A Dream of Kings

by Harry Mark Petrakis

  "Are you getting acquainted here?" he asked. "Have you been introduced to the solid burghers and their somber wives? Is there among them a black sheep or two to keep you company?" He laughed wryly. "I cannot imagine you lying still, old sport, listening to the wind among the stones. The rest of your scrawny frame might be content to sleep but not your lovely fingers, your marvelous hands. I would give ten to one that even now when twilight falls they rise and roam among the graves flexing a deck of cards and trying to assemble a table of players for some stud."

  He rose to his feet and brushed the earth from his knees and fingers. Overhead a bird passed trailing a strange eerie cry.

  "The game is getting tighter for me, old friend," he said quietly. "We came so close, Stavros and I, because of you, that I cannot endure waiting any longer. One of these days... one of these days I may strike a solid parlay or run a streak at stud. Then the boy and I will escape. I won't be able to visit you anymore then, but I know you will understand. You know we must go."

  He turned and began walking slowly toward the gate. As he crossed the rise of hill he waved back to his friend in a mute gesture of farewell.

  There was a night near the end of those two weeks when Matsoukas was awakened by a high shrill scream. The sound shattered his sleep. He stumbled furiously from the bed with Caliope close behind him and ran to the parlor.

  Stavros lay rigid within the bed, his cheeks and mouth twisted into the shape of the scream. His eyes stared into space, the pupils wild with fear. His head was thrown back and a terrible gasping for breath bubbled in his throat.

  Once again Matsoukas held the heaving body of his son in his arms, suffering each savage wave that ripped the boy's limbs. After the seizure passed he sat watching the boy sleep until dawn split the rim of the night, anguish and fear flaying his flesh.

  After that attack, so close to the one the boy had endured before, Matsoukas could not bear to remain away from his son for very long. Sitting at his desk in the office during the morning he would be swept by a violent unrest and would hurry home. He would remain with the boy for hours, playing with him, holding him gently. In those moments he marked the tendons springing from the boy's frame, the meat melting on his arms, the flesh of his cheeks shriveling so all that remained were the boy's great dark eyes. More and more Stavros grew torpid and sluggish, lacking the strength or will to move, lying by the hour on his back, one small-fingered hand twitching slightly in a sign to his father.

  There was an afternoon with the sky crusted in a gray low foam when they sat together. Caliope and the girls were out and they were alone except for the mother-in-law brooding in her room. Matsoukas sat on the floor beside the boy's bed, his cheek against the bars, his face just a few inches from his son's head. He saw in that strange moment a yearning in the boy's face, a mute longing, a burning plea for life. He moaned softly and raised his son's hand, pressing the tiny cold fingers to his lips in a fierce caress.

  "Lie quietly," Matsoukas said. "Store up your strength. Soon now, I promise you, soon now we will fly." In a cramp of despair he rose to his feet and spread his powerful arms to simulate the wings of a plane. "We will fly," he cried softly. "We will sweep like the wind through the sky!" He moved his arms furiously, wagging them up and down, rumbling through his teeth in imitation of the roar of great engines.

  Stavros watched him with a faint light spreading across his face. The tips of his small crooked ears quivered as if they heard the roar of the engines. He gathered the thin bones of his arms, his legs twitched and grew taut, his toes moved in a fin-like flutter.

  Matsoukas lowered his arms and crouched once again beside the bed. Stavros curled with a shudder toward his hand.

  "Soon now!" Matsoukas cried. He closed his eyes tightly and opened them and smiled at his son. "Soon now, my son, my heart, my soul!"

  "What are you mumbling, you fool?" the carp of his mother-in-law swept the room like a vulture's wing. "Why don't you quit tormenting that poor child, trying to make him understand what he cannot ever understand."

  Matsoukas sprang to his feet with a snarl.

  "You dried-up barracuda!" he said hoarsely. "You wretched old bitch! What do you know? When I talk to him, he understands! He understands every word, every sign!"

