The Little Parthenon E-Book

Edvard Arroyo

• Herausgeber: novum publishing
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 183

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2025

Beschreibung

Southern France in the summer of 2008. A family of three is traveling in a camper van: Pastor Clemens Birnenlohn, 58, from the Bernese Seeland, his wife Gerlinde, 56, and their son Lukas, 18. On a whim, Gerlinde decides to go to Lourdes. The two men are stunned, but go along with her plan. Gerlinde spends her time in the mobile home writing and dies of heart failure a few days later. Just what she wanted in Lourdes remains as much a mystery as the end of her first career as an actress. Lukas begins to investigate and unearths some incredible facts. But what is true and what is fiction?

Leseprobe

Any inconsistencies in the text are due to the fact that it was translated using computer-aided technology for a company-wide study.

© 2025 novum publishing gmbh

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To the content

In the summer of 2008, a family of three travel to the south of France in a motorhome: Clemens Birnenlohn, 58, a pastor in Witznach, Switzerland, his wife Gerlinde, 56, and their son Lukas, 18. On a whim and against the will of the two men, Gerlinde wants to travel to Lourdes, where the 150th anniversary of the Marian apparitions is being celebrated. After a few days there, she dies of heart failure. Father and son break off their vacation early. The mother's death leaves questions unanswered. What was she, the Protestant pastor's wife, doing in Lourdes of all places? And what happened in the years she had spent as an actress before the birth of her son? A central figure is her brother, the intimidating government councillor Gotthold Wankdorf, 58, who and Clemens have had a deep but almost extinct friendship since their youth. There are increasing indications that there is something mysterious about this family. Lukas travels into his mother's past and painstakingly tracks down clues to facts and events in the writings she has left behind that he hardly dares to believe. What is true, what is fiction?

About the author

Edvard Arroyo grew up in Switzerland’s Bernese Oberland. In Thun he concluded his school years with the A Levels. After that he studied acting in Zurich und had engagements in Switzerland and Germany. Deeply connected with literature, as he always was, he started his studies in modern German literature in Bern. After his employment as an assistant in the Bernese Institute of Germanistics he became speech writer in a communication team in a Swiss cantonal administration. He lives in the eastern part of Switzerland with his husband. In his free time he cares for the garden, three cats and a Cairn terrier. Wishing to be able to read books in their original language, he currently widens his knowledge in foreign languages. He can’t do much with the term «Swiss Literature». For him, books are gates to the world, and with this short novel he wants to open one of them.

www.edvardarroyo.com

Preliminary remarks

This novel is based on the author's personal experiences. Nevertheless, it is absolutely fictional. Any similarities between the characters in the novel and real people are based on coincidence.

All worlds' chaos, mankind's chaos,

Chaos in the human chest,

Holy love and ardent hate,

Gloomy grief and cheerful mirth!

How it blazes, how it flames,

A somber cloud, a wobbly boat,

Holy courage and sweet hope:

Keep staying in that brittle boat!

Friederike Kempner

Monday, July 21, 2008

Wrapping paper remains true to its role. Two-dimensional spreading is not its favorite thing. On a spacious table, its unruly edges could be temporarily fixed with adhesive tape. But there are only small tables at the post office.

Anyone wrapping a parcel there needs a third and a fourth hand. Two hands forthe wrapping paper, two for placing the contents of the parcel. If you are alone, you can use your two elbows. It may look silly, but as said before, you're on your own.

At some point it does work, the bundle is now wrapped in brown paper and glued. The already prepared envelope is glued on. Inside is a short letter with instructions on what to do: "Please do not open the parcel any further!"

Then the whole chore again: wrapping paper, two hands, two elbows, lots of tape.

A second layer now covers the whole thing. The label with the sender's and recipient's addresses is glued on top.

This almost completes the gluing process. What is still to come is a small customs form with details of the contents.

Foreign postage is a painful drain on a young man's budget.

Finally, the parcel is placed in a container that already contains many other consignments. From here, they travel all over the world. For such a famous place, the post office is surprisingly small.

One last check, an anxious feeling.

If that turns out well.

Monday, July 28

Ornella knocked briefly and entered. Cigar smoke hit her and mingled with the aroma from the coffee cup she was carrying on a small tray.

The boss looked up silently from a document. It looked like a speech, and he didn't seem to like it. Ornella put the tray on his desk and pushed her way through the thick air back to her anteroom.

Wankdorf's fingers drummed on the paper. "Funeral service", it read, "July 30, 2008", "Speech by Government Councillor Gotthold Wankdorf". Above it was the letterhead with the Bernese cantonal coat of arms and the words "Justice, Communal and Church Directorate". In the text block, what was to be expected: "Dear mourners", "tragic circumstances of her death" and so on. Gotthold snorted. By now, everything was tragic, damn it, even a stupid motorhome. He picked up the phone and let himself be put through to the vicarage. He would make it quick.

