“Maybe I wasn’t a magician the last time, so I’d not have any escape.”
He regarded his palms. They rippled curiously: uncounted muscles, each as mobile as an individual soldier, each an infinitesimal hand in itself. He placed his hand flat on the floor, waited, raised it, turned it: the scarcely perceptible pucker of the palm held the paper firmly. The paper “walked” along, until it came to the junction of two fingers. It vanished between them, and then marched along the back of the hand.
Marvelous—but not magic.
And seeing his own skill, he began to fear what real magic might be. He willed for an instant, and the paper dropped.
He extended his arm. Between elbow and wrist, the wiry hair stood on end. Then the solid “goose-flesh” divided into bands, with unpuckered stretches between: and on those, the hairs lay flat.
He could almost hear someone say, yawningly, “Hi—o, mirrors and wires, but wait till you see the gal with the rhinestone gee-string…”
The knocking at the door startled Janos. That intruding sound brushed away the isolation and the tension. Once more, he heard brakes squealing in the street below, and the jangling bells of street cars, and the drone of the bombers who circled, day and night, from the nearby airfield. The Master’s presence vanished, and Janos was alone and tired and worried. He could pull anything but ten dollar bills and ham sandwiches out of the air…
He went to the door.
A ruddy little man with wide, childlike eyes was in the hall. He was old, but no one could have said how old. Nobody would care. He’d be as popular in an old soldiers’ home as in a kindergarten.
“Oh, hello, Istavan, awfully glad you’re in. I’ve been thinking of dropping in for weeks now, I thought you’d be wanting to talk to me.”
Janos was puzzled at the stranger’s amiability. There had not for months, for years, been anyone who gave a damn about Istavan Janos, Magyar magician. The only interest he had for people was in his knack of making them impatient for the strip-tease girl’s appearance, and then, his funny name. The MC always got a chuckle when he said, “Istavan means Steve, and it’s pronounced like it is spelled, if you can spell it, but J-A-N-O-S is easy to spell only you say it Yanosh, which is an old Hungarian custom. Clever chaps, these Magyars, and the full name is Istavan Maxim Zoltan J-A-N-O-S spells Yanosh, and now watch him, there’s nothing up his sleeve—”
Mockery was worse than little pay and less applause; so Janos warmed up, for here was a friend.
“Please come in, sir. Yes, indeed, I’ve wished to speak to you, but I—well, names do escape me.”
The little man winked. “That’s generally wise, too. I never use the same one twice.” For all his chubbiness, his bald spot rimmed by a hedge of mousey hair, his ruddy cheeks, the cocked head gave the illusion of a bird, one with the peculiar intentness of a falcon. “Fact is, this is the first time I’ve used this face, but I liked it right away.”
Even for an expert at cutting a blonde’s head off, passing it around to the audience, and then tacking it back on again, such patter was disconcerting. “Er—ah—I agree, sir.”
The little man chuckled. He jabbed Janos right in the center of the rumpled dress shirt. “Come, come, Istavan, don’t try to remember me, I’m the Boss Magician. Remember the cave way beyond Vladikavkaz, that night?”
“Oh.”
Janos was barely able to make that brief statement. Without going into the details of initiation, which by the way are not intended to be broadcast, the significant fact was that not even Janos, until his arrival at the cave, had been aware that it was to be the place of initiation.
Janos sighed, quaveringly, and with unsteady feet retreated to clear another chair of its load of debris. “Master—”
The Master seated himself. He cocked one knee over the other, hitched up a not too well pressed trouser leg. The cuffs were frayed. His shoes were scuffed. The soles were thin. “Istavan, I wonder if you can do me a favor.”
Janos sat there, gulping and dry-lipped. “Brother, can you spare an illusion? Stake me to some bam-and, and here’s the sword and bag trick… Lord almighty, what had magic come to?” Janos said, finally, “It depends—as you can see—”
“That’s all right,” the Master said, “you can still help me. I need your piece of True Magic. Magicians are scarce enough, and every one I’ve contacted had already used his.”
