by John Barth
“You said ’twas Malaga we drank that night.”
“Aye, I’ve a clear memory of’t.”
“And I that ’twas Madeira.”
Ebenezer laughed. “As for that, I’d trust my memory over yours, inasmuch as ’twas my first wine, and I’d not likely forget the name of’t.”
“True enough,” Burlingame agreed, “if you got it aright in the first place. But I too marked it well as your first glass and well knew Malaga from Madeira, whereas to you the names were new and meaningless, and thus lightly confused.”
“That may be, but I am certain ’twas Malaga nonetheless.”
“No matter,” Burlingame declared. “The fact is, where memories disagree there’s oft no means to settle the dispute, and that’s the second weakness. The third is, that in large measure we recall whate’er we wish, and forget the rest. ’Twas not until you summoned up this quatrain, for example, that I recalled having slipped upstairs to a whore the while you were composing it. My shame at leaving you thus alone, for one thing, forced it soon out of mind.”
“I’faith, my polestar leads me on the rocks!” Ebenezer lamented. “What is the fourth objection to’t?”
“That e’en those things it holds, it tends to color,” Burlingame replied. “ ’Tis as if Theseus at every turn rolled up the thread and laid it out again in a prettier pattern.”
“I fear me thy objections are fatal,” Ebenezer said. “They are like the four black crows that ate up Gretel’s peas, wherewith she’d marked her trail into the forest.”
“Nay, these are but weaknesses, not mortal wounds,” said Burlingame. “They don’t obliterate the path but only obfuscate it, so that try as we might we never can be certain of’t.” He smiled. “Howbeit, there is yet a fifth, that by’s own self could do the job.”
“ ‘Slife, you’d as well uncage the rascal and let us see him plainly.”
“My memory served as my credentials, as you told me,” Burlingame said. “Blurred, imperfect as it is from careless use, and thine as well, the twain agreed on points enough to satisfy you I am Burlingame, though I could not prove it any other way. But suppose the thread gets lost completely, as’t sometimes doth. Suppose I’d had no recollection of my past at all?”
“Then you’d have been Colonel Sayer for all of me,” Ebenezer replied. “Or if haply you’d declared yourself my Henry, but knew no more, I’d ne’er have credited your tale. But ’tis a rare occurrence, is’t not, this total loss of memory, and rarer yet where no other proof exists of one’s identity?”
“No doubt. But suppose again I looked like the man who fetched you to London, and spoke and dressed like him, and e’en was called Burlingame by Trent and Merriweather, and fat Ben Oliver. Moreover, suppose I had before witnesses signed the name as Burlingame was wont to sign it. Then suppose one day I swore I was not Burlingame at all, nor knew aught of his whereabouts, but only a clever actor who had got the knack of aping signatures, and had passed myself as Henry for a lark.”
“Thy suppositions dizzy me!” Ebenezer cried.
“However strong your convictions,” Burlingame went on, “you’d ne’er have proof that I was he.”
“I must own that’s true, though it pains me.”
“Now another case—”
“Keep thy case, I beg you!” Ebenezer said. “I am cased from head to toe.”
“Nay, ’tis to the point. Suppose today I’d claimed to be Burlingame, for all my alteration, and composed a line to fit your quatrain—nay, a whole life story—which did not match your own recollection; and when you questioned it, suppose I’d challenged your own identity, and made you out to be the clever impostor. At best you’d have no proof, would you now?”
“I grant I would not,” Ebenezer admitted. “Save my own certainty. But it strikes me the burden of proof would rest with you.”
“In that case, yes. But I said at best. If I had learned aught of your past, however, the discrepancies could be charged to your own poor posing, and if further I produced someone very like you in appearance, ’tis very possible the burden of proof would be on you. And if I brought a few of your friends in on the game, or even old Andrew and your sister, to disclaim you, I’ll wager even you would doubt your authenticity.”
“Mercy, mercy!” Ebenezer cried. “No more of these tenuous hypotheses, lest I lose my wits! I am satisfied thou’rt Henry; I swear to thee I am Ebenezer, and there’s an end on’t! Such casuistical speculations lead only to the Pit.”
