{"product_id":"the-bells-isbn-9780307590534","title":"The Bells","description":"\u003cb\u003eWritten as a confessional letter to his son, an 18th century opera singer recounts how his gift for  sound led him on an astonishing journey to Europe’s celebrated opera  houses and reveals how he came to raise a son who by all rights he never could have sired. \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe celebrated opera singer \u003ci\u003eLo Svizzero\u003c\/i\u003e was born in a belfry high in the Swiss Alps where his mother served as the keeper of the loudest and most beautiful bells in the land. Shaped by the bells’ glorious music, he possessed an extraordinary gift for sound. But when his preternatural hearing was discovered—along with its power to expose the sins of the church—young Moses Froben was cast out of his village with only his ears to guide him in a world fraught with danger. \u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eRescued from certain death by two traveling monks, he finds refuge at the vast and powerful Abbey of St. Gall. There, he becomes the protégé of the Abbey’s brilliant yet repulsive choirmaster, Ulrich. But it is this gift that will cause Moses’ greatest misfortune: determined to preserve his brilliant pupil’s voice, Ulrich has Moses castrated. Now, he will forever sing with the exquisite voice of an angel—a \u003ci\u003emusico\u003c\/i\u003e—yet castration is an abomination in the Swiss Confederation, and so he must hide his shameful condition from his friends and even from the girl he has come to love. When his saviors are exiled and his beloved leaves St. Gall for an arranged marriage in Vienna, he decides he can deny the truth no longer and he follows her—to sumptuous Vienna, to the former monks who saved his life, to an apprenticeship at one of Europe’s greatest theaters, and to the premiere of one of history’s most beloved operas. \u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003eLike the voice of \u003ci\u003eLo Svizzero\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eThe Bells\u003c\/i\u003e is a sublime debut novel that rings with passion, courage, and beauty. | \u003cb\u003eIndie Next List, October 2010\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"THE BELLS does for the ears what \u003ci\u003ePerfume\u003c\/i\u003e did for the nose. A novel to engage the senses as well as tickle the mind.\"\u003cbr\u003e—Sarah Dunant, international bestselling author of \u003ci\u003eSacred Hearts\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Harvell has written an entertaining and eye-opening aria of a book.\" \u003cbr\u003e—\u003ci\u003eWashington Post\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Richard Harvell's first novel is a marvel of sound woven through the tale of an extraordinary life.\"\u003cbr\u003e—\u003ci\u003eFredericksburg Freelance Star\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"When I look at my copy of \u003ci\u003eThe Bells \u003c\/i\u003esitting in front of me, I cannot believe it lies there immobile and lifeless...During the time I spent entranced with this story, my body rang like the bells within its pages...Harvell’s magical prose gives sound to Moses’ life: the bells, the arias, and the uneven breath of true love.\" \u003cbr\u003e—\u003ci\u003eHistorical Novels Review\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Harvell has fashioned an engrossing first novel ringing with sounds; a musical and literary treat.\"\u003cbr\u003e—\u003ci\u003eBooklist\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Harvell's debut is saturated with sound...A poignant and acutely told storey of the human spirit.\"\u003cbr\u003e—\u003ci\u003eLibrary Journal\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Astonishing in its originality, epic in its scope, luminous in its richness, \u003ci\u003eThe Bells \u003c\/i\u003eis a novel to be savored page by glorious page.”\u003cbr\u003e—Cathy Marie Buchanan, \u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e bestselling author of \u003ci\u003eThe Day the Falls Stood Still\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“I was mesmerized from first page to the last by this haunting and seductive novel. Long after I finished, the characters and their heartbreaking tale of love, loss, and obsession resonated with me still. Readers, here is a book you’ll find impossible to resist. Bravo andencore!”                \u003cbr\u003e—M.J. Rose, international bestselling author of \u003ci\u003eThe Reincarnationist\u003c\/i\u003e | RICHARD HARVELL was born in New Hampshire and studied English literature at Dartmouth College. He lives in Basel, Switzerland, with his wife and children. This is his first novel. | \u003ci\u003eA Note to the Reader\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI grew up as the son of a man who could not possibly have been my\u003cbr\u003efather. Though there was never any doubt that my seed had come\u003cbr\u003efrom another man, Moses Froben, Lo Svizzero, called me “son.” And I\u003cbr\u003ecalled him “father.” On the rare occasions when someone dared to\u003cbr\u003eask for clarifi cation, he simply laughed as though the questioner were\u003cbr\u003ebeing obtuse. “Of course he’s not my son!” he would say. “Don’t be\u003cbr\u003eridiculous.