  She spit at him through the curl of her lips.

  "He understands nothing!" she cried shrilly. "He lies there like a vegetable, poor tormented creature, and understands nothing!"

  A wild rage shattered his flesh. He reached her in a single great bound and grabbed her by her stringy coarse hair. She let out the howl of a demented witch and coiled her fingers to ward him off.

  He locked his hand on the dry hard strands. He evaded her clawing fingers and jerked her head to one side. Her howl of fury became a shriek of pain. He started to tear loose a clump of her hair when Stavros screamed.

  Matsoukas let go the old lady's head and turned to the bed. The boy lay on his side watching them, his eyes open to wide bursting cups, his mouth shaped in the form of a broken shell. One thin arm fluttered in a spasm of terror.

  Matsoukas moaned in remorse and ran back to the bed. He raised the boy in his arms, holding him tightly against the shudders that wracked his body. Behind him the old lady gasped hoarsely to regain her breath.

  "Bastard!" she spit. "Bastard! God has punished you for your filthy body, for your inhuman soul, for all the debauched evil in your heart!"

  He held Stavros close in his arms, rocking him gently, seeking desperately to calm and console him.

  "I live for one thing!" the old lady hissed. "I live to see you broken, driven into the sewers where you belong! Animal out of darkness! Bastard and filth is what you are!"

  Stavros fluttered his shoulders and Matsoukas softly kissed the boy's trembling cheeks.

  "God has punished you with such a son!" the old lady shrieked. "Your filthy seed made him the broken animal he is! You murdered his soul and you'll burn in hell!"

  "Soon now, my son," Matsoukas whispered. "Soon we will fly."

  "Bastard!" the old lady screamed. "Bastard! Animal! Filth!"

  "Soon," Matsoukas said, and he nodded and winked and grimaced at his son. "Soon now, my heart, soon now we will fly."

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  There was a night he woke with a cry of terror from a fearful dream. He lay trembling, sweat erupted across his cold flesh, and his heart beating like a trapped bird seeking to escape the cage of his body. For an instant he thought he was dying and then he caught his breath. Caliope stirred beside him and raised her head to ask sleepily what was wrong. He could not answer. After a moment she lowered her head to the pillow and fell asleep again.

  But sleep was strangled that night for him and he lay in the dark trying to unravel the nightmare. He recalled that from his open palm a tiny moth had sprung aloft, sailing into the sky in a swift and jubilant ascent. It was a dark-winged insect with a butterfly's grace and he watched it with delight. Higher and higher it rose toward the corona of the sun. He saw the small wings glimmer for a moment with a crimson brilliance. A chill swept his flesh and he cried out a warning but it was too late. A flash of flame swept the tiny furry body. A puff of smoke and it blew apart. The soft blackened wings fluttered in embers and ashes down to the dark sea.

  He tried to calm himself. He understood the dream had been spawned from his growing desperation. Each day his horses continued to run out and he lost steadily at poker. When he won a few dollars it was barely enough to provide him a stake for another hand. He had tried blackjack, roulette, and craps, but these had proved fruitless as well. He was hooked to a deadly losing streak that withered everything he touched. And in that grieving moment the thought of cheating sprang like a demon to birth.

  A nausea swept his flesh. He had gambled most of his life, won or lost on his skill and on the diverse elements of chance. He had only contempt for those who sought to alter this balance by swindle and hoax. He swore not to join them.

  But in the long slow waning of the night he
marked the tremor of his son's frail breathing. He pressed his palms tightly across his ears but the boy's gasps penetrated even that shield. He held his eyes tightly closed and hummed softly under his breath. The hum became a drone and the drone grew in volume until it became a roar. When he took his hands away from his ears the roaring did not cease. It seemed to come from the sky above, the roar of a plane passing overhead, a rumbling that faded slowly. He opened his eyes and saw the first veins of daylight spotted through the fabric of the worn shade. He knew that another flight had left for Greece without them. He made his fearful decision then.

