The Wazir and the Witch

by Hugh Cook

  ‘My cockroach,’ said the plaintive Shabble. ‘Won’t anyone help me with my cockroach?’

  Not having any desire to be turned inside out by a wrathful Crab, Uckermark seized his opportunity to escape:

  ‘All right, my friend,’ said Uckermark. ‘Let’s go and see this cockroach of yours.’

  Then he looked at Yilda. And she, realizing the reasons for Uckermark’s decision, made her apologies to her Empress and followed her mate and the free-floating Shabble.

  ‘So,’ said the Empress Justina, ‘it seems my people wish to desert me. Very well! Be gone, the lot of you! Off you go! Now! Vanish!’

  Thus spoke Justina, driving her people from her despite their protests. She too had realized that the Crab was on the verge of doing something unfortunate.

  Once the crowd had left, the Crab seemed to calm down a little. At least it stopped claw-crunching. So Justina ventured to say:

  ‘All I’m asking is a very little favour. I’m asking you to bring Dui Tin Char into line, that’s all.’

  ‘I am no longer interested in your politics,’ said the Crab. ‘If you haven’t paid your taxes that’s your problem, not mine.’

  ‘But I’m the Empress!’ protested Justina. ‘I don’t have to pay taxes.’

  ‘I have heard that legal opinion is divided on the matter,’ said the Crab. ‘In any case, I am no longer interested. Go away, leave me alone.’

  Further argument convinced Justina that this entity was speaking the truth. The Hermit Crab had entered one of those deep depressions to which it was prone; it wished nothing more than to be left alone and in peace. Justina did her best to rouse the Crab’s interest, appealing to its pride, curiosity, vanity and fear, to its philanthropic inclinations and its desire for human fellowship. All to no avail.

  For many millennia, the Crab had pursued a policy of quietism; it seldom intervened in human politics, which it had found singularly unrewarding, for the greatest labours in that field of endeavour are likely to be undone overnight by the thoughtless violence of the mob or the cunning machinations of unscupulous power-seekers. Justina was battling against habits deeply entrenched over the centuries, and she was losing. At last the Empress Justina withdrew in confusion.

  ‘Well?’ said Log Jaris, when the Empress met up with her expeditionary force at the steps of the Analytical Institute.

  ‘It’s no good,’ said Justina. ‘The Crab won’t help us.’

  Then she looked around and said:

  ‘Where’s Uckermark? And Yilda?’

  ‘Still with Shabble,’ said Odolo. ‘And Shabble’s cockroach.’

  ‘That Shabble!’ said the Empress. ‘Can Shabble help us?’

  ‘Shabble,’ said Odolo, ‘is notoriously difficult to work with. But I suggest we ... I suggest we work on the problem.’

  CHAPTER FIVE

  In the days that followed, the Empress Justina and the conjuror Odolo did work very hard on the problem of converting Shabble to their cause; but unexpected difficulties supervened, and their best efforts met with failure.

  Then the Empress Justina despaired of her life.

  She had virtually no power of any description at her disposal, and the power of her enemies was great. At the moment, her enemies feared her to be protected by the Crab. That fear was restraining them. But the illusion of such protection surely could not be maintained for ever.

  While Justina did truly despair, this condition did not last long, for the Empress was possessed of a strong streak of constitutional optimism. After a secret conference with Log Jaris, Dardanalti and other advisers, she initiated an extremely dangerous strategy, risking the total destruction of Injiltaprajura.

  Justina Thrug said nothing directly to Tin Char, and refused to speak to the head of the Inland Revenue when he asked for an audience so they could discuss ‘the matter of your unpaid taxes’.

  While Dui Tin Char tried to persuade his allies to launch a direct assault on the pink palace, Justina arranged for the Crab to be tormented most unmercifully. At her instigation, parties of school children toured the island of Jod, with a visit to the lair of the Crab being the highpoint on their itinerary. Since the Crab was known to have an aversion to bells, Justina arranged for a bell-swinging ghost to walk that island thrice nightly. As the Crab was a dedicated gourmet, its personal chef - the eminent Pelagius Zozimus - was poisoned with opium then kidnapped, and held incommunicado in a helpless drug stupor.

