could not understand it was threatened by the sort of banal accident that might have befallen a peasant hut. The first who looked up at the windows blessed themselves, murmuring words of fear, and I realized they were thinking of further apparitions. I grabbed their clothing and begged them to understand, until someone finally translated my sobs into human words.

It was Nicholas of Morimondo, who said, “The library is on fire!”

“It is, indeed,” I whispered, sinking to the ground, exhausted.

Nicholas displayed great energy, shouted orders to the servants, gave advice to the monks surrounding him, sent some to open the other doors of the Aedificium, others to seek water and vessels of every kind. He directed those present toward the wells and the water tanks of the abbey. He ordered the cowherds to use the mules and asses to transport jars. . . . If a man invested with authority had given these orders, he would have been obeyed at once. But the servants were accustomed to taking orders from Remigio, the scribes from Malachi, all of them from the abbot. And, alas, none of those three was present. The monks looked around for the abbot, to ask instructions and solace, and did not find him; only I knew that he was dead, or dying, at that moment, shut up in an airless passage that was now turning into an oven, a bull of Phalaris.

Nicholas shoved the cowherds in one direction, but some other monks, with the best of intentions, pushed them in another. Some of the brothers had obviously lost their heads, others were still dazed with sleep. I tried to explain, now that I had recovered the power of speech, but it must be remembered that I was almost naked, having thrown my habit on the flames, and the sight of a boy, as I was then, bleeding, his face smudged by soot, his body indecently hairless, numbed now by the cold, surely did not inspire much confidence.

Finally Nicholas managed to drag a few brothers and some other men into the kitchen, which in the meantime someone had opened. Another monk had the good sense to bring some torches. We found the place in great disorder, and I realized William must have turned it upside down, seeking water and vessels to carry it.

At that point I saw William himself appear from the door of the refectory, his face singed, his habit smoking. He was carrying a large pot in his hand, and I felt pity for him, pathetic allegory of helplessness. I realized that even if he had succeeded in carrying a pan of water to the second floor without spilling it, and even if he had done so more than once, he could have achieved very little. I recalled the story of Saint Augustine, when he saw a boy trying to scoop up the water of the sea with a spoon: the boy was an angel and did this to make fun of a saint who wanted to understand the mysteries of the divine nature. And, like the angel, William spoke to me, leaning in exhaustion against the door jamb: “It is impossible, we will never do it, not even with all the monks of the abbey. The library is lost.” Unlike the angel, William wept.

I hugged him, as he tore a cloth from a table and tried to cover me. We stopped and, finally defeated, observed what was going on around us.

There was a confused bustle, people going up the spiral staircase bare-handed and encountering others, bare-handed, who had been driven upstairs by their curiosity and were now coming down to look for vessels. Others, cleverer, had immediately started hunting for pans and basins, only to realize there was not sufficient water in the kitchen. Suddenly the great room was invaded by mules, bearing huge jars, and the cowherds driving the animals unloaded them and started to carry up the water. But they did not know how to climb to the scriptorium, and it was a while before some of the scribes told them, and when they went up they bumped into others rushing down, terrified. Jars broke and the water spread over the ground, though other jars were passed up the stairs by willing hands. I followed the group and found myself in the scriptorium. Thick smoke came from the access to the library; the last men who had tried to go up to the east tower were already coming down, coughing, red-eyed, and they announced it was no longer possible to penetrate that hell.

Then I saw Benno. His face distorted, he was coming up from the lower floor with an enormous vessel. He heard what those coming down were saying and he attacked them: “Hell will swallow you all, cowards!” He turned, as if seeking help, and saw me. “Adso,” he cried, “the library . . . the library . . .” He did not await my answer, but ran to the foot of the stairs and boldly plunged into the smoke. That was the last time I saw him.

I heard a creaking sound from above. Bits of stone mixed with mortar were falling from the ceiling of the scriptorium. The keystone of a vault, carved in the shape of a flower, came loose and almost landed on my head. The floor of the labyrinth was giving way.

I rushed downstairs and out into the open air. Some willing servants had brought ladders, with which they were trying to reach the windows of the upper floors, to take water up that way. But the highest ladders barely extended to the windows of the scriptorium, and those who had climbed up were unable to open them from the outside. They sent word down to have them opened from within, but at this point nobody dared try to go up there.

Meanwhile, I was looking at the windows of the top floor. The whole library by now must have become a single smoking brazier as the fire raced from room to room, spreading rapidly among the thousands of dry pages. All the windows were alight, a black smoke came from the roof: the fire had already spread to the beams. The Aedificium, which had seemed so solid and tetragonous, revealed in these circumstances its weakness, its cracks, the walls corroded from within, the crumbling stones allowing the flames to reach the wooden elements wherever they were.

Suddenly some windows shattered as if pressed by an inner force, the sparks flew out into the open air, dotting with fluttering glints the darkness of the night. The strong wind had become lighter: a misfortune, because, strong, it might have blown out the sparks, but light, it carried them, stimulating them, and with them made scraps of parchment swirl in the air, the delicate fragments of an inner torch. At that point an explosion was heard: the floor of the labyrinth had given way at some point and its blazing beams must have plunged to the floor below. Now I saw tongues of flame rise from the scriptorium, which was also tenanted by books and cases, and by loose papers, spread on the desks, ready to provoke the sparks. I heard cries of woe from a group of scribes who tore their hair and still thought of climbing up heroically, to recover their beloved parchments. In vain: the kitchen and refectory were now a crossroads of lost souls, rushing in all directions, each hindering the others. People bumped into one another, fell down; those carrying vessels spilled their redemptive contents; the mules brought into the kitchen had sensed the presence of fire and, with a clatter of hoofs, dashed toward the exits, knocking down the human beings and even their own terrified grooms. It was obvious, in any case, that this horde of villeins and of devout, wise, but unskilled men, with no one in command, was blocking even what aid might still have arrived.

 

The whole abbey was in the grip of disorder, but this was only the beginning of the tragedy. Pouring from the windows and the roof, the triumphant cloud of sparks, fostered by the wind, was now descending on all sides, touching the roof of the church. Everyone knows how the most splendid cathedrals are vulnerable to the sting of fire: the house of God appears beautiful and well defended as the heavenly Jerusalem itself thanks to the stone it proudly displays, but the walls and ceilings are supported by a fragile, if admirable, architecture of wood, and if the church of stone recalls the most venerable forests with its columns rising high, bold as oaks, to the vaults of the ceilings, these columns often have cores of oak—and many of the trappings are also of wood: the altars, the choirs, the painted panels, the benches, the stalls, the candelabra.