"How can I know them?" I asked.
And then Petrus taught me the Messenger Ritual.
"Wait until night to perform it, when it is easier," Petrus said. "Today, at your first meeting, he will tell you his name. This name is secret and should never be told to anyone, not even me. Whoever knows the name of your messenger can destroy you."
Petrus got up, and we began to walk. Shortly, we reached the field where the farmers were working. We said "Buenos dias" to them and went on down the road.
"If I had to use a metaphor, I would say that your angel is your armor, and your messenger is your sword. Armor protects you under any set of circumstances, but a sword can fall to the ground in the midst of a battle, or it can kill a friend, or be turned against its owner. A sword can be used for almost anything...except as something to sit on," he said, laughing.
We stopped in a town for lunch, and the young waiter who served us was clearly in a bad mood. He didn't answer any of our questions, he served the meal sloppily, and he even succeeded in spilling coffee on Petrus's shorts. I watched my guide go through a transformation: furious, he went to find the owner and complained loudly about the waiter's rudeness. He wound up going to the men's room and taking off his shorts; the owner cleaned them and spread them out to dry.
As we waited for the two o'clock sun to dry Petrus's shorts, I was thinking about everything we had talked about that morning. It was true that most of what Petrus had said about the boy by the river made sense. After all, I had had a vision of the desert and of a face. But that story about "the messenger" seemed a little primitive to me. For a person with any intelligence here in the the twentieth century, the concepts of hell, of sin, and of the devil did not make much sense. In the Tradition, whose teachings I had followed for much longer than I had followed the Road to Santiago, the messenger was a spirit that ruled the forces of the earth and was always a friend. He was often used in magical operations but never as an ally or counselor with regard to daily events. Petrus had led me to believe that I could use the friendship of the messenger as a means to improve my work and my dealings with the world. Beside being profane, this idea seemed to me to be childish.
The Messenger Ritual
1. Sit down and relax completely. Let your mind wander and your thinking flow without restraint. After a while, begin to repeat to yourself, "Now I am relaxed, and I am in the deepest kind of sleep."
2. When you feel that your mind is no longer concerned with anything, imagine a billow of fire to your right. Make the flames lively and brilliant. Then quietly say, "I order my subconscious to show itself. I order it to open and reveal its magic secrets." Wait a bit, and concentrate only on the fire. If an image appears, it will be a manifestation of your subconscious. Try to keep it alive.
3. Keeping the fire always to your right, now begin to imagine another billow of fire to your left. When the flames are lively, say the following words quietly: "May the power of the Lamb, which manifests itself in everything and everyone, manifest itself in everything and everyone, manifest itself also in me when I invoke my messenger. (Name of messenger) will appear before me now."
4. Talk with your messenger, who should appear between the two fires. Discuss your specific problems, ask for advice, and give him the necessary orders.
5. When your conversation has ended, dismiss the messenger with the following words: "I thank the Lamb for the miracle I have performed. May (name of messenger) return whenever he is invoked, and when he is far away, may he help me to carry on my work."
Note: On the first invocation--or during the first invocations, depending on the ability of the person performing the ritual to concentrate--do not say the name of the messenger. Just say "he." If the ritual is well performed, the messenger should immediately reveal his name telepathically. If not, insist until you learn his name, and only then begin the conversation. The more the ritual is repeated, the stronger the presence of the messenger will be and the more rapid his actions.
But I had sworn to Mme Lourdes that I would give total obedience to my guide. Once again, I had to dig my nail into my red, raw thumb.
"I should not have put him down," Petrus said about the waiter after we had left. "I mean, after all, he didn't spill that coffee on me but on the world that he hated. He knows that there is a huge world out there that extends well beyond the borders of his imagination. And his participation in that world is limited to getting up early, going to the bakery, waiting on whoever comes by, and masturbating every night, dreaming about the women he will never get to know."
