The Bethlehem message

Heinrich Böll

The door was no real door: a few boards nailed together with a wire around a nail for a lock. The man stood motionless and thought: "It is a shame, that a woman should be giving birth here." He lifted the wire carefully, opened the door and was startled: He saw the child laying in the straw, his very young mother kneeling down at his side, smiling to him.. In the back against the wall stood someone whom the man dared not look at: it could be one of those whom the shepherds believed were angels. The one leaning against the wall had a mouse gray coat and flowers in both hands: slim yellow lilies. Fear came over him, he thought: "Maybe what the shepherds are telling is true".

The young mother raised her head, looked friendly upon him, and the young man quietly asked "Is the joiner  living here?"

The young woman shook her head: "Not joiner - he is a carpenter."

"All right" said the man, "I guess he will know how to fix a door, if he has his tools."

"He does" said Maria, "and he can fix doors. He did it in Nazareth too."

So they did come from Nazareth.

He with flowers in the hands looked at the man and said: "You need not be afraid."  His voice sounded so beautiful, that the man got frightened again, he looked up: the gray looked friendly, but also quite sad.

"He comes for Joseph", said the young woman, "I will wake him up. Should he fix the door?"

"Yes, at the "Red Inn", just plane it a little bit and check it because it is creaking. I will wait outside, if you will please get him."

"You can quietly wait here", said the young woman.

"No, I'd rather wait outside." He glanced at the gray who was smiling at him, went outside, and closed the door carefully hooking the wire over the nail.  He had always thought that men with flowers were laughable, but the gray did not look like a man, nor like a woman, and laughable, he certainly was not.

When Joseph showed up with his toolbox, he took his arm and said: "This way, to the left." They turned left, and the man finally gathered enough courage to tell him what he had wanted to tell the woman earlier but had not, because of him with his flowers standing nearby. "The shepherds", he said, "are telling stories about you all over town." Joseph did not answer but said: "I hope you have good pliers, mine are broken. Are there several doors?"

"Only one" said the man, "and we do have pliers. It is very urgent. We have soldiers quartering."

"Quartering? Now? There aren't any manoeuvres now."

"Not manoeuvres, but a whole company of soldiers is coming to Bethlehem. And the captain" he said proudly, "the captain will stay at our place. The shepherds...", but he suddenly stopped, so did Joseph. The gray stood at a corner, a bunch of flowers in his arm, and he was giving them away to little children who kept coming.  Mothers were accompanying those who could not walk yet and the man who had fetched Joseph was frightened, because of the gray crying: the gray's voice, his eyes had frightened him, but his tears were much more terrible: he touched the mouths of the children, their forehead with his hand, he kissed their little dirty hands and gave everyone a lily.

"I was looking for you", said Joseph to the gray, "because, during my sleep, I dreamt..."

"I know", said the gray, "we have to leave right away."

He waited one more minute till a dirty little girl could come up to him.

"Shall I still fix the door for the captain?"

"No, we have to go." He turned away from the children, took Joseph's arm, and Joseph said to the man who had fetched him: "I am sorry, I guess I won't make it."

"Oh, that's fine" said the man. He watched them return to the barn, and then looked in the street where the children were running around laughing with their big white lilies.  He then heard the hoofs of the horses, turned around and saw the company entering town. "They'll be mad at me again" he thought "because the door is not fixed."

The children stood on the side of the road and waved at the soldiers with their flowers. The soldiers thus came into Bethlehem through a line of white lilies, and the man who had fetched Joseph thought" I guess the shepherds were right about everything they said..."