“And is having the devil’s own luck ever since?”
“Mmmm…well…the funny thing is, magicians don’t use as much sense as they might. They get sore at life, and demand idleness and comfort, and would you believe it, those who demand it, get it. Say, in a county hospital, waited on hand and foot, nicely treated, only they don’t like it but they have to put up with it. I don’t want to bore you, but their conceit and selfishness makes them use their magic for dodging work, or because of fear, or a grudge, or from vanity, not a one of them ever makes any generous use of the gift.”
“Oh, you’re referring to Black Magic.” Janos made a cutting gesture. “I’ve never been interested. Just my gift—”
“I mean just the gift, too,” the Master cut in. “You want to go back into the stream of time, and you’d be gone right now if you’d not been too much worried about the chances of picking a bad spot instead of a soft one.”
Janos sat up straight and pulled down his dingy white waistcoat.
“Mmmm…yes, Master, that’s true. But I’ve sweated and worked all my life and magicians are a…yes, dime a dozen, only you can’t even turn in a dozen of them for a war stamp.” He spread out his hands. “Now look—”
“I know, I know, they rebel, it is discouraging. You know, in one of your incarnations, you were a thief in Bagdad, marvelous hands, too, only both were chopped off for picking purses.”
Janos began to wonder. Magicians it seemed, were conceited about their superior dexterity, they did insist on hogging the spotlight, or, failing, they felt sorry for themselves. So, being open-minded, he asked, “You really want my piece of True Magic, Master?”
“Well, damn it, yes! That’s why I asked for it.”
“But—but—you’re the Master.”
“And so of course I have lots of it to give away? Just like a banker can dish out a million dollars any old time, just like an admiral can hand out a cruiser to any friend who needs a yacht, the fleet has plenty of them.”
Janos scratched his head. “You mean, there is just so much magic available, and someone has to pass up his turn, voluntarily?”
“Of course, voluntarily. I can’t take it away, it’s yours by right. And I met a fellow who needs a lift. It’s a sad case.”
Janos wiped away some sweat. “Go ahead, Master.”
“No. It is your magic. You have to use it. Proxies don’t count. Well, good luck to you, Istavan, but before I go, I want to quote you an odd saying. It goes like this: What I kept, I lost; what I spent, I kept; what I gave, I have. Doesn’t make much sense, eh. Well, good night, and lots of applause.”
He hurried out, ignoring the protests of Janos.
The whole thing seemed crazy.
It was as if the bright little man had never been there.
Then a few minutes later, Janos had his second caller: and the mere fact of two seeking his door in one evening set him on edge. He knew that his fate was shaping up, and he feared that his will would have little enough to do with the outcome, except, perhaps, make things worse than otherwise. For all the little round-faced man’s joviality, there’d been something sardonic and almost menacing about him, far more than there would have been about a Master who arrived in a column of elemental fire.
This newcomer was wild-eyed. His pupils were dilated. He wore what remained of good clothes. These were still new, but stained, torn, half destroyed from abuse. The man was an ambulance case. The reek of marijuana told Janos that this man was equal to anything that m
ight happen.
“I’m John Crane,” he announced, “and I need help before I go completely off my chump. A crazy little fellow down the street told me you’re a magician, and that’s what I need.”
Crane’s gait was erratic. The drug he had smoked had warped his timing. Janos did not know what else had been warped, so he said, in his best professional manner, “Watch, Mr. Crane—nothing in my sleeves—nothing in either hand—Ah!”
There was a gold fish bowl, with three fish swimming about.
“Now!”
A puff of smoke. The bowl vanished. In its place was a sandwich, savory, hot; and a glass of beer. “Have a bite, it’s really trout, not gold fish.”
Crane ate, and as though this were the first food in days.
Then he began coughing, violently, and fumbled for another of the foul-smelling cigarettes. “Feel—better—now—don’t know how you—made me—eat. Never thought I’d ever again eat.”