“True enough,” Burlingame said good-humoredly. “I wished only to establish that all assertions of thee and me, e’en to oneself, are acts of faith, impossible to verify.”
“I grant it; I grant it. ’Tis established like the—” He waved his hand uncertainly. “Marry, your discourse hath robbed me of similes: I know of naught immutable and sure!”
“ ’Tis the first step on the road to Heaven,” Burlingame smiled.
“That may be,” Ebenezer said, “or haply ’tis the road to Hell.”
Burlingame cocked his eyebrows. “ ’Tis the same road, or good Dante is a liar. Thou’rt quite content that I am Burlingame?”
“Quite, I swear’t!”
“And thou’rt Ebenezer?”
“I never doubted it; and still thy pupil, as this carriage ride hath shown.”
“Good. Another time I’ll ask you what me and thee refer to, but not now.”
“No, i’faith, not now, for I’ve a thousand things to ask of you!”
“And I to tell,” Burlingame said. “But so fantastic a tale it is, my first concern is for thy credulity, and thus I deemed necessary all this Sophistical discourse.”
Not long afterwards the carriage stopped at Aldershot, for it was well past suppertime, and the travelers had not eaten. Burlingame, therefore, as was his habit, postponed all further conversation on the subject while he and Ebenezer dined on cold capon and potatoes. Afterwards, having been informed by their driver that there would be a two-hour wait for the horses and driver which would take them on to Salisbury, Exeter, and Plymouth, they took seats before the fire, at Burlingame’s suggestion, with their pipes and a quart of Bristol sherry. It had grown dark outside; a light rain began to fall. Ebenezer waited impatiently for his friend to begin, but Burlingame, when his pipe was lighted and his glass filled, sighed a comfortable sigh and asked merely, “How fares your father these days, Eben?”
4
The Laureate Hears the Tale of Burlingame’s Late Adventures
“FATHER BE DAMNED!” Ebenezer cried. “I know not whether he lives or dies, nor greatly care till I’ve heard your story!”
“Yet you know who he is, alive or dead, do you not? And in that respect, if not some others, who you are.”
“Pray let us dismiss old Andrew for the nonce,” Ebenezer pleaded, “as he hath dismissed me. Where have you been, and what done and seen? Wherefore the name Peter Sayer, and your wondrous alterations? Commence the tale, and a fig for old Andrew!”
“How dismiss him?” Burlingame asked. “ ’Twas he commenced my story, what time he dismissed me.”
“What? Is’t that nonsense over Anna you refer to? How doth it bear upon your tale?”
“What towering wrath!” Burlingame said. “What murtherous alarm! I’God, the hate he bore me—I am awed by’t even yet!”
“I’ve ne’er excused him for it,” Ebenezer said shortly.
“Your privilege, as his son. But I, Eben, I excused him on the instant; forgave him—nay, e’en admired him for’t. Had he made to slay me—ah, well, but no matter.”
Ebenezer shook his head. “ ’Tis past my understanding. But say, must I give up hope of hearing your tale?”
“Thou’rt hearing it,” Burlingame declared. “ ’Tis the pier whereon the entire history rests; the lute-work that ushers in the song.”
“So be’t. But I fear me ’twill be a tadpole of a history, whose head is greater than his body. You forgave him, then?”
“More, I loved him for’t, and scur
ried off in shame.”
“Yet ’twas a false and vicious charge he charged you!”
Burlingame shrugged. “As for that, ’twas not his justice awed me, but his great concern for his child.”
“A marvelous concern he bears us, right enough,” Ebenezer said. “He will wreck us with his concern! Suppose he’d birched her bloody, as you told me once he threatened: would you not adore and worship such concern?”
“I would kill him for’t,” Burlingame replied, “but love him none the less.”
“Marry, thou’rt come a wondrous way from London, where I left you! Why did you not applaud my resolution to go home with Anna, seeing ’twas pure filial solicitude that prompted it?”