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBut whenever I myself gained the courage to ask him further of\u003cbr\u003eour past, he just looked at me sadly. “Please, Nicolai,” he would say\u003cbr\u003eafter a moment, as though we had made a pact I had forgotten. With\u003cbr\u003etime, I came to understand I would never know the secrets of my\u003cbr\u003ebirth, for my father was the only one who knew these secrets, and he\u003cbr\u003ewould take them to his grave.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThis aside, no child could have wished for more. I accompanied\u003cbr\u003ehim from Venice to Naples and, fi nally, here, to London. Indeed, I\u003cbr\u003erarely left his side until I entered Oxford. Even after that, as I began\u003cbr\u003emy own, unrelated, career, at no time were we ever more than two\u003cbr\u003emonths absent from each other’s company. I heard him sing in\u003cbr\u003eEu rope’s greatest opera houses. I sat beside him in his carriage as\u003cbr\u003emobs of admirers ran alongside and begged him to grace them with a\u003cbr\u003esmile. Through all of this, I never knew anything of the poor Moses\u003cbr\u003eFroben, but only of the renowned Lo Svizzero, who could make ladies\u003cbr\u003eswoon with a mere wave of his hand, who could bring an audience\u003cbr\u003eto tears with his voice.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd so you can imagine my surprise, a week after my father’s\u003cbr\u003edeath last spring, to fi nd among his things this stack of papers. And\u003cbr\u003emore, to fi nd within them all I had sought to know: of my father’s\u003cbr\u003ebirth and mine; of the origin of my name; of my mother; and of the\u003cbr\u003ecrime that had kept my father silent.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThough he appears to have had me in mind as his reader, I cannot\u003cbr\u003ebelieve he did not wish these words for other eyes as well. This\u003cbr\u003ewas a singer, remember, who practiced with an open window, so any\u003cbr\u003eman or woman passing on the street would have the chance to hear an\u003cbr\u003eangel sing.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eNicolai Froben\u003cbr\u003eLondon, October 6, 1806\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cb\u003eACT ONE\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFirst, there were the bells. Three of them, cast from warped shovels,\u003cbr\u003erakes, and hoes, cracked cauldrons, dulled ploughshares, one rusted\u003cbr\u003estove, and, melted into each, a single golden coin. They were rough\u003cbr\u003eand black except along their silvery lips, where my mother’s mallets\u003cbr\u003ehad struck a million strokes. She was small enough to dance beneath\u003cbr\u003ethem in the belfry. When she swung, her feet leapt from the polished\u003cbr\u003ewooden planks, so that when the mallet met the bell, it rang from the\u003cbr\u003ebell’s crown to the tips of my mother’s pointed toes.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThey were the Loudest Bells on Earth, all the Urners said, and\u003cbr\u003ethough now I know a louder one, their place high above the Uri Valley\u003cbr\u003emade them very loud indeed. The peal could be heard from the waters\u003cbr\u003eof Lake Lucerne to the snows of the Gotthard Pass. The ringing\u003cbr\u003egreeted traders come from Italy. Columns of Swiss soldiers pressed\u003cbr\u003etheir palms against their ears as they marched the Uri Road. When\u003cbr\u003ethe bells began to sound, teams of oxen refused to move. Even the fattest\u003cbr\u003emen lost the urge to eat, from the quivering of their bowels. The\u003cbr\u003ecows that grazed the nearby pastures were all long since deaf. Even the\u003cbr\u003eyoun gest herders had the dull ears of old men, though they hid in\u003cbr\u003etheir huts morning, noon, and night when my mother rang her bells.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI was born in that belfry, above the tiny church. There I was\u003cbr\u003enursed. When it was warm enough, there we slept. Whenever my\u003cbr\u003emother did not swing her mallets, we huddled beneath the bells, the\u003cbr\u003efour walls of the belfry open to the world. She sheltered me from the\u003cbr\u003ewind and stroked my brow. Though she never spoke a word to me,\u003cbr\u003enor I to her, she watched my mouth as I babbled infant sounds. She\u003cbr\u003etickled me so I would laugh. When I learned to crawl, she held my\u003cbr\u003efoot so I did not creep off the edge and fall to my death on the jutting\u003cbr\u003erocks below. She helped me stand. I held a fi nger in each fi st, and she\u003cbr\u003eled me round and round, past each edge a hundred times a day. In\u003cbr\u003eterms of space, our belfry was a tiny world— most would have thought \u003cbr\u003eit a prison for a child. But in terms of sound, it was the most massive\u003cbr\u003ehome on earth. For every sound ever made was trapped in the metal\u003cbr\u003eof those bells, and the instant my mother struck them, she released\u003cbr\u003etheir beauty to the world. So many ears heard the thunderous pealing\u003cbr\u003eecho through the mountains. They hated it; or were inspired by its\u003cbr\u003emight; or were entranced until they stared blindly into space; or\u003cbr\u003ecried as the vibrations shook their sadness out. But they did not fi nd\u003cbr\u003eit beautiful. They could not. The beauty of the pealing was reserved\u003cbr\u003efor my mother, and for me, alone.