It was the time of day when we usually stopped for our siesta, but Petrus had decided to keep walking. He said that it was a way of doing penance for his intolerance. And I, who had not done a thing, had to trudge along with him under the hot sun. I was thinking about the good fight and the millions of souls who, right then, were scattered all over the planet, doing things they didn't want to do. The Cruelty Exercise, in spite of having made my thumb raw, was helping me. It had helped me to see how my mind could betray me, pushing me into situations I wanted no part of and into feelings that were no help to me. Right then, I began to hope that Petrus was right: that a messenger really did exist and that I could talk to him about practical matters and ask him for help with my day-to-day problems. I was anxious for night to fall.
Meanwhile, Petrus could not stop talking about the waiter. Finally, he wound up convincing himself that he had acted properly; once again, he used a Christian argument to make his case.
"Christ forgave the adulterous woman but cursed the grower who would not give him a fig. And I am not here, either, just to be a nice guy."
That was it. In his view, the matter was settled. Once again, the Bible had saved him.
We reached Estella at almost nine o'clock at night. I took a bath, and we went down to eat. The author of the first guide for the Jacobean route, Aymeric Picaud, had described Estella as a "fertile place, with good bread and great wine, meat, and fish. Its river, the Ega, has good, fresh, clean water." I didn't drink the river water, but as far as the menu at our restaurant was concerned, Picaud's assessment was still right, even after eight centuries. It offered braised leg of lamb, artichoke hearts, and a Rioja wine from a very good year. We sat at the table for a long time, talking about inconsequential things and enjoying the wine. But finally Petrus said that it was a good time for me to have my first contact with my messenger.
We went out to look around the city. Some alleys led directly to the river--as they do in Venice--and I decided to sit down in one of them. Petrus knew that from that point on it was I who would conduct the ceremony, so he hung back.
I looked at the river for a long time. Its water and its sound began to take me out of this world and to create a profound serenity in me. I closed my eyes and imagined the first billow of fire. It was not easy to imagine at first, but finally it appeared.
I pronounced the ritual words, and another billow of fire appeared to my left. The space between the two billows, illuminated by the fires, was completely empty. I kept looking at that space for a while, trying not to think, so that the messenger would manifest himself. But instead of his appearing, various exotic scenes began to appear--the entrance to a pyramid, a woman dressed in pure gold, some black men dancing around a fire. The images came and went in rapid succession, and I let them flow uncontrolled. There also appeared some stretches of the Road that I had traversed with Petrus--byways, restaurants, forests--until, with no warning, the ashen desert that I had seen that morning appeared between the two fires. And there, looking at me, was the friendly man with the traitorous look in his eyes.
He laughed, and I smiled in my trance. He showed me a closed bag, then opened it and looked inside--but in such a way that I could not see into it. Then a name came to my mind: Astrain.1
I began to envision the name and make it dance between the two fires, and the messenger gave a nod of approval; I had learned his name.
It was time to end the exercise. I said the ritual
words and extinguished the fires--first on the left and then on the right. I opened my eyes, and there was the river Ega in front of me.
"It was much less difficult than I had imagined," I said to Petrus, after I had told him about everything that had occurred between the two fires.
"This was your first contact--a meeting to establish mutual recognition and mutual friendship. Your conversations with the messenger will be productive if you invoke him every day and discuss your problems with him. But you have to know how to distinguish between what is real assistance and what is a trap. Keep your sword ready every time you meet with him."
"But I don't have my sword yet," I answered.
"Right, so he can't cause you much damage. But even so, don't make it easy for him."
The ritual having ended, I left Petrus and went back to the hotel. In bed, I thought about the poor young waiter who had served us lunch. I felt like going back there and teaching him the Messenger Ritual, telling him that he could change everything if he wanted to. But it was useless to try to save the world: I hadn't even been able to save myself yet.2
Love
"TALKING WITH YOUR MESSENGER DOESN'T MEAN ASKING questions about the world of the spirits," Petrus said the next day. "The messenger performs only one function for you: he helps you with regard to the material world. And he will give you this help only if you know exactly what it is that you want."
