Of course, you can’t do without following, but the main thing is not in the life, not in the correspondence with the others, but in the beauty and sweetness. It all has to be shapely, brief, and thorough. There should be softness, gentleness, and tenderness in every little line, so that there’s not a single coarse, harsh, or unsuitable word. It has to be written so that the one who is praying will rejoice and weep in his heart, but shake and be in awe in his mind. In the akathist to the Mother of God there are the words: ‘Rejoice, height unattainable to human reason; rejoice, depth invisible to the eyes of angels!’ In another place in the same akathist it says: ‘Rejoice, tree of the bright fruit on which the faithful feed, rejoice, tree of good-shading leaves in which many find shelter!’”

Ieronym, as if frightened or embarrassed at something, covered his face with his hands and shook his head.

“Tree of the bright fruit … tree of good-shading leaves …” he murmured. “He really finds such words! The Lord gave him that ability! He puts many words and thoughts into one brief phrase, and it all comes out so smooth and thorough! ‘Light-proffering lamp to those …’ he says in the akathist to the Most Sweet Jesus. ‘Light-proffering!’ There’s no such word in our speech, or in our books, and yet he thought it up, he found it in his mind! Besides smoothness and eloquence, sir, it’s necessary that every little line be adorned in all ways, to have flowers in it, and lightning, and wind, and sun, and all things of the visible world. And every exclamation should be composed so that it’s smooth and easy on the ear. ‘Rejoice, lily of paradisal blossoming!’ it says in the akathist to Nicholas the Wonderworker. It doesn’t say simply ‘lily of paradise,’ but ‘lily of paradisal blossoming’! It’s sweeter and smoother on the ear. And that’s precisely how Nikolai wrote! Precisely like that! I can’t even express to you how he wrote!”

“In that case, it’s a pity he died,” I said. “However, my good man, let’s get moving, otherwise we’ll be late …”

Ieronym recovered himself and rushed to the cable. On the bank all the bells were ringing away. Probably the procession was already going around the monastery, because the whole dark space behind the pitch barrels was now strewn with moving lights.6

“Did Nikolai publish his akathists?” I asked Ieronym.

“Where could he publish them?” he sighed. “And it would be strange to publish them. What for? In our monastery nobody’s interested in them. They don’t like it. They knew Nikolai wrote them, but they paid no attention. Nowadays, sir, nobody respects new writings!”

“Are they prejudiced against them?”

“Exactly so. If Nikolai had been an elder, the brothers might have been curious, but he wasn’t even forty years old. There were some who laughed and even considered his writings a sin.”

“Then why did he write?”

“More for his own delight. Of all the brothers, I was the only one who read his akathists. I used to come to him on the quiet, so that the others wouldn’t see, and he was glad I was interested. He embraced me, stroked my head, called me tender words as if I were a little child. He would close the door, sit me down next to him, and start reading …”

Ieronym left the cable and came over to me.

“We were like friends, he and I,” he whispered, looking at me with shining eyes. “Wherever he went, I went, too. He missed me when I wasn’t there. And he loved me more than the others, and all because I wept from his akathists. It moves me to remember it! Now I’m like an orphan or a widow. You know, in our monastery the people are all good, kind, pious, but … there’s no softness and delicacy in any of them, they’re all like low-class people.