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI wish that were the beginning: my mother and those bells, the Eve\u003cbr\u003eand Adam of my voice, my joys, and my sorrows. But of course that is\u003cbr\u003enot true. I have a father; my mother had one as well. And the bells,\u003cbr\u003etoo; they had a father. Theirs was Richard Kilchmar, who, one night\u003cbr\u003ein 1725, tottered on a table, so drunk he saw two moons instead of\u003cbr\u003eone.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHe shut one eye and squished the other so the two moons resolved\u003cbr\u003einto a single fuzzy orb. He looked about: Two hundred men\u003cbr\u003efi lled Altdorf’s square, in a town that was, and was proud to be, at the\u003cbr\u003every center of the Swiss Confederation. These men were celebrating\u003cbr\u003ethe harvest, and the coronation of the new pope, and the warm summer\u003cbr\u003enight. Two hundred men ankle- deep in piss- soaked mud. Two\u003cbr\u003ehundred men with mugs of acrid Schnapps burned from Uri pears.\u003cbr\u003eTwo hundred men as drunk as Richard Kilchmar.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Quiet!” he yelled into the night, which seemed as warm and\u003cbr\u003eclear to him as the thoughts within his head. “I will speak!”\u003cbr\u003e“Speak!” they yelled.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThey were quiet. High above, the Alps shone in the moonlight\u003cbr\u003elike teeth in black, rotting gums.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Protestants are dogs!” he yelled, raised his mug, and nearly\u003cbr\u003estumbled off the table. They cheered and cursed the dogs in Zu rich,\u003cbr\u003ewho were rich. They cursed the dogs in Bern, who had guns and an\u003cbr\u003earmy that could climb the mountains and conquer Uri if they wished.\u003cbr\u003eThey cursed the dogs in German lands farther north, who had never\u003cbr\u003eheard of Uri. They cursed the dogs for hating music, for defaming\u003cbr\u003eMary, for wishing to rewrite the Holy Book.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThese curses, two hundred years dull in the capitals of Eu rope,\u003cbr\u003epierced Kilchmar’s heart. They brought tears to his eyes— these men\u003cbr\u003ebefore him were his brothers! But what could he reply? What could\u003cbr\u003ehe promise them? So little. He could not build them a fort with cannons.\u003cbr\u003eHe was one of Uri’s richest men, but still, he could not afford\u003cbr\u003ean army. He could not soothe them with his wisdom, for he was not a\u003cbr\u003eman of words.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThen they all heard it, the answer to his silent plea. A ringing\u003cbr\u003ethat made them raise their bleary eyes toward heaven. Someone had\u003cbr\u003eclimbed the church’s belfry and tolled the church’s bell. It was the\u003cbr\u003emost beautiful, heartaching sound Richard Kilchmar had ever heard.\u003cbr\u003eIt resounded off the houses. It echoed off the mountains. The peal\u003cbr\u003etickled his swollen belly. When the ringing ceased, the silence was as\u003cbr\u003ewarm and wet as the tears Kilchmar rubbed from out his eyes.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHe nodded at the crowd. Two hundred heads nodded back at him.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“I will give you bells,” he whispered. He sloshed his drink at the\u003cbr\u003emidnight sky. His voice rose to a shout. “I will build a church to house\u003cbr\u003ethem, high up in the mountains, so the ringing echoes to every inch\u003cbr\u003eof Uri soil! They will be the Loudest and Most Beautiful Bells Ever!”\u003cbr\u003eThey cheered even more loudly now than they had before. He\u003cbr\u003eraised his arms in triumph. Schnapps washed his brow. Then he and\u003cbr\u003eevery man plunged their eyes into the bottom of their mugs and\u003cbr\u003edrank them empty, sealing Kilchmar’s pledge.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAs he drank the fi nal drop, Kilchmar stumbled back, tripped,\u003cbr\u003eand fell. He spent the rest of the night lying in the mud, dreaming of\u003cbr\u003ehis bells.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHe awoke to a circle of blue sky ringed by twenty reverent faces.\u003cbr\u003e“Lead us!” they implored him.