"Hello, it's me. Listen, Birnenlohn, do I have to say anything? It's enough if you do it, it's your job after all."

At the other end of the line, Pastor Clemens Birnenlohn took a deep breath. "You want to give up your speech? That's something completely new. As far as I'm concerned, I have to disappoint you. I'm not going to say anything. I can't do that. My colleague Spreeling has already been called up."

"What kind of a one is this?"

"Pastor in Allenwässern. You'll like him, hands-on guy. Just flown in from Brandenburg."

"You're garnishing my performance with an Ossi? Thank you for letting me down!"

"I'm instructing him, the Ossi. No one is forcing you to speak at your own sister's funeral. Everyone will understand if you don't have the words. But what about your hack?"

"Despierres is not a hack."

Of course not,thought Clemens. Not if you belong to the same student fraternity as Wankdorf.

Gotthold felt compelled to quell any suspicions of personnel errors: "Despierres is a professional speechwriter and has a solid PR background. He even worked at the United Nations Office in Geneva, if that tells you anything. In Gerlinde's case, he really got stuck in, as always. However, this is his first eulogy, so you have to understand that. Listen to it:

'Dear mourners, a dear person has passed away who was always a natural part of my life.' A bit trite, isn't it? And so it goes on: 'My belovedsister Gerlinde', exclamation mark. 'If there was only emptiness where she had once been for me, then I would fall silent now. But I find fullness and gratitude. If I am still at a loss for words, then it is because of the excess of images and sounds' etc. – Birnenlohn, no one speaks like that!"

"I think it's quite nice. I'll have to remember that. Oh dear ..."

"Stop giggling! The situation is serious."

"I'm not laughing and I'm not crying. Listen, I've got to set the agenda in a minute. Are you going to say something or not?"

"I'll talk, Tiny Pear. I will talk. Without a manuscript. And if I start with a minute's silence. Then I'll just say her name: Gerlinde! The rest will come naturally."

"Good, that will certainly make a strong impression."

"Keep your mouth shut! I'll see you in church on Wednesday. Write your Brandenburger a nice transition so I can get started without any contortions."

"I'll do it. Whether he sticks to it is another question."

"Then build up pressure, at least once in your life. After all, I'm not just anyone."

"How could I forget?"

"Goodbye."

Wednesday, July 30

It was half past nine in the morning. The haze of the night had lifted in the damp hollows of the Bernese Seeland, swallows were buzzing in the pale blue sky above Witznach, and far in the background the Alpine peaks were drawing jagged lines on the horizon. The church tower cast its broad shadow over the cemetery and the Bernese baroque garden of the vicarage, which had originally been a farmhouse.

A small, petite man in a black suit stepped out of the vicarage and walked past the garden across the forecourt to the church. He opened the door and disappeared inside.

Then the same man stood under the gallery and looked into the emptiness of his church. No decorations except for two huge bouquets of flowers to the left and right of the baptismal font. Between them was the inconspicuous urn made ofwood, Gerlinde's last, no, penultimate station. Clemens Birnenlohn struggled with a slight dizziness.

He walked through the center aisle to the front. There was a note on the first bench on the left. "Reserved for relatives."We'll have plenty of room, the three of us,he thought, and sat down. He soaked up the silence and coolness.

The church door opened with a click. A man's voice shrilly sang a single high note, then rapid footsteps approached. A lanky man sat down next to Clemens and took hold of his shoulders.

"Did I scare you? I always check the acoustics first in a new church. A little quirk of mine. Clemens, I salute you!"

Clemens tried to wriggle out. "Hello, Christoph, are you there yet?"

Spreeling pulled his arm back. "But of course, dear colleague, it's not good to be alone at times like this. This peace, this silence. Beautiful flowers, wonderful."

"Yes, Vera does a good job. Vera Nüth, the sigrist."

"Cute, these job titles. We used to call them churchwardens. I'm so proud that you appointed me as a deputy. I couldn't do that either if the person at my side, oh dear God, I can't even think about it. That you even considered conducting the funeral service yourself!"

"It wasn't an easy decision, believe me."

"Certainly not, certainly not. But who would seriously be able to replace you? Without your exposé, I'd be completely lost. Insanely well written, it's as if I knew your wife in the flesh, it comes across so vividly."

"I rather had the feeling that I was losing her more with every word."

"That's quite normal, my dear Clemens. Seen in this light, it's very remarkable that after two thousand years of incessant debate, there's still anything left of Jesus Christ at all. You can see how great the man was. Or is."

Clemens pulled his face together, unpleasantly touched. "Well, Christoph, let's give the Lord a rest for today, shall we? For once, I'd prefer it to be mundane."

"Uh ..."

"Yes, just without the superstructure. I've had a bit too much of it recently."

