Stacked tiki totem on the neck and upper back

The sea gave us the totem on Tuesday, the morning after the gale took the lower roof of the boathouse. Brother Tobias found it wedged between the rocks below the St Bride's steps, five faces stacked one upon another like plates on a dresser, black with tar and weed. The top face is no bigger than a teacup. I have looked at it more than a man should look at anything made of wood.

Prior Hilary wants it burned before Vespers. He calls it a heathen thing and says the Visitor will hear of it. I replied that a thing which had crossed half the world of water to find our steps might be allowed a night in the wash-house. He did not smile, but he did not say no. Tobias has been sanding the mouths, which are all open as if the whole stack were shouting the same word, and the largest face near the base has a grin that splits the wood from ear to ear.

I keep thinking about the band carved around the top, the zigzag like a row of teeth or a line of breaking waves. Tobias says a woman in Falmouth once told him such faces were set to watch over doorways. I do not know whether that is true. I do know that on the first night the totem lay in the wash-house, the bell in the tower rang by itself, and nobody will admit to having touched the rope.

I have decided it will stand in the cloister, facing the prior's window, where the morning sun can reach those open mouths. Hilary may burn it if he likes. I suspect he will find it has already said what it came to say.

Your brother in Christ, Brother Julian