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTheir veneration seemed to lift him to his feet, and after six or\u003cbr\u003eeight swigs from their fl asks, he felt more weightless still. Soon he\u003cbr\u003efound himself on his horse leading a pro cession: fi fty horses; several\u003cbr\u003ecarts fi lled with women; children and dogs darting through the\u003cbr\u003egrasses. Where to lead them he did not know, for until that day he’d\u003cbr\u003efound the mountains menacing and hostile. But now he led them up\u003cbr\u003ethe Uri Road toward Italy, toward the pope, toward snowfi elds glittering\u003cbr\u003ein the sun, and then, when inspiration took him, turned off\u003cbr\u003eand began to climb.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eUp and up they went, almost to the cliffs and snow. Kilchmar\u003cbr\u003enow led fi ve hundred Urners, and they followed him until they\u003cbr\u003ereached a rocky promontory and beheld the valley stretched before\u003cbr\u003ethem, the river Reuss a thin white thread stitching it together.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Here,” he whispered. “Here.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Here,” they echoed. “Here.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThey turned then to regard the tiny village just below them, a\u003cbr\u003emere jumble of squalid houses. The villagers and their scrawny cows\u003cbr\u003estared back in awe at the assemblage on the rocky hill.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThis tiny, starved village I write of is Nebelmatt. In this village I\u003cbr\u003ewas born (may it burn to the ground and be covered by an avalanche).\u003cbr\u003eKilchmar’s church was completed in 1727, built of only Uri sweat and\u003cbr\u003eUri stone, so that, in the winter months, no matter how much wood\u003cbr\u003ewas wasted in the stove, the church remained as cold as the mountain\u003cbr\u003eupon which it was built. It was a stocky church, shaped something like\u003cbr\u003ea boot. The bishop was petitioned for a priest well suited to the frigid\u003cbr\u003eand lonesome aspects of the post. His reply came a few days later in the\u003cbr\u003eform of a young priest scowling at Kilchmar’s door— a learned father\u003cbr\u003eKarl Victor Vonderach. “Just the man,” read the bishop’s letter, “for a\u003cbr\u003eposting on a cold, distant mountain. Do not send him back.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNow the church had a master, twelve rustic pews, and a roof that\u003cbr\u003ekept out a good deal of the rain, but it still did not have what Kilchmar\u003cbr\u003ehad promised them. It did not have its bells. And so Kilchmar\u003cbr\u003epacked his cart, kissed his wife, and said he would undertake an expedition\u003cbr\u003eto St. Gall to fi nd the greatest bell maker in the Catholic\u003cbr\u003eworld. He rumbled off northward to patriotic cries, and was never\u003cbr\u003eseen in Uri again.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe building of the church had ruined him.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd so, one year after the last slate had been laid on its roof, the\u003cbr\u003echurch built to house the Loudest and Most Beautiful Bells Ever did\u003cbr\u003enot even have a cowbell hanging in its belfry.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eUrners are a proud and resourceful folk. How hard can it be to make a bell?\u003cbr\u003ethey thought. Clay molds, some molten metal, some beams on which\u003cbr\u003eto hang the fi nished bells— nothing more. Perhaps God had sent\u003cbr\u003ethem Kilchmar only to set them on their way.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eGod needs your iron\u003c\/i\u003e, went the call. \u003ci\u003eBring Him your copper and your tin.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eRusted shovels, broken hoes, corroded knives, cracked cauldrons—\u003cbr\u003eall of these were thrown into a pile that soon towered over Altdorf’s\u003cbr\u003esquare on the very spot where Kilchmar had sealed his pledge three\u003cbr\u003eyears before. Crowds cheered every new donation. One man lugged\u003cbr\u003ethe stove that should have kept him warm that winter. God bless her, was\u003cbr\u003ethe murmur when an old widow tossed in her jewelry. Tears fl owed\u003cbr\u003ewhen the three best families gathered to contribute three golden\u003cbr\u003ecoins. Ten oxcarts were needed to transport the metal to the village.\u003cbr\u003eThe villagers, though they had little metal of their own to offer,\u003cbr\u003ewould not be outdone. As they minded the makeshift smelter for\u003cbr\u003enine days and nights, they contributed what ever Schnapps remained\u003cbr\u003ein their fl asks at daybreak, plus a full set of wolf’s teeth, a carved ibex\u003cbr\u003ehorn, and a dusty chunk of quartz.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTwelve men were scarred for life with burns the day they poured\u003cbr\u003ethe glowing soup into the molds. The fi rst bell was as round as a fat\u003cbr\u003eturkey, the second, large enough to hide a small goat beneath it, and\u003cbr\u003ethe third, the extraordinary third bell, was as high as a man and took\u003cbr\u003esixteen horses to hoist into the belfry.