"Oh, yes. Lourdes. I know it. I understand. All that Catholic fuss, isn't it? How wonderful, on the other hand, to be able to proclaim God's word in the sober atmosphere of a Bernese country church!"

"Please!"

"Well, then I've just moved from the ruins of East German atheism to Zwinglistan to preach godlessness here. Don't worry, I'm joking, I'll do it. Me failing, what a silly idea!"

Someone coughed and the church door quietly slammed shut. Another black-clad, somewhatshapeless man approached cautiously. In his right hand he held a heavy, crumpled briefcase. The two clergymen stood up.

Clemens introduced the new arrival: "Christoph, this is Konrad Klotz, our organist. Konrad, this is Pastor Christoph Spreeling, my replacement."

Spreeling's hand shot forward and Klotz hurried to get his free. "Mr. Spreeling, it's a pleasure to meet you."

"Oh, please call me Christoph. Nice to meet you too, Mr. Klotz. May I say Konrad? No, don't feel obliged to do anything, that's just my way as a real Senftenberger. By the way, I mean the Brandenburg Senftenberg, I must emphasize that. There is another Senftenberg in Lower Austria, but there I would probably have turned into an ossified priest who doesn't address anyone except God and the cute altar boys."

Clemens groaned softly. Klotz smiled uncertainly. "No, dear Christoph, I'd be delighted if ..."

Spreeling clapped his hands. "Great, then that's settled. You're my salvation, Konrad. In music, God's closeness is revealed even when he is unwanted. A little joke on the side, I won't bother our apostate survivor any longer."

Klotz smiled irritably. "You must know, Christoph, that I have an extraordinary bond with the deceased. We made music together. Her wonderful cello playing up there in the gallery, plus myself on the organ ..."

Klotz wiped away a tear. Clemens looked at him blankly and remained silent.

Spreeling felt compelled to break the silence: "But my dear Konrad, that's wonderful, I mean, then Gerlinde will be present to us in your music, much more than could happen through my meager words!"

"Don't forget Wankdorf," interjected Clemens dryly.

Spreeling grabbed his forehead. "Oh yes, he's still here too. The dear brother. I've already had a look at him online. Poh, what a guy! No need to introduce him."

"No, don't do that to him," said Clemens, "he assumes that everybody knows him. And most people actually do. I've written down what you need to know here." He handed Spreeling a sheet of paper.

Spreeling read through it. He was taken aback. "You're childhood friends?"

"Yes, we went to grammar school together."

"Then you already knew Gerlinde in the sandpit? My goodness!"

"No, we were already teenagers when we met, so the sandpit hadn't been an issue for a long time. Our dear Klotz would have been more of an option. How old were you then, sixty-six, did you even exist then?"

Klotz blushed and stammered: "Two, I was two years old, what a strange question. I think I need to go up and adjust the registers. Are there any changes to the schedule?"

Clemens looked at him for a long time and said: "No, the schedule won't change."

Klotz blushed again and hurried away.

***

Now the church was full. Why might they all have come? Because of Gerlinde? Or perhaps because of her prominent brother? Clemens sat on the right, Gotthold on the left, with Lukas in between. The sound of bells rang in from outside. Spreeling's acoustic test had long since proved to be worthless, the many people muffled any echo.

Clemens was much more nervous than usual, he didn't like them, the crowd behind him. Had he only become a priest because he had hated sitting in a crowd as a child? He belonged at the front, where he had air and control. Here he was in danger of suffocating.

They had buried the urn an hour ago, in the immediate family circle. Lukas had been the only one to shed a tear. It was probably first and foremost a sign of relaxation after this crazy summer. They had had to wait almost ten days for the urn to be brought over from the south of France.

The bells fell silent. Klotz played his entrance piece. Spreeling stood up and waited with a tidy smile for his cue. Then the organ fell silent, Spreeling held the opening prayer and greeted the congregation. Clemens immediately sensed that a certain liturgical recklessness was on the cards here, as he had a keen sense of the temperature, language and function of the individual parts of the program. Spreeling, on the other hand, made it clear right at the beginning that he had been called in as a replacement by the esteemed Pastor Birnenlohn and that this meant a great honor to him. That should have come elsewhere.

Clemens glanced furtively over at his son. He was now eighteen, tall, a handsome man in an unusual way, and always a little enigmatic. Like his late mother. Something must have happened to him down there in Lourdes. Hopefully not a vision of Mary. He was sad, of course, but there was also something like happiness in his eyes. Although he had already had that dreamy smile as a small child. Clemens loved him very much, but he kept that to himself. He dreaded the fact that Lukas would be graduating from high school in a year's time and then probably moving to a university city. And he himself would be alone in the vicarage, just like nineteen years ago and all those long years before that. Clemens sighed.

Spreeling was already moving on to the curriculum vitae.Safe liturgical waters,thought Clemens.

