The Ruler paused to allow that to sink in within the minds of his televiewers. And then came what has become the talk of all Aburiria and probably the basis for the rumors of snakes, devil worship, and supernatural powers. Emphasizing the warning he was about to issue, he pointed at the cameras with his club-shaped staff as if at the terrorists of the Movement for the Voice of the People. He, the Ruler, would outsnake all their plastic terrorist snakes with real ones. In biblical times, it was the Mosaic snakes that swallowed the Pharaonic ones. Today in Aburiria, it is the Pharaonic snakes that will swallow all of you who think that you are the new Moses.
And suddenly he raised the club higher in the air as if ready to throw it at any and all self-styled Moseses. The cameramen ducked behind their cameras, and all at once, as if hit by the same object simultaneously, every television screen in the country split into seven pieces. The viewers did not know whether the Ruler had actually thrown the club or simply had the power of mind to disintegrate their screens; disagreements remain to this day. Whatever the truth, the television performance did inspire a new snake dance, which became all the rage so that wherever and whenever two or three young people met, they would move their bodies—heads, torso, and hands—in serpentine motions as they sang:
The pot I made is broken
Little did I know that freedom
Would bear a viper and a devil
9
At first the Ruler did not mind the rumors about devils and snakes because he hoped that these would only deepen the fear among his enemies and strengthen his hold on Aburlria. But when his M5 told him that far from creating fear the rumors were actually making people have a low opinion of his reign, verging on contempt, and that this might lessen people’s support for Marching to Heaven, the Ruler saw the need to take steps to deny these rumors their power. But which action would bring about the biggest impact?
As a schoolboy in a colonial classroom long ago, he had come across stories of an ancient king of Babylon who used to appear among the populace disguised as one of them, and when later the citizens found out who he was they were amazed and flattered. A king had walked among them. The image had faded in time, but it sprang back to life, and when he tried the idea on his handlers, they said, Yes, perfect. A well-publicized spontaneous Sunday visit to a church to draw attention to his religiosity would surely counter the basis of the malice toward him.
The church chosen was All Saints Cathedral, Eldares, and what a clever choice! Located between two of the most populous districts in Eldares, Santalucia and Santamaria, the cathedral stood on a hill, and this would make a dramatic scenic background for television pictures.
The cathedral was headed by the slightly eccentric Bishop Tireless Kanogori. His followers had given him those names because long before he became a bishop he used to say that Jesus Christ was the eternal tireless remover of the burden of all the sins weighing heavily on tired souls. Soon his followers started talking about him as the priest who never tired of talking about the tireless redeemer. When promoted to the bishopric he legalized his name out of respect for his followers.
On the chosen Sunday, surrounded by newspaper reporters, television cameras, and handheld microphones, the Ruler and his motorcade arrived at the Santamaria marketplace, where the historic journey to the church would start. He got out of his Rolls-Royce and surveyed the market before the startled faces of the many fruit sellers who did not know whether or not they should rush forward to lure sales by singing praises for their wares. The contrast between the motorcade of sleek Mercedes-Benzes and the line of donkey-pulled and hand-pushed carts loaded with goods of various kinds was stunning. But another scene was even more so. The Ruler saw a lone donkey and, seemingly impulsively as choreographed by his image builders, decided to ride a donkey in imitation of Christ. Some of his secret service agents, dressed as ordinary citizens, grabbed some palm leaves from the sellers and lay them on the ground. At the foot of the hill, he got off the donkey and walked the rest of the way. The long camera shots showing the Ruler at the foot of the hill and the church on the hill made him look as if he was leading a pilgrimage to the City of God.
With slow and thoughtful strides, his entourage allowed the principal actor a foot or so; the performance was almost flawless, and the inner circle even started imagining a social celebration of the victory of guile over rumor.
As it turned out, those following the performance on TV, at home or in community halls, had sensed that something was amiss when, as soon as the Ruler set his foot at the doors of the cathedral they lost the pictures, reminding them of that other time when their TV screens broke into seven pieces. The glitch denied them a view of what happened next, and they had to glean bits and pieces from those who were there and saw the Ruler enter the building.
Though details conflict, all agree that as soon as the Ruler set foot inside the cathedral, the walls shook as if moved by an earth tremor. Crosses on the walls, people’s clothes, or pieces of paper danced strangely, as if struggling to flee. And when Bishop Tireless Kanogori placed on the altar a small Bible he had been holding in his hands, the altar shook and the Bible fell to the ground. He did not pick it up but instead disappeared into an anteroom, and before all had finished wondering what had made him abandon the holy book and the congregation, he reemerged holding a very big Bible in his right hand and a huge cross in his left, both hands outstretched toward the Ruler. The bishop’s lips were moving as if making an incantation, but nobody could catch his words and so were unable to repeat them afterward.
Then the whole congregation heard the sound of something crashing through a window, breaking the glass into seven pieces, and then, just as suddenly, all the shaking walls and dancing crosses became still and the whole cathedral was embraced in silence and peace; the sound of Bishop Tireless Kanogori’s voice as he continued his ceremony as if nothing untoward had happened only served to underscore the silence.