We had stopped in a town to have something to drink. Petrus had ordered a beer, and I asked for a soft drink. My fingers made abstract designs in the water on the table, and I was worried.
"You told me that the messenger had manifested himself in the boy because he needed to tell me something."
"Something urgent," he confirmed.
We talked some more about messengers, angels, and devils. It was difficult for me to accept such a practical application of the mysteries of the Tradition. Petrus said that we are always seeking some kind of reward. But I reminded him that Jesus had said that the rich man would not enter into the kingdom of heaven.
"But Jesus rewarded the man who knew how to make his master more adept. People did not believe in Jesus just because he was an outstanding orator: he had to perform miracles and reward those who followed him."
"No one is going to blaspheme Jesus in my bar," said the owner, who had been listening to our conversation.
"No one is blaspheming Jesus," Petrus answered. "People speak poorly of Jesus when they commit the sin of taking his name in vain. Like all of you did out there in the plaza."
The owner hesitated for a moment. But then he answered, "I had nothing to do with that. I was only a child at the time."
"The guilty ones are always the others," Petrus mumbled. The owner went into the kitchen, and I asked Petrus what he was talking about.
"Fifty years ago, in this twentieth century of ours, a gypsy was burned at the stake out there in the plaza. He was accused of sorcery and of blaspheming the sacred host. The case was lost amid the news of the Spanish civil war, and no one remembers it today. Except the people who live here."
"How do you know about it, Petrus?"
"Because I have already walked the Road to Santiago."
We went on drinking there in the empty bar. The sun was hot, and it was our siesta time. A few minutes later, the owner reappeared, accompanied by the town priest.
"Who are you people?" asked the priest.
Petrus showed him the scallop shells sewn to his knapsack. For twelve hundred years, pilgrims had passed along the Road in front of the bar, and the tradition was that every pilgrim was respected and welcomed under any circumstance. The priest changed his tone.
"How can it be that pilgrims on the Road to Santiago are speaking poorly of Jesus?" he asked, in a tone that was appropriate to a catechism.
"Nobody here was speaking poorly of Jesus. We were speaking poorly of the crimes committed in the name of Jesus. Like the gypsy that was burned at the stake there in the square."
The shells on Petrus's knapsack had also changed the owner's attitude. Now he addressed us with some respect.
"The curse of the gypsy is still with us today," he said, and the priest looked at him reprovingly.
Petrus wanted to know how. The priest said that these were stories told by the villagers and that the church did not approve of them. But the owner of the bar went on:
"Before the gypsy died, he said that the youngest child in the village was going to receive and incorporate his devils. And that when that child became old and died, the devils would pass on to another child. And so on, for all the centuries to come."
"The soil here is the same as the soil in the other towns around here," said the priest. "When the other towns have a drought, we do, too. When it rains and there's a good harvest, we fill our barns, too. Nothing has happened here with us that has not happened in the neighboring towns, too. This whole story is a fantasy."
"Nothing has happened because we isolated the curse," said the owner.
"Well, then, let's see it," answered Petrus. The priest laughed and said that that was no way to talk. The owner of the bar made the sign of the cross. But neither of them moved.
Petrus got the check and insisted that someone take us to the person who had inherited the curse. The priest excused himself, saying that he had been interrupted at something important and had to get back to his church. And he left before anyone could say anything.
The owner of the bar looked at Petrus fearfully.
"Not to worry," said my guide. "Just show us the house where the curse resides. We are going to try to rid the town of it."
The owner of the bar went out into the dusty street with us. The hot sun of the afternoon beat down everywhere. We walked to the outskirts of the town, and he pointed to a house set off by itself at the side of the Road.
"We always send meals, clothing, everything they need," he apologized. "But not even the priest goes in there."