Janos brightened. The man hadn’t eaten a thing. If hot fish sandwiches were so easily arranged, Janos would have found life much simpler. Crane had chewed an illusion, and for the moment, it had pacified him; better yet, it had dimmed the dangerous light in those drug-dilated eyes.
And then Janos was sorry for Crane. While almost anyone would have been fooled by the sandwich and beer which followed the gold fish, only a hasheesh addict would have believed that he had actually eaten the illusion. Marijuana—hasheesh—a hypnotic, that is, leaves little enough to test a magician’s skill. It was not sport. To accept a hop-head’s silent wonder was unworthy of the profession.
Janos, being ashamed and sorry, said, “I am, as you see, a magician. What can I do for you, and why do you need me?”
Crane blurted it out. The horror was increased by the bald simplicity. “I was one of the merchant marine until too many weeks on a life raft made me worth nothing. Except for pushing a broom to sweep up lathe cuttings. But they paid well. And I met a girl who wasn’t afraid of me. I’m generally all right, but generally isn’t enough. She had a car. She made me drive it. So I’d make myself coordinate—whip the shakes—you see?”
Janos spread out his marvelous hands. “Yes. She was right. Make them work, they’ll obey, keep trying, trying, trying—”
He droned the words, hoping by that knack of hypnosis, part of every magician’s kit of tricks, to sell the man a fact, rather than an illusion. But Crane yelled, “Try, damn it, try? I cracked up and killed her. Can’t kill me, you understand, nothing can kill me, that’s what’s wrong, I’m the only one on the boat they didn’t kill—”
Just that simple: the world shot out from under a man, and the man wants a magician to help him! Crane and Janos were brothers for the moment.
“What can I do for you?”
“You’re a magician,” the drugged man said, simply.
“Why the hasheesh—er, the marijuana?”
Crane made a shaky-handed gesture. “It does things to Time. You know that.”
“Mmmm…yes,” Janos said, disturbed by the similarity of their needs. “It does things to Time.”
“I knew her just a week. Out of death and into death again in one week, only I am alive. But with marijuana, one second stretches into years. Do you see?”
“You kiss her again, and the illusion stretches and stretches.”
“Until it ends. But I’ve learned things. Sometimes I step right out of Time and back to the start of the week. But only for a second. I can’t stay there. You fix it so I can.”
This was one of the 1943 wizards who had hauled guns and shells and food and armies! This was one of those who faced elementals as destructive and merciless as any of those who crowded about the blue chalked pentagram and howled and clawed at barriers of olibanum smoke. This wreck was one with the bombardier who with mirrors and wires dropped a ton of TNT to flatten a block of Hamburg.
“Maybe I can do something.”
“He said you could.” Crane dug out a wad of small bills. “Here’s fourteen dollars, all I’ve got, I’ll pay you more next week.”
Janos ignored the outstretched dirty hand. Crane laid the money on the dusty table, then sat, fidgeting, staring. The drug-dilated eyes became wider and wider, as for seconds, he recaptured pieces of time. Then he yelled, shook his head.
“Got the wrong second then.”
“How’d you like to be a boy again, way, way back?”
“No. I want that week.” A crafty smile. “You see, I wouldn’t drive the car, I’d beat the game. I’d know better.”
Janos exhaled a long breath. During that sigh he had time to think, “That is what we all believe. It sounds foolish when someone else says it, but it sounded good when I thought it, and my doubts must have been buried experience, and this man hasn’t lived enough lives before this one… It’d be a shame to waste my magic, my one piece of magic on him…”
He said aloud: “Crane, I can do what you ask. But I warn you, I can do this thing only once. Not twice. Suppose you make some other mistake? Then what?”
“But I won’t! I won’t! I tell you, I won’t!”
Janos could not stand it much longer. Crane’s fierce will was winning. He had to make Crane change his wish.
