Robert Coover - Origin of the Brunists

“Get out—?”

“You are expelled!”

So, he does what Mr. Bradley has told him to do, but in a kind of daze, wondering how it could ever have happened, how his life could have turned out this way, and altogether it takes him about forty-five minutes, so he is able to catch Elaine in the corridor between fifth and sixth hour classes. He tells her all that happened and he doesn’t know exactly what he wants her to do about it, but she does it anyway. She takes ahold of his hand like she doesn’t mean ever to let go and says if he has to go, then she’s going too, and that’s how it is that they walk out of there together, laughingly in love, and the day, crazy as it is, is beautiful.

Elaine’s Ma is that moment over in Randolph Junction with another Brunist, Ben Wosznik, concluding the most successful day so far. The newspaper stories have carried their fame far and wide, and the way, she discovers, has been prepared. Naturally, there are those who scoff, there always are, but there are many who do not. Above all, she does not encounter out here that kind of implacable hostility she has run up against in West Condon. And, of course, the people with whom she speaks have, almost all of them, known and respected her and Ely for years and years, such that even the scoffers scoff gently.

The Cleggs, Hiram and Emma, to whom she and Ben now bid farewell, are two of at least fifteen people who have said they would try to come next weekend, and, what is more, they believe they can bring another half dozen or so with them. Both Hiram and Emma are important leaders of the Randolph Junction Church of the Nazarene. Clara tells them how the Spirit has truly taken on flesh, that a new day is come, brought by the White Bird, which would last to the end of the world.

“Amazing! To be sure, there is something great here!” Hiram says, nodding gravely, and Emma listens wide-eyed.

Clara recounts the prophecies and the signs, tells of Ely’s premonitions and his disaster message, explains how so many folks arrived at the same truth by different paths, and mentions the secret aspects of it which of course cannot be let out until they actually join. She’s noticed the effect this usually has.

“And a prophetic cross, you say?”

“You mean like to tell the future?” Emma asks. “Oh, Hiram! we must go see!”

“Yes, dear, I quite agree.”

Clara also is careful to mention how the Mother Mary has played a part, because she has discovered this idea has a tremendous appeal wherever she goes. Ben tells them again how he himself was attracted to the group and why he has stayed on. It’s just plain common sense to come and have a look for yourself, he says.

“True! That’s true!” says Hiram.

Ben’s frank and earthy manner impresses people.

Driving back toward West Condon together, Clara tells Ben how big a help he has been to her. He tells her then how much he admires her, and adds surprisingly that if she ever thought of remarrying, he would like to be considered. She says she hasn’t been thinking about any such thing. He tells her that he understands perfectly well and certainly he could never hope to hold a candle to so great a man as Ely Collins, but he only wanted her to know how he felt. Just like Ben, she thinks, to put it so plain like that. Anyways, he adds, there’s no point even concerning themselves about it until after next Sunday, if there is an afterwards, but he does go on to mention anyway the Bible story about the woman who was widowed seven times. Of course, that story has already occurred to her. And then something Elaine reminded her of yesterday morning, something she had almost forgot, something Ely used to say in almost every preaching, comes back to her now and it has all the ring of a prophecy to it: “Grace is not something you die to get, it is something you get to live!”

One moment, Colin Meredith is assured of the end and ecstatic with its glorious promise, the next, plunged into deepest despair in seeing it can never be, then relieved and even made joyful by the certainty of continuance, the certainty of more life, next terrorized by a sudden paralyzing vision of the final horror now upon them. For one sublime and exquisite moment, he embraces and is embraced by all, the boy of the Brunists, the loved one, he upon whom all depend, the all without whom he is forever lost; and then, suddenly, he is utterly alone, ignored, forgotten, unwanted — Eleanor is self-absorbed and impatient, Carl Dean deserts him for a girl, Giovanni does not even see him, a woman laughs cruelly in his face. Though he has willed an end to all his vices, they return to overwhelm him. Chaste in principle, he seeks lecherous solace in the act of love. Spent, he sinks miserably into self-disgust, returns repentant to his vows and to his friends, only to meet rebuff and anguish and to fall again in sin. She is beautiful, but her beauty is ultimately a terror to him; she is enormous, but her enormity protects him. She is brilliant with Mr. Himebaugh’s cold true brilliance, and her passion is as spontaneous and furious as Carl Dean’s temper. Her eyes are gray and wise, and her mouth is young and full and eager. Her breasts, sweet to his hungry mouth, are greater even than Mrs. Wilson’s, her hips, which quiver in his grip, mightier even than Mrs. Hall’s. Her arms grip with the strength of Mr. Wosznik, her hands, like Mrs. Cravens’, tear at his flesh, her massive thighs squeeze and kick like a mare’s, and her hair, wild as the prophet’s, whirls and snarls and clings to his body. Her womb, fertile as Mrs. Harlowe’s, grabs him like a fist and wrings the seed from his body and angels sing and sweat beads his forehead— “Mother!” he cries out, and sucks, bites, chews the hard nipple of his pillow. “Son!” she says, and sinks away from him into the dark and hollow earth.

We all were so happy there together

In our peaceful little mountain home ,

But the Savior needed angels up in heaven:

Now they’re singin’ round that great white throne!

Tommy (the Kitten) Cavanaugh has, at long last, climbed that famous furry mountain and passed into manhood. Spent, yet firm and ready as ever — a tiger , man! — he cuddles naked with her in a corner of the Lincoln’s rangy back seat, staring out on the old ice plant, only witness to the miracle of his accomplishment. He rolls down the window, and, turning his back to her — which she kisses and softly scratches — he slips the fragile skin off: like a young snake enjoying his first molt. Taking care to hold it cuplike so as not to make an even worse mess in his Dad’s car, he flips it out, regretting that it could not be kept somehow as a souvenir. He’s still wet where the skin was and his hands are sticky, so he looks in the clothes on the floor for a handkerchief or something, comes across her panties. “May I?” he asks devilishly, yet at the same time with an intimacy, a camaraderie, he has never known before. She nods, takes them from him, dries him tenderly, looking down at it, her cheeks against his chest. There are dark stains, too, which cause profound pangs of compassion and gratitude to course through him.

“I can hear your heart,” she whispers.

Which is cause for him to listen to hers, and he does so, staring ahead at that stupendous pink bud at the tip of his nose. The two feelings he has not anticipated are the inexpressible after-sense of well-being that now magnifies everything into such tremendous — almost unbearable — beauty, and the terrible nostalgia that goes, he supposes, with any perfect love. For love it is, no doubt about it, the greatest he has ever known and the greatest, he’s sure, he’ll ever know. The unexpected beauty, the excruciating sadness, the intensity of his love, all seem oddly summed up in the silly country music swimming over them from the car radio. He knows now that, though neither of them like hillbilly stuff, it will be, in an inescapable way, their song, and that no matter where they are or who they’re married to, the song will recall for them this moment….