"Gerlinde Birnenlohn was born Gerlinde Wankdorf in Bern on April 3, 1952. Her parents were Albert and Louise Wankdorf, née Gognat, and we are delighted to welcome her brother Gotthold, two years older than her, into our solemn circle today. Gerlinde had a peaceful and happy childhood and youth. She revealed her extraordinary talents as a cellist, singer and actress at an early age. In 1971she graduated from high school in Bern and joined the acting class at the Bern Conservatory. Four years later, she took up her first engagement in Kaiserslautern, moving to Bielefeld in 1980 and Aachen in 1984. But 1989 was the big turning point in her life."

Oh yes,thought Clemens.The Tiananmen massacre and the fall of the Berlin Wall were footnotes by comparison.

"She gave up her career as an actress to marry the boyfriend of her youth and give her rich life a new meaning. At Clemens Birnenlohn's side, she became the pastor's wife of Witznach and gave birth to a gorgeous son, our Lukas here in the front row, on March 14, 1990. You could say that this gifted entertainer gave the word entertainment a new meaning: entertainment for the family, the home, the church, the community, Christian dialog."

Which means my exposé is already a waste of time,thought Clemens.What kind of nonsense is he talking about?

"Every life, dear mourners, follows invisible traces and laws. Some, including myself, see God's hand at work here, others speak of fate or, somewhat more gloomily, of doom. No matter, everyone can handle it as they wish. Actors and actresses are beings of giving, of spending themselves, of giving themselves away and revealing themselves. Where does this seemingly never-ending energy come from? And what happens when it does run dry, when a deep exhaustion of body and soul sets in? I don't know if that was the case with Gerlinde, but she certainly had good reasons for returning to her beautiful home country. As a German, I understand that perfectly, because I also gain an energy here that I missed in my home country of Brandenburg. There is such a thing as Teutonic exhaustion, and not only in the East. Here, on the other hand, it's the eternal vacation."

I knew it, Brandenburg would come at some point,thought Clemens.

"This speculation on my part has a specific reason, namely Gerlinde's tragic death in Lourdes. Of all placesLourdes, one might say, the Mecca or at least Medina of the Catholic world. The Birnenlohn family arrived there by chance on their trip to the south of France, and contrary to all expectations, this was to be the last place Gerlinde reached alive. She died of heart failure on July 19 at the age of fifty-six. May her soul rest in peace."

Now he has to be careful not to get tangled up,thought Clemens. But Spreeling picked up the thread again.

"Once again I ask: Why Lourdes of all places, dear mourners? Lourdes, where, exactly one hundred and fifty years ago, Our Lady supposedly appeared to an inconspicuous young woman, where a spring suddenly began to gush forth, whose water is now carried to all corners of the world by millions of people every year? Believe it or not, there is something very special about this place, I have experienced it myself. It's like Switzerland. Some people call it a place of power. Gerlinde really wanted to drink from this water, and in the end she wouldn't drink anything else. To put it metaphorically: she was looking for the source, the source of her faith and the source of her life. She wanted to recapture what had been taken from her as an actress in Aachen."

Clemens was no longer surprised by anything, not even the boldest hypothesis.

"But perhaps everything was completely different. Aachen, the imperial city, the cathedral city, is also a Catholic hotspot, and there are springs there too. The water there tastes of sulphur, which is known to represent that unpleasant deep zone that is still considered to exist by doctrinally faithful Catholics."

Spreeling formed his right hand into a telephone receiver and spoke in the deepest bass: "Hello, poor souls, you're talking to hell, my name is the devil, what can I do for you?"

Some members of the congregation laughed hesitantly.

"Yes, it has a certain spectacular added value, Catholicism, and that can't have escaped the actress Wankdorf. It's a strange world, and I understand Gerlinde's fascination very well. I very fondly rememberan ecumenical event where I was introduced to various Catholic dignitaries, including a nice Monsignor. He was wearing a sign with his name on it: Arno Schwan-Zengel. With a hyphen.Beforethe Z in Zengel, of course. Where else would it be? Good heavens!" Spreeling played the bewildered man.

Great hilarity. Spreeling continued immediately: "No, he was really very friendly. I addressed him as 'Mr. Monsignor', whereupon he politely corrected me. You could leave out the Mr., it was already in the Monsignor. Well, if you have a reasonably trained theological ear, a thousand lights will come on here."

Spreeling spread out his hands and repeated the sentence in a priestly singing falsetto voice: "The Mister is already inside the Monsignor!" Then he released his pose with a sly grin. The dams of decorum burst and the church was filled with laughter.

Clemens wondered whether he should put an end to it, but couldn't help smiling. He glanced furtively to his left. Lukas was sitting there with his quiet smile. Gotthold's motionlessness was reminiscent of the statues of Abu Simbel.