“What did she do? Her work, I mean?”
“That’s why you’ve got to help me change things! She worked in—well—that’s not secret in itself—lots of women work there—no one but women can do it, and not many of them have the touch—they have to have hands—so fine—fiddling with wires thinner than hairs, fitting them, welding them, juggling bits of metal you can hardly see without a glass, they can’t use magnets, I don’t know why, but they can’t, and whatever it is they make when it’s fitted together, it’s for dropping a bomb from ten miles up and hitting a spot the size of your hat.”
Janos looked at his own hands. He understood. “Hmmmm…”
Crane went on, “It’s my fault that she’s gone, I can’t take her place, no man can, and only one woman maybe in ten thousand can even start, and not many of those can stand the gaff, it drives you wild finally unless you’re—well—special.”
This was downright painful and uncomfortable. There was no use telling the man that magic cannot change fate. However you play tricks on the stream of time, you have to go where the stream drifts you. So Janos said, “All men who live have lived before and will live again, for nothing ever dies, nothing except the memory of what you have been before. And whatever two are close together in one life, will come together again in the next.”
He remembered ancient wisdom, and he spoke solemnly, impressively, as a priest intoning a ritual: he was fighting to save his own magic, for he would have to give this man the gift, unless Crane freely dropped the demand.
“Far back when Time began,” Janos went on, “Arjuna the Pandu Prince was ready to lead an army into battle, and as he waited to give the signal, Time began to waver, and he could see what the day’s end would bring, and the knowledge horrified him, and he said to divine Krishna, who rode with him, that no battle outcome was worth the cost.
“And Krishna said: Think not that ever there was a time when all these men were not: and think not that ever there shall be a time when they shall not be: so strike, Pandu Prince!”
Silence.
Finally: “Crane, do you understand?”
“Yes, but I want that week.”
“Then get up!”
Crane obeyed.
“Step into that blue chalk star and stand still and look me in the eye and when you can move again, tell me what happened. Do you understand and believe?”
The crazy glare dimmed. The cracked voice softened. “I understand and I believe.”
The eyes became fixed.
Janos the Magician knew what to do.
He spoke without hesitation, and he gestured.
Scarcely any time passed before Cr
ane’s cry shook the room, and tore the ears. His face twisted and his eyes were wild. He was trembling from shock. He would have fallen had not Janos caught him.
“Take this!”
Crane gulped an ounce of hoarded brandy.
“Now tell me!”
Crane sank into a chair. “You been here a week?”
“Go on, tell me.”
“God, there’s no use. That week—” He glanced about him, bewilderedly, looked at himself, as if seeking bruises and cuts. “Where’s the little man—where—?”
“So you’ve been through it again?”
Crane sagged, and said, hopelessly, “You been sitting here a week, waiting, all right, you’re right, there’s no use.”
Resignation now. Seeing was believing. Trial proved the words of Janos. Crane said, calmly, accepting his fate, “I couldn’t get killed, I couldn’t save her; you’re right, pick up your dough, how much more do I owe you?”
Janos made a pass. The wadded bills seemed to stretch out, fly for his fingertips: then, new and crisp, they spiraled into Crane’s breast pocket. “Nothing more. Maybe—” A weary smile. “I owe you something. But listen, you remember what I said?”
“Yes. That nothing dies, that everything which was yesterday is today and always will be. That we are bound to the wheel, and that there is no escaping it for good or evil. And that—”
The man’s face glowed through the ravages of hasheesh and exhaustion and the hunger of one who might eat but does not want to. “And that whatever two were as close as she and I will again be as close, the next time.”
He blinked, as though startled by suddenly having become aware of his own voice and words: for he had not been speaking in the manner or voice of Crane.
Janos mopped his forehead. He had saved his magic for himself. He patted Crane on the shoulder, and said, “One thing I did not say, I say now: not only will you two meet, but it may be sooner than you think.”
The E. Hoffmann Price Fantasy & Science Fiction Page 26