“You mistake me,” Burlingame said. “I’d oppose it still, and Anna’s bending to his every humor. Were I his son I’d be disowned ere now for flying in the face of his concern; but what a priceless prize it is, Eben! What a wealthy man I’d be, to throw away such treasure! The fellow repines in bed for grief at losing you; he dictates the course of your life to make you worthy of your line! Who grieves for me, prithee, or cares a fig be I fop or philosopher? Who sets me goals to turn my back on, or values to thumb my nose at? In fine, sir, what business have I in the world, what place to flee from, what credentials to despise? Had I a home I’d likely leave it; a family alive or dead I’d likely scorn it, and wander a stranger in alien towns. But what a burden and despair to be a stranger to the world at large, and have no link with history! ’Tis as if I’d sprung de novo like a maggot out of meat, or dropped from the sky. Had I the tongue of angels I ne’er could tell you what a loneliness it is!”
“I cannot fathom it,” Ebenezer declared. “Is this the man that stood in Thames Street praising Heav’n he knew naught of his forebears?”
“ ’Twas a desperate speech”—Burlingame smiled—“like a pauper’s diatribe on the sinfulness of wealth. When the twain of you had gone I felt my loneliness as ne’er before, and thought long of Captain Salmon and gentle Melissa that raised me. Do you recall that day in Cambridge when you asked me how I came to be called Henry Burlingame the Third?”
“Aye, and you replied ’twas the name you’d borne from birth.”
“I spent some hours grousing in my chamber,” Burlingame said, “and at length I came to see this pompous name of mine as the most precious thing I owned. Who bestowed it on me? Wherefore Burlingame Third, and not just Burlingame?”
“ ’Sheart, I see your meaning!” Ebenezer said. “ ’Tis your name that links you with your forebears; thou’rt not wholly ex nihilo after all! ’Tis a kind of clue to the riddle!”
Burlingame nodded. “And did I not profess to be a scholar?” He refilled his glass with Bristol sherry. “Then and there I made myself a vow,” he said, “to learn the name and nature of my father, the circumstances of my birth, and haply the place and manner of his death; nor would I value any business higher, but ransack the very planet in my quest till I had found my answer or died a-searching. And search I have—i’faith!—these seven years. ’Tis the one business of my life.”
“Then marry, I must hear the tale of’t, that I’ve waited for too long already. Drink off your sherry and commence, nor will I stand for interruption till the tale be done.”
“As you wish,” Burlingame said. He drank the wine and filled his pipe besides, and told the following story:
“How should a man discover the history of his parentage when he knows not whence he came or how, or even whether the name he bears hath any authenticity? For think not I was blind to’t, Eben, that my one hope might be a false one: what evidence had I ’twas not some jest or happenstance, this name of mine, or perchance some other guardians, that nursed me up from infancy till Captain Salmon chanced along? It wants but pluck to vow to build a bridge, yet pluck will never build it. I cast about me for a first step, and betook myself at last to Bristol, where I thought perchance to find some that knew at least my Captain and recalled his orphan ward—and privily, I’ll own, I prayed to meet some old and trusted friend of his, or kin, that might know the full story of my origin. ’Twas not unthinkable he might have told the tale, I reasoned, if not broadcast then at least to one or two, unless there was some mighty sin about it.”
Ebenezer frowned. “Such as what? The man you’ve pictured me ne’er could stoop to kidnaping.”
Burlingame pursed his lips and raised and let fall bis hands. “He had no children, to my knowledge, and the yen for sons can drive a man and woman far. Moreover, ’twould be no great matter to achieve: Many’s the anchor that’s dropped at dusk and weighed ere the sun comes up. Yet ’twas not kidnaping I mainly thought of, though I would not rule it out—more likely, if he came by me improperly, ’twas that he’d got me on some mistress in a port of call.”
“Nay,” said Ebenezer. “I have indeed read that the sailor is a great philanderer, even at times a bigamist, by reason of his occupation, but Captain Salmon, as I picture him, had neither the youth nor the temper for such folly, the less so far that he was no common sailor, but master of a vessel. ’Twere as unlike such a man to saddle himself with a bastard as ’twould be for Solomon to prattle nonsense or a Jew to strike fair bargains.”