At home, all television sets that had a break in proceedings returned to normal. Those already sitting in front of their sets and those who happened to turn on their TVs at that moment found Bishop Kanogori at the beginning of his sermon. Among the latter group, a few voices ridiculed the tales that went beyond the donkey ride, the palm leaves, the hoarse hosannas, and the long walk to the hill.
But the tellers of the uncanny event did not give up and went as far as to insist that the All Saints Cathedral was not the only shrine of worship where the drama had occurred. It is said that the Buler did thereafter attend a few other services in other churches with similar results: in all cases at least one glass window was shattered into seven pieces by whatever force the cross-and-Bible-wielding priests had driven out. That is why, so they say, the Buler of Aburlria suddenly announced, without clarification, that to demonstrate his belief in the equality of all faiths he would now also connect with Islam, and out of modesty and deference to the Islamic hatred of images no cameras would be allowed to follow him.
The idea was to stage this at Islamic mosques, Sunni, Shiite, or Wahabi; then at Indian temples, Hindu, Buddhist, or Jain; and Sikh gurdwaras; and end up in Jewish synagogues, with the hope that these spontaneous appearances would wipe out images of what had happened at All Saints and other churches.
For his first visit to an Islamic shrine, he ordered his handlers to look for a mosque without glass windows. After scouting around Eldares, they managed to find a mosque with a beautiful dome and minarets but, more important, with windows of wood and iron bars.
An even bigger drama ensued, but since it was not captured on film once more we have to rely on hearsay that when the imam in charge of the day’s ceremony realized, on the Buler s entry, that something was not right, he quickly raised the Quran in midair and called out in Arabic:
Allahu Akbar Allahu Akbar
Ash-hadu an la-Ilaha ill-Llah
Ash-hadu anna Muhatntnadar-r-
Rasuwlu-Llah
Hayya ala-swalaah
Hayya alal Fataah
Allah
u Akbar
La-Ilaha illa-Llah …
Those in attendance say they felt something like wind whirl through the air and the next minute they heard the iron bars of one of the windows creak and then saw some of them bend outward as if someone were pushing the bars to set himself free. Brandishing the Quran and the rosary at the window, the imam shouted something like Satan, and lo and behold the creaking stopped abruptly and the only sound was the imam calling out, Allahu Akbar. There are some who, like the biblical Thomas, doubt everything about this tale, but even they are unable to explain how the iron bars came to be so bent; for it is said that the mosque’s ruling council, after much internal debate, decided that they would not repair the window but let it stay like that, a witness to the victory of the Holy Quran over the wiles of Satan, even when disguised in the modern fineries of earthly glory.
The entire program of spontaneous appearances at places of worship was scrapped quietly, and a devilless normal order of worship was restored to these religious shrines. Some city dwellers put up posters: ELDARES IS A DEVIL-FREE ZONE.
10
It was not, for soon they found that the Satanic daemons had escaped the churches and the mosques to roam the land, for how else were people to explain two amazing reports that soon began to circulate in Eldares? The first was comic, claiming that Satan visited Maritha and Mariko in their home at Santalucia just to pick a fight.
The scarier second, beyond the realm of religion, told of Satan going about the towns and villages plucking out people’s hearts, leaving their bodies as empty shells on roadsides and dumpsites.
But there were a few people who argued that the two, Satan’s picking a fight with Maritha and Mariko and Satan’s plucking out people’s hearts, were connected, a clear case of Satan’s showing that though he had lost some battles he had not lost the war. But why pick a fight with an elderly coupler
11
Maritha and Mariko, wife and husband, were well known in Santalu-cia because they were always in each other’s company, going to market and shops or attending wakes, funerals, and weddings. If one or the other was spotted alone, people knew—and they were hardly ever proven wrong—that the other one was not far away.
Their cat, black except for a white patch on its forehead, sometimes followed them, and when once it came to church children adapted a familiar song:
Mari had a little cat,
Little cat, little cat
Mari had a little cat
With a skin as black as soot
And wherever Mari went,
Mari went, Man went
And wherever Man went
The cat was sure to go
It followed Mart to church one day …
Maritha and Mariko were faithful members of the All Saints. They dusted pews and windows and arranged flowers. When the cathedral started a program of feeding the homeless and sheltering them in the basement on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays, Maritha and Mariko volunteered to minister to the needy wayfarers. They even fed doves and other birds nesting on the roof of the cathedral.
Maritha and Mariko were as twins. Many were the times when one would complete a sentence begun by the other. They were in their sixties, their bodies had held remarkably well, and their children, now young men and women, were secure in their different jobs. All in all, Maritha and Mariko were without a blemish, and they seemed a model for a wholesome marriage and family life.
That may explain why the entire church community was so shocked when one Sunday, not many months after the event involving the Ruler and the broken glass at All Saints, Maritha and Mariko stood before the congregation and confessed that they were tormented by an irresistible lust for other people’s flesh. In keeping with how they always did things, they told their story as if reading from the same book.