  If there was one person who possessed a degree of empathy with the Crab, one person who could possibly be thought of as a friend of that entity, then that was the Ebrell Islander Chegory Guy. But Justina removed young Chegory from the Crab’s presence by the simple expedient of commanding him to her bed then keeping him there. Chegory’s abrupt disappearance left the delectable Olivia Qasaba quite hysterical. She retired to the Dromdanjerie, where she took to her bed and wept as if the world were ending.

  That left the Crab completely alone in the world.

  Meanwhile, Justina arranged for a series of conflicting rumours and ambiguous documents (variously marked SECRET, TOP SECRET, MOST URGENTLY SECRET, EYES ONLY, BURN AFTER READING and BURN UNREAD) to be leaked to Dui Tin Char. She then told her sister Theodora (in the greatest confidence) that the Crab planned to boil Tin Char alive when the Trade Fleet arrived, and was only permitting him to live so he would still be available for this ceremony. As Justina had expected, this intelligence was common knowledge in less than three days.

  Naturally, Dui Tin Char took fright at this intelligence.

  But Tin Char was no coward, and hence did not commandeer a canoe and flee from Untunchilamon forthwith.

  So what were his other options?

  He could have sat tight and done nothing.

  Had he done so, then a messenger would have arrived bearing a summons (ostensibly from the aforesaid Crab) commanding Tin Char to the presence of that dignitary, thus precipitating a confrontation between two great Powers.

  As it happened, no such subterfuge was necessary. For Tin Char was true to his courage. He thought Justina Thrug might be feeding him lies in an effort to scare him off Untunchilamon; so, taking his life in his hands, he went to the island where the Hermit Crab dwelt, meaning to ask that dignitary what the truth was.

  Justina had expected as much.

  The timing was perfect.

  By the time Dui Tin Char ventured to Jod, the Crab was in the worst of moods imaginable. Its companions had deserted it; in place of gourmet meals it was being fed buckets of slops; its sleep had been disturbed nightly by bells; it had been brought close to murder by the attentions of giggling schoolchildren.

  When Tin Char arrived, the Crab refused to communicate with the head of the Inland Revenue. That courageous individual continued to pester the continent one. The Crab told Tin Char to go away, for such importunate attentions were unwelcome in the extreme. Tin Char did not go away. The Crab lost its temper.

  The Crab did not turn Tin Char inside out. (To Justina’s great disappointment. She had been certain that this would be the minimum misfortune which would befall her enemy.) Instead, the Crab merely exerted a fraction of its power, causing Tin Char to be set upon his backside. Then, as the head of the Inland Revenue staggered to his feet, the Crab caused Tin Char’s arms to be forced backwards and upwards.

  Until both shoulders were dislocated.

  At that, Tin Char fled the island. Or, to put it more precisely, he staggered over the harbour bridge which led from the island of Jod to the mainland of Untunchilamon, and was carried from there to the Temple of Torture.

  Tin Char then gave urgent orders, and the contents of the treasure (minus certain irretrievable bribes which had been paid out to Justina’s soldiery) were returned to the pink palace forthwith.

  This incident had a very salutary effect, for it led most people on Untunchilamon to believe that Justina Thrug truly did have the Crab on her side. Respect for her increased enormously. But Justina and her trusted advisers knew the dreadful trut
h. The Crab’s brief-lived interest in the politics of Injiltaprajura had ceased; it was no longer an ally but a neutral power. If this secret were to get out, then Tin Char would surely have no hesitation in slaughtering Justina immediately.

  However, at least Justina once again had her money.

  At least she could still hope to bribe her soldiers when the time came to seize her dozen ships.

  But, for the moment, there were not a dozen ships to seize. There were only the same three, the three which had sat in the Laitemata throughout Fistavlir. And, as the days went by and no new ships manifested themselves, Justina began to consider a dreadful possibility: what if, this year of all years, the Trade Fleet never came?