Burlingame smiled. “Which is but to say, ’tis not out of the question. Follow Horace if you will when making verse—flebilis Ino, perfidus Ixion, and the rest—but think not actual folk are e’er so simple. Many’s the Jew hath lost his shirt, and saint that hath in private leaped his houseboy. A covetous man may be generous on occasion, and Even an emmet may seek revenge. Again, though ’twere unlike Captain Salmon to sow wild oats, ’twere not at all unlike him, if his own plot would not bear, to seek a-purpose a field more fruitful. Melissa may even have pressed him to.”
“A wife incite her husband to be unfaithful?”
“ ’Twere no breach of faith, methinks, in such a case. Howbeit, no matter: in the first place I thought it most likely he came by me in no such sinister fashion, but simply took him in an orphan babe as any man might who hath a Christian heart; in the second, I cared not a straw for the manner of my getting so I could but discover it and my getter.”
“And did you?”
Burlingame shook his head. “I found three or four old people that had known Salmon and remembered his ungrateful charge: one told me, when I revealed my name, ’twas grief at my loss killed the Captain, and grief o’er his killed Melissa. I yearn to credit that story, for fear my conscience might accuse me else of fleeing such an awful responsibility; yet there is a temper wont to twist the past into a theater-piece, mistake the reasonable for the historical, and sit like Rhadamanthus in everlasting judgment. This man, I tell you reluctantly, was of that temper. In any case none knew aught of my origin save that Captain Salmon had fetched me home from somewhere, on his vessel. I asked then, who was the Captain’s closest friend, and who Melissa’s? And each of the men among them claimed to be the former, and each of the women the latter. Finally I asked whether any remembered who was the mate on Salmon’s ship in those days; but Bristol is a busy port, where men change ships from voyage to voyage, and ’tis unlikely they’d have known were’t but one year before instead of thirty. Yet as often happens, in asking someone else, I hit on the answer myself, or if not the answer at least a fresh hope: a man called Richard Hill had been first mate on all five voyages I had made with Captain Salmon, and ’twas my impression, more from their manner with each other than from any plain statement, that he and the Captain were shipmates of some years’ standing. ’Twas not impossible he’d been mate on that voyage ten years before, though ’twas a long chance; and if indeed he’d been, why, ’twas certain he’d know more than I about the matter. Of course, for aught I knew, this Hill might be long dead, or finding him as hard a matter as finding my father—”
“I grant you, I grant you!” Ebenezer broke in. “Prithee trust me to appreciate your obstacles without enumeration, save such as advance the story, and tell me quickly whether you overcame them. Did you find this Hill
fellow? And had he aught to tell you?”
“You must attend the how of’t,” Burlingame said; “else thou’rt as much a Boeotian as he that reads the Iliad no farther than the invocation, where the end of’t all is plainly told. As’t happened, none of my informants recalled for certain this Richard Hill, but two of them, who still were wont to stroll about the wharves, declared there was a Richard Hill in the tobacco fleet. Yet, though he sometimes called at Bristol, they told me he was no Bristolman, nor even an Englishman, but either a Marylander or a Virginian; nor was he a mate, but captain of his own vessel.
“This I took as good news rather than bad. When I had satisfied myself that neither Captain Hill nor farther news of him was to be found in Bristol at that time, I hastened back to London.”
“Not to the plantations?” Ebenezer asked, feigning disappointment. “ ’Tis unlike you, Henry!”
“Nay, I was ready enough to sail for America,” Burlingame replied, “but ’Tis wiser to ask at the carriage-house than to chase off down the road. London is the very liver and lights of the sot-weed trade; it took but half a day there to learn that Captain Hill was in fact a Marylander, from Anne Arundel County, and master of the ship Hope, which lay at that very moment in the Thames with other vessels of the fleet, discharging her cargo. I fairly ran down to the wharf where she lay and with some difficulty (for I had no money) contrived an interview with Captain Hill. But I had no need to ask my great question, for immediately upon hearing my name he enquired whether I was Avery Salmon’s boy, that had jumped ship in Liverpool. When we had done shaking our heads at my youthful folly and singing the praises of Captain Salmon (who, however, he told me had died of tumors and not grief), I told him the purpose of my visit and besought him to give me any information he might have on that head.
“ ‘Why,’ he declared, ‘I was not Avery’s mate in those days, Henry. I know what there is to know of’t, and no more.’
“ ‘And prithee what is that?’