“Even walking in the streets is becoming a torture,” Mariko said.
“There is not a single night we have not prayed that this burden be lifted, but our prayers have not yet been answered,” added Maritha.
“Our own bodies no longer call out to each other, but other people’s make ours burn with desire.”
“As if Satan is beckoning us to leave the path of righteousness to break some of the Ten Commandments …”
“… which say,” they intoned together as in a chorus, “Thou shall not commit adultery and Thou shall not lust after another person’s property. “
“So far, the lust has remained in our eyes only” Maritha explained.
“But even that is a sin,” Mariko hastened to add, as if to quell any doubts the audience might harbor about how seriously he and Maritha took these temptations.
The congregation prayed that the couple be made strong and the Satan of Lust be crushed. After the service was over, Bishop Tireless Kanogori, a fellow brother in Christ, had a heart-to-heart talk with them and told them to remain steadfast, that they should remember that when Christ was once alone in the wilderness, hungry, thirsty, tired, Satan chose that very moment to tempt him for forty days and nights, and Jesus wrestled with numerous desires but remained steadfast in his courage and righteousness and in the end defeated Satan; and it was this great struggle with the Temptor that prepared Christ to assume his role as the redeemer of all the sinful. Consider, then, he went on, how lucky you are that you are not alone with Satan for forty nights and days in a wilderness full of howling winds and wild animals, that you are still there for each other in your own home in Santalucia, and we are all around you, shouting at the Temp-tor: Shame on you, Satan! And the trio broke into a hymn:
His evil Angels will come
And Satan himself will come
But my soul is armed with faith
I will knock him down
I will strike and tell him
Get behind me, Satan,
I will never become your follower
But even then Satan would not leave them alone, and every Sunday Maritha and Mariko would tell scarier and scarier stories of how Satan had dogged their paths for seven nights and days in different guises, and wily as ever, trying to stoke their lust for other people’s flesh. The only place where they felt safe from him was within the cathedral. Elsewhere, especially when one or the other was asleep, at home, or walking the streets alone, Satan was back. Theirs was now a war on a grand scale; testifying about his tactics was their one way of fighting back so that if Satan struck a pound’s worth they would hit back with their two cents’ worth. It was because they feared most the possibility of Satan catching one of them alone in a dark alley that they were now inseparable. Their saga was very moving, and every Sunday more and more people would congregate at the All Saints to listen to the latest episode in the daily battles between Maritha and Mariko and Satan.
The cathedral became a popular spot packed every Sunday with people eager for titillating details about the couple’s lust and engagement with Satan. There was not even standing room left inside, and many would simply gather outside the doors and windows the better to catch glimpses of the heroic couple as they told their story.
It was bound to happen that this story would reach the desks of news editors, and one newspaper, the Daily Gossip, increased sales severalfold when it started carrying versions of Maritha and Mariko’s serial confessions; and the war against Satan became the subject of talk at crossroads, marketplaces, shopping centers, and bars. Whenever and wherever young men and women met, they would say half in jest: Oh, my dear, you have afflicted me with a severe case of Maritha and Mariko, or I feel a Mariko and a Maritha for you—what do you say to that r
To the dwellers of Eldares, particularly those living in Santalucia, the story of Maritha and Mariko and their epic battle against the Satan of Lust became bigger than even the arrival of the Global Bank mission to study the feasibility of funding the proposed Marching to Heaven. The story of an ordinary man and woman standing up to the mighty Satan gripped their imagination, curious as they were as to how it would all end.
12
On the fortieth day
of Maritha and Mariko’s first confession to visitation by the Devil, people flocked to All Saints as never before. Forty was significant. It was after the same number of days that Jesus Christ had returned home from the desert victorious over Satan. But when Maritha and Mariko gave witness to the Lord and confessed that Satan was still after them, people, and especially the young, were confused, some clearly upset. Why hadn’t Satan taken on his equals in Hell instead of relentlessly pursuing Maritha and Mariko? What particularly annoyed them were Satan’s cowardly tactics: preying on old Maritha and Mariko when alone or just about to close their eyes. Satan is a big bully, they said. He dare not come here.
But others cautioned the congregation not to become complacent; the only reason Satan had not dared to come back to soil the holy grounds was because the ignominious exit forced on him by Bishop Tireless Kanogori only a few months before was still fresh in his memory.
The youth, especially the recently saved, took up the challenge and after the service remained behind to put their heads together, quickly vowing to do for Santalucia what the bishop had done for All Saints. They would comb every nook and creek in Santalucia to ferret Satan out, and if they failed to catch him they would at least scare the shit out of him.
So, they took on the name Soldiers of Christ and vowed to fight till the Devil let Maritha and Mariko live their lives in peace. They would arm themselves with the Bible for a shield, a hymnbook for a diet, and the cross doubling as a walking stick and a cane with which to chase out Satan. The Evil One must move or be made to move. They broke into a call-and-response battle hymn.
Where are you going,
Carrying food and armed with a staff?
Wizard of the Crow Page 4