  The Empress Justina was not the only one considering dreadful possibilities. The Hermit Crab had dislocated Tin Char’s shoulders. It indicated that the Crab was not pleased with him. That he could live with. But . . . what if the Crab was seriously angry with him? Tin Char brooded about the possible consequences of such anger as he lay awake at nights listening to the disconsolate drumming of a group of adolescents, the drums of their cult singing thus:

  Tok - tok - tuk. Tok - tok - tuk. Tok - tok - tukata tok. Tok - tok - tuk. Tok - tok - tuk. Tok - tok - tukata tok.

  Ah yes.

  I remember.

  Night.

  Night, hot night, with the bloodstone of Untunchilamon clotted to absolute black. The shimmering stars reflected by the sharktooth silence of the black lagoon. The hulking shadow of a ship looming dark against the doom-black waters of the Laitemata. A brief burst of hubbub as the heavy soundproof door of a speakeasy swings open. That noise abruptly silenced. No noise now but the drums. The drums throbbing through the heat.

  The heat!

  The heat of Injiltaprajura, a moist enfolding heat, a sweating embrace, smelling of armpits and coconut musk, of woodsmoke and rotting drains. A positively vaginal heat. Heat, yes, and the mosquitoes whining through deliriums of dark, and the relentless punctuation of the drums speaking of the oppressions of the present, the past and the future . . .

  CHAPTER SIX

  To know of the Crab, and to know of the Crab’s crucial role in the affairs of Injiltaprajura, is to know much. The historian believes that the ruling dynamic of those affairs has now been explicated: while Justina’s enemies believed the Crab to be on her side, they would obey her; but, once they realized that she had in fact been deprived of such protection, they would fall upon her and overwhelm her.

  Justina’s problem, then, was threefold:

  First, to maintain the illusion that she was still supported by the Crab;

  Second, to avoid death at the hands of assassins and such until the arrival of the Trade Fleet;

  Third, to seize the ships of that Fleet and thus make her escape.

  All this is very easily stated.

  Bu of course the realities are somewhat more complex, because there did not in fact exist a clear-cut division between ‘Justina Thrug and her allies’ and ‘Justina’s enemies’.

  Rather, there were many shades of political affiliation and intention within Injiltaprajura; and to explain fully the political complexities of the last days of the reign of the Empress Justina, it would be necessary for the historian to analyse the thoughts and actions of all 30,000 of the inhabitants of Injiltaprajura. Some mention might also have to be made of the interactions between those individuals and the animals which then inhabited Untun-chilamon’s capital, the said animals consisting of 1,946 monkeys, 3,101 pigs, 6,429 dogs, 10,111 snakes, 17,942 cats, 30,000 people, 246,995 vampire rats, 456,831,887 mosquitoes, and numbers of billipedes, millipedes, centipedes, scorpions and other creatures.

  When one considers the difficulties attendant upon the exercise thus suggested, one must surely allow the historian the right to generalize upon occasion. On occasion? It is more reasonable to say that generalization must be the rule, and particularization the exception; else the creation of this account will become impossible for logistic reasons alone, the historian being a mortal creature with strictly limited supplies of ink, pens and fooskin at his disposal.

  A generalization, then:

  It was a quiet, peaceful day on Untunchilamon, where Frangoni was having intercourse with Dub, and Dub with Janjuladoola, and Janjuladoola with Toxteth, and Toxteth with Ashmarlan, and Ashmarlan with Slando-lin, without any sign of riot or civil disturbance.

  Even so, it was not, of course, quiet and peaceful for everyone.

  It was not, for example, peaceful for the conjuror Odolo, who was having yet another painfully frank interview with his bank manager. Nor was it quiet and peaceful for Threp Sodakik, a hapless fisherman, who was being torn to pieces by sharks in the lagoon waters just south of Island Scimitar. Others embroiled in turmoil, strife and barrat include Yilda, the mate of the corpse-master Uckermark, for Yilda was busy driving a group of teenaged drummers from her doorstep with the help of a gutting knife and a kraken club.

  As for the Princess Sabitha, why, she had been kidnapped - snatched in the streets by a group of adolescent drummers from Marthandorthan - and was being held in a captivity which she bitterly resented.

  (Do not worry. The princess will escape, even though this history will not chronicle the event; and we will meet her later in these pages, and find her aristocratic beauty unmarred and her matchless hauteur as imposing as ever.)