  He rose from the bed and went to the bathroom. As he shaved he considered the possibilities. There was no simple way to fix the races so he discarded that prospect. Poker was almost impossible since the dealer controlled the fall of the cards. Blackjack was also dealer-directed and the cards stationary before each player. Only in craps was the player able to control the action. So craps it must be.

  When he finished shaving he was conscious that his face had somehow altered. His cheeks seemed sunken as though during the night two long crescent-shaped gashes had been cut into them. There was a hollow darkness to his eyes, a shadow that seeped from the pupil to discolor the iris.

  He dressed and left the flat and walked with rapid nervous strides down the street. Inside his office he closed the door and went to his desk to rummage in a bottom drawer. He uttered a deep sigh when he found them, a pair of Busters, crooked dice confiscated from a dice mechanic he had once hurled from a game. They were beautifully made, marvelously balanced, with a series of number combinations that added up to only seven.

  All that morning and for the balance of the afternoon he practiced with the dice. He had always had a certain agility in his fingers, and this nimbleness helped him now even as he yearned for Cicero's skill.

  For the next three days he repeated the same sequence of movements with the dice. The problem lay in deftly switching the Busters when he was the shooter, then ripping them out of the game and returning the fair dice to play before the next shooter made his throw. To achieve this switch smoothly he practiced with the Busters concealed in his palm and reached for the set of fair dice. He closed his hand, let the Busters drop to his fingers, palmed the fair dice, and threw the Busters for the loaded toss. He depended on the excitement of the game, the tension of the play, to help conceal his switch. At the same time he understood with a feeling of desolation that the greatest possibility of success would result from his unblemished reputation for honest play.

  When he finished practicing in the late afternoon he went to Falconis to observe the crap table play in the room which housed the private game. He observed the movement and position of the players, gauging the spot he would wait for, the one on the other side of the table from the door, his right side turned toward the shadows in the corner.

  On the morning of the fourth day after his decision he took his passbook to the bank. He withdrew the full amount of their savings balance, two hundred and sixty-two dollars, to use as a stake. He closed the account and endured watching the teller voiding the passbook. From the bank he went downtown to the airline office. He wanted to confirm the reservations for the following morning's flight to Greece. He feared that because of his endless cancellations they would not hold a pair of seats. This time he left a deposit of a hundred dollars, the balance to be paid at the airport before the flight.

  He went from there to Falconis'. He stood in a corner of the small back room, watching the crap table action, waiting for the position he had chosen to open. He felt himself trembling, his fingers twitching around the Busters in his pocket, his forehead covered with a strange heavy sweat. Anguish spread cold fingers through his body.

  The player holding the position he wanted moved out of the game with a curse. Matsoukas stepped forward to take his place. The player next to him surrendered the dice to Matsoukas for the throw. At the same time he thought with a kind of frenzy of Anthoula.

  He was astounded why he had not considered asking her for the money. She told him endlessly how much she adored him. She would understand his great need and aid him.

  Time out!" he cried and spun away from the table in a surge of excitement.

  Outside the Minoan he started at a run for the bakery. By the time he came to the windows laden with sweets and pastries he was almost completely out of breath. He panted around to the alley and knocked urgently on the door. Anthoula opened it.

  He stood there with his face flushed, his body shaking, and his breath coming in quick tight gasps. She mistook his disorder for passion and it exploded her own ardor.

  "Darling!" she cried hoarsely and pulled him into the kitchen. "You are burning up with love! O my darling!" Desire swept from her body like mist from a marshy bog.

  "Listen my dearest," he gasped.

  "The old lady is ill today," Anthoula said fervently. "We are alone! O my darling!"

  An uneasiness swept him. "Perhaps I should return later," he struggled for breath. "You are busy with the trade."

  "Don't move, my darling!" she cried. To prevent him leaving she reached around him and snapped the bolt closed on the door. "Wait!" she cried again and swept to the front of the store. He heard her slam and lock the door and the shade being drawn.