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAll of Uri gathered on the hill below the church to hear the bells\u003cbr\u003ering for the fi rst time. When all was set, the crowd turned their reverent\u003cbr\u003eeyes to Father Karl Victor Vonderach. He stared back at them as\u003cbr\u003eif they were merely a fl ock of sheep.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A blessing, Father?” one woman whispered. “Would you bless\u003cbr\u003eour bells?”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHe rubbed his temples and then stepped before the crowd. He\u003cbr\u003ebowed his head, and everyone else did the same. “Heavenly Father,”\u003cbr\u003ehe croaked through the spittle gathered in his throat. “Bless these\u003cbr\u003ebells that You have—” He sniffed and looked around him, and then\u003cbr\u003eglanced down at his shoe, which rested in a moist cake of dung.\u003cbr\u003e“Damn them all,” he muttered. He stalked back through the crowd.\u003cbr\u003eThey watched his form until it vanished into his house, which had\u003cbr\u003eglass in its windows, but no slates yet on its roof.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThen the silent crowd turned to watch seven of Kilchmar’s cousins\u003cbr\u003emarch resolutely into the church— one to ring the smallest, two\u003cbr\u003ethe middle, and four the largest bell. Many in the crowd held their\u003cbr\u003ebreath as, in the belfry, the three great bells began to rock.\u003cbr\u003eAnd then the Loudest and Most Beautiful Bells Ever began to\u003cbr\u003ering.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe mountain air shuddered. The pealing fl ooded the valley. It\u003cbr\u003ewas as shrill as a rusty hinge and as rumbling as an avalanche and as\u003cbr\u003epiercing as a scream and as soothing as a mother’s whisper. Every\u003cbr\u003eperson cried out and fl inched and threw his hands over his ears.\u003cbr\u003eThey stumbled back. Father Karl Victor’s windows cracked. Teeth\u003cbr\u003ewere clenched so hard they chipped. Ear drums burst. A cow, two goats,\u003cbr\u003eand one woman felt the sudden pangs of labor.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhen the echoes from the distant peaks fi nally faded, there was\u003cbr\u003esilence. Every person stared at the church as if it might collapse. Then\u003cbr\u003ethe door burst open and the Kilchmar cousins poured out, their\u003cbr\u003epalms held to their ruined ears. They faced the crowd like thieves\u003cbr\u003ecaught with trea sure in their stockings.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThen the cheering began. Hands rose toward heaven. Fists\u003cbr\u003eshook. Tears fl owed. They had done it! The Loudest Bells Ever had\u003cbr\u003ebeen rung!\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eGod’s kingdom on earth was safe!\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe crowd retreated slowly down the hill. When someone yelled,\u003cbr\u003e“Ring them again!” there was a collective cringe, and soon began a\u003cbr\u003estampede— men, women, children, dogs, and cows ran, slid, rolled\u003cbr\u003edown the muddy hill and hid behind the decrepit houses as if trying\u003cbr\u003eto outrun an avalanche. Then there was silence. Several heads peered\u003cbr\u003earound the houses and toward the church. The Kilchmar cousins\u003cbr\u003ewere nowhere to be found. Indeed, soon there was no one within two\u003cbr\u003ehundred paces of that church. There was no one brave enough to\u003cbr\u003ering the bells again.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOr was there? Whispers fi lled the air. Children pointed at a\u003cbr\u003ebrown smudge moving lightly up the hill, like a knot of hay, blown by\u003cbr\u003ea gentle wind. A person? No, not a person. A child— a little girl— in\u003cbr\u003edirty rags.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt so happened that this village possessed, among its trea sures, a\u003cbr\u003edeaf idiot girl. She was wont to stare down the villagers with a haunting\u003cbr\u003eglare, as though she knew the sins they fought to hide, and so they\u003cbr\u003edrove her off with buckets of dirty wash water whenever she came\u003cbr\u003enear. This deaf child was staring at the belfry as she climbed the hill,\u003cbr\u003efor she, too, had heard the bells, not in her vacant ears, but as we\u003cbr\u003ehear holiness: a vibration in the gut.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThey all watched her climb, knowing that God had sent this idiot\u003cbr\u003egirl to them, just as God had sent them Kilchmar, had sent them the\u003cbr\u003estone to build this church, and the metal to cast the bells.\u003cbr\u003eShe looked upward at the belfry as though she wished that she\u003cbr\u003ecould fly.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Go,” they whispered. “Go.”","brand":"Crown","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46301838115045,"sku":"NP9780307590534","price":14.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780307590534.jpg?v=1767738307","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/the-bells-isbn-9780307590534","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}