  Furthermore, if we were to attempt an exhaustive catalogue of those currently unquiet and unpeaceful, we would have to mention the bullman Log Jaris, who was arguing with the drug dealer Firfat Labrat about the question of alleged non-payment of certain beer-buying debts; and Ox No Zan, who was thrashing and screaming in his sleep as he endured nightmares in which Doctor Death the dentist played a prominent role; and Dolglin Chin Xter, who was struggling to stay alive as hepatitis and malaria did their best to overwhelm him; and the market gardener Pa Po Pep who was staring at a chancre on his shaft and wondering if it was syphilis (it was, and in due course he would die of it); and Dunash Labrat, who was berating his son Ham for misplacing his favourite bee-smoking pot.

  And other individuals could be mentioned, for the above list is far from complete.

  However, if the historian can be allowed a generalization:

  It was a quiet, peaceful day on Untunchilamon. It was quietest and most peaceful of all in those parts of Untunchilamon which were uninhabited; but even the most populous region of the island was tranquil and unagitated. That most populous region was of course Injiltaprajura, the city to be found (then and now) on the Laitemata Harbour at the southern end of the island.

  It was a quiet, peaceful day on Untunchilamon, and it was also hot.

  It was a hot day?

  It was a day on Untunchilamon, so what else could it have been if not hot?

  It was a hot day, and Master Ek was in a bad mood.

  But it was not the sweating humidity which had put Master Ek in a bad mood, nor the restless night occasioned by the repeated onslaughts of vampiric insects which had taken advantage of a tear in his mosquito net.

  Nor was it the drumming, the relentless drumming of the discontented adolescents of Injiltaprajura.

  Ah, the drums! The drums!

  Tok-tok-thuk! Tok-tok-thuk . . . !

  The drums!

  Tok-tok-thuk! Tok-tok-thuk . . . !

  Mesmeric pulse of monomania and menace.

  Tok-tok-thuk!Tok-tok-thuk . . . !

  The horror! The horror!

  Dui Tin Char, head of the Inland Revenue, felt the pulse of those infernal instruments in the marrow of his bones as he tried to sleep by day after a sleepless night. The bullman Log Jaris heard those drums as he (having finished his argument with the drug dealer Firfat Labrat) quit the Xtokobrokotok and stumped away through the streets of Marthandorthan. The inimitable Yilda heard those drums as she looked for blood on the kraken club she had used to such good effect; for, though she had driven a pack of drummers from her doorstep, they had not gone far, and were drumming again just around
the corner.

  Tok-tok-thuk! Tok-tok-thuk . . . !

  Tok - tok - toketa - toketa - toketa - tok!

  Will they not stop that infernal noise? Will they not—

  But enough of this atmospheric backgrounding! It is totally irrelevant to our present purpose, which is to introduce Master Ek into this history; and the reason it is irrelevant is that Nadalastabstala Banraithanchumun Ek heard those drums not at all.

  Not because he was deaf.

  But because the drums were not there to be heard.

  Not where he was.

  And where was he?

  Why, he was exactly where we would expect to find him; which is to say, he was in his house on Hojo Street, that road which follows the line of Pokra Ridge. That thoroughfare was the site of Injiltaprajura’s prime real estate. Naturally the pink palace is there. Also, Aquitaine Varazchavardan had a villa there. And a great many temples were there located. And adolescent drummers were not to be found anywhere along that road, for temples and villa-keepers alike had servants with sticks who were quite prepared to sally forth to assault any drummer should a single ‘tok - tok - tuk’ or ‘tok - tok - thuk’ be heard.

  So, while it is disappointing to have to abandon the attractively melodramatic line which we began to develop so nicely above, the historian must favour truth over drama; and the fact is that Master Ek was singularly untroubled by drums or by drummers. First, because there was none to be heard anywhere near his house. And second because, if the truth be told, Ek rather liked drums; and, when they were to be heard, Ek found their rhythms comforting rather than disturbing.

  So we must seek elsewhere for the source of Ek’s discomfort.

  After seeking elsewhere, the historian presents the world with the following datum: the proximate cause of the discontent experienced by Nadalastabstala Ban-raithanchumun Ek was the Empress Justina’s undisturbed enjoyment of life, health and liberty.