  "What will your customers think?" he asked with concern when she flew back. "It is poor business practice to close in the middle of the day."

  She did not answer but stretched her arms like pincers to embrace him, one hand clasping his neck in a vise, the other hand fumbling furiously at the fly of his pants.

  "Patience, my beloved!" he gasped in dismay.

  She would not release him and tugged him toward the stairs leading to her apartment. She held tightly to his body while uttering soft wild cries of ardor.

  "Hurry, my darling!'' she moaned. "My nest is on fire!"

  "Let me go and we will make it up the stairs more quickly," he tried to speak gaily while struggling vainly to unlock her arm from around his throat.

  "I cannot let you go!" she cried. She thrust her knee between his legs so hard he winced.

  So they stumbled and bumped the walls and labored up the stairs. Matsoukas cursed silently at her total abandonment of restraint and grace while marveling at her agility. When they reached the second floor he staggered as if they had been humping for hours.

  She tugged him toward the bedroom. His fly was open and she endeavored to pull out his organ. He feared if she once got a grip on it she would wrench off the hapless member.

  He made it to the bed at the same moment she pulled down his trousers and tore loose two buttons of his shirt. They fell across the spread together and he saw her face swoop down upon him like the beak of some wild bird.

  When he finally managed to hold her down long enough to mount her, he ached in every muscle and had to resist a strong impulse to crack her across the snout.

  "Take me!" she shrieked. "God, take me!"

  He bent in a grim despair to the extension of her body, trying furiously to concentrate, feeling the hard bones of her hips, and the hoard opening and unfolding before his wild numbed thrusts.

  Later, lying naked beside her, soaked in an afterglow of exhaustion, he told her about his son and asked her for the money. She screamed. Then she scrambled up to crouch nakedly over him, her great breasts swinging like melons beneath her outraged cheeks.

  "You want to leave me!"

  "Certainly not!" he protested. "But I have to go!"

  "I have given you all my love and now you want to leave me!"

  "I love you too, my dearest," he tried to soothe her. "I must go for the sake of my son. He has been ill for a long time and I must take him to Greece."

  "Why Greece?" she cried. "The best doctors in the world are here! Why Greece?"

  "Not for the doctors," he said slowly. "For the sun of Greece." He shook his head earnestly. "I know it will heal and cure him."

  She stared at him with her breath coming in short tight gasps. />
  "You must be mad!" she cried. "How will the sun cure him of anything? If you are so enamored of sun, take him to Denver for a week!"

  He tried patiently to explain again.

  "The boy has been ill a long time," he said gently. "The doctors here hold out little hope. They don't understand what the sunlight in Greece is like, the way it reflects off the water. I know..."

  "Stop talking like a moron!" she cried. She clutched at him in quick remorse. "The thought of losing you drives me wild!"

  "You will not lose me, my darling," he said. "I will continue to love you always."

  She shook her head in a mounting frenzy. "I will not let you go! You must not leave me!"

  "My darling!" he cried. "You have brought me hours of happiness. You have captured my soul and my heart! I would never leave you now except that my son is ill!"

  "You don't love me!"

  "I do love you!"

  "You don't!"

  "I do!" he protested. "I do!"

  "If you love me, how can you bear to leave me?"

  "I must go!" he cried. "Don't you understand? My son is very ill and I must go!" He felt the helpless tug of his anguish. "If you cannot help me, I must look elsewhere for the money."

  He swung his naked legs over the edge of the bed and reached for his underwear on the floor. She threw her arms about his neck in a wild embrace.

  He struggled gently to disengage her. As quickly as he loosened her hands, she grabbed him again.

  "Don't leave me!" she begged. "Don't leave me, my darling. I will die without you."

  He shook his head mutely and managed finally to pull free. "You will not die," he said softly. "You burn with too much life." He bent and pulled his underwear shorts over his legs and up around his naked buttocks. Misery swept his flesh in great waves.