We said good-bye to him and walked toward the house. The owner of the bar waited there, perhaps thinking that we would pass it by. But Petrus went up to the house and knocked on the door, and when I looked around, the bar owner had disappeared.
A woman of about seventy came to the door. At her side was an enormous black dog, wagging his tail and apparently happy to see company. The woman asked what we wanted; she said she was busy washing clothes and had left some pots on the fire. She did not seem surprised by our visit. I figured that many pilgrims, not knowing about the curse, must have knocked on the door seeking shelter.
"We are pilgrims on the Road to Compostela, and we need some hot water," Petrus said. "I knew that you would not refuse us."
With a show of irritation, the woman opened the door. We went into a small room, clean but poorly furnished. There was a sofa with its stuffing coming out, a bureau, and a Formica-topped table with two chairs. On the bureau was an image of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, some saints, and a crucifix made of mirrors. Through one of the two doors in the room, I could see the bedroom. The woman led Petrus through the other door into the kitchen.
"I have some water boiling," she said. "Let me get you a container, and you can both get going."
I was there in the living room, alone with the huge dog. He wagged his tail, docile and contented. The woman came back with an old can, filled it with water, and held it out to Petrus.
"There. Go with God's blessing."
But Petrus did not move. He took a tea bag from his knapsack, put it in the can, and said that he would like to share the little he had with her in appreciation for her welcome.
The woman, clearly upset now, brought two cups and sat down at the table with Petrus. I kept looking at the dog as I listened to their conversation.
"They told me in the village that there was a curse on this house," Petrus commented boldly. The dog's eyes seemed to light up, as if he had understood what had been said. The old woman stood up immediately.
"That's a lie. It's an old superstition. Please finish your tea, because I ha
ve lots of things to do."
The dog sensed the woman's sudden mood change. He remained still but alert. But Petrus continued to do what he was doing. He slowly poured the tea into the cup, raised it to his lips, and put it down on the table without drinking a drop.
"That's really hot," he said. "I think I will wait until it cools off a bit."
The woman did not sit down again. She was visibly uncomfortable with us there and clearly regretted having opened the door. She noticed that I was staring fixedly at the dog and called him to her. The animal obeyed, but when he reached her side, he turned to look at me.
"This is why he did it, my friend," Petrus said, looking at me. "This is why your messenger appeared yesterday in the child."
Suddenly I realized that I was not just looking at the dog. As soon as I had come in, the animal had hypnotized me and had kept my eyes fastened on him. The dog was staring at me and making me do as he wanted. I began to feel weak, as if I would like to lie down and sleep on the torn couch; it was really hot outside, and I did not feel much like walking. The feelings all seemed strange to me, and I had the impression that I was falling into a trap. The dog continued to look fixedly at me, and the more he looked at me, the more tired I felt.
"Let's go," said Petrus, getting up and offering me the cup of tea. "Drink a bit of tea, because the lady wants us to get going."
I hesitated, but I took the cup, and the hot tea revived me. I wanted to say something, ask what the animal's name was, but I could not get my voice to work. Something inside me had been aroused, something that Petrus had not taught me but that nevertheless began to manifest itself. I felt an uncontrollable desire to say strange words, the meaning of which I didn't even know. I thought that Petrus had put something in the tea. Everything began to blur, and I heard only very faintly the woman repeat to Petrus that we had to leave. I was in a state of euphoria, and I decided to speak the strange words that were coming to my mind.
All I could see in the room was the dog. When I began to say those strange words, the dog started to growl. He understood what I was saying. I became more excited and continued to speak, louder and louder. The dog rose and bared his teeth. He was no longer the docile animal I had seen on arrival but something awful and threatening that could attack me at any moment. I knew that the words were protecting me, and I began to speak even louder, focusing all of my energies on the dog. I felt that I had a different power within me and that it could keep the animal from attacking me.