The Far Arena

by Richard Ben Sapir

  'I realize now we should have had a few centuries and millions of dollars. Pugilists might have been better. Yet the man seemed so fast’ said Lewus.

  'Useless’ I said.

  'Just a moment’ said Olava, addressing Lewus. 'How did you expect to keep this secret forever?'

  'He didn't have to, woman/1 said. 'He only needed time until the proper donatives were given to the proper officials of the nations in which the oil was.'

  'I don't know about bribes’ said Lewus. 'I've heard of other companies but not us.'

  'Of course you have. If one person does it, everyone must. You have to provide monies just not to be hurt by others. A bribe is a loose thread pulled out of a cloth. Once you get one, others must do it also, and only a rare public official fights determinedly against his own wealth.Your latifundium had to do it, Lewus, if anyone did it.' .

  'Yes. Our goodwill ambassador going from country to country. He was the head of our latifundium.'

  ‘I had Demosthenes. Ah, was I lucky to have him. What he could do with the sort of secret advantage you have. He was a good slave, but he had a bad master. Me.'

  'What about the authorities?' said Olava.

  'Whom do you think we talk of?' I said. For she did not understand still. I pointed to the seclusion of the house. I pointed to the stock of supplies. To the rooms we had. Everything Lewus had done was to get us here, I tried to explain.

  Upon this, Lewus rose and went to one of the rooms, returning with a statue of a little boy urinating.

  Semyonus looked to Olava. He was embarrassed.

  Looking at the statue, from what 1 gathered, Lewus used it as proof that he had planned this all well, even to this object, which I then realized belonged to Semyonus.

  'Where did you dig it up?' I asked, and Olava explained something at length to Semyonus.

  'She's telling him,' said Lewus, 'that you think the statue is ancient. He thinks it's a new thing, even though you had statues like that. She says not everything in Rome was in good taste.'

  'We didn't have the hat. It is a cute statue, don't you think?' I said.

  Semyonus showed how it urinated a dark drink, which was the unwatered wine of the barbarians. I had heard of stories of wine like that, distilled so that human stomachs could not tolerate it, and only the coarser intestines of the Germans could down it. Yet Semyonus seemed civilized and, in truth, an intestine was an intestine. I had seen many.

  'And the purpose of that?' she said pointing to the statue.

  Semyonus gave the hat another tap.

  I nodded approval. It was good to see something I recognized again.

  'The purpose of the statue, Olava, is to show everything had been arranged,' said Lewus. 'I understand you arranged it. I understand that. I am beginning to understand very peculiar behaviour. But I do not understand what this has to do with the authorities,' said Olava. ‘I cannot believe complicity of everyone.'

  And still she did not understand, although the woman had a good mind, except when she wilfully refused to use it. And I explained again about vast wealth, about responsibilities of governments, about people who make decisions, and about how, when there is a great amount of wealth depending on cooperation, then all men are friends.

  This is not the politics of the arena, Eugeni. Two thousand years have passed. It is a long time. A very long time. While we still have corruption, there are some things that cannot be bribed for.'

  And again the woman threatened revelations to authorities, and said she would not be surprised if Lewus's own company would be very interested in this information and peculiar behaviour. Lewus pointed to the modern weapon.

  They gave me that,' he said.

  'Why?'asked Olava.

  'I don't know,' said Lewus.

  'Because they are close to making their arrangements for the valuable materials,' I said, ‘I don't understand,' said Lewus. it is complicated.' 'I'm not a fool.'

  ‘I never said you were, Lewus, but you certainly have run your life into a tangle.'

  ‘I have. All I wanted was to retire with the guaranteed salary they give people when they retire from latifundia. And now this. But you are worse, Eugeni. You were rich.'

  'Don't you dare call Eugeni "worse"', said Olava, who for all her gravity and strength now reminded me of my old talkative acquaintance, Publius. Perhaps it was her tone that reminded me of Publius talking to the lanista, telling him how he should address me.

  'Why did they give me the weapon?' he asked again. 'Do you think it was to kill you?' 'And possibly these,' I said pointing to Olava and Semyonus.

  'If you had to. Only if it would give them time. Perhaps it would be just me. Whatever they would need.'

  'Am I in the wrong job!' said Lewus, shaking his head sadly.

  'It is not your fault. It is theirs. I would wager they often assigned people to things that were beyond them. Why did they choose you? What foolishness was it?'

  'I was there.'

  'So often the reason, so often the disaster.'

  'I can't believe this,' said Olava. And then Semyonus said that he would inform his embassy, which had relations with this country we were in.

  'Have you been translating, Olava?' I demanded to know angrily.

  'Yes. Almost everything for Semyonus.'

  'Then how can he be that stupid? There is a great amount of wealth here. Why don't you understand that your masters work together? You are working with Lewus, by your masters' permission.'

  'Not to kill people,' said Olava.

  'No. That is left to the idiot Lewus, who has left his arena and found he does not belong out of it.'

  Olava was quiet. She mentioned that she was not familiar with some workings of large organizations. She translated for Semyonus. He pressed the hat and the boy gave him the strong, brown wine. I looked outside at the young afternoon, with the trees and the very blue sky, and I was sad beyond reason. I was more a slave now than I had ever been even on the latifundium. Not to have any place you want to go is the greatest manacle of all.

  The house smelled of fruits in bowls, and there was a sharp odour of recent soaps upon the wood. I found myself leaning back in the chair, expecting the back to be there now, and I became sadder still.

  The three of them did not know what to do. Lewus mentioned that all of this meant only a small amount of money to his latifundium, and he said it as though that were something illogical. Obviously he had once believed bis life was more important to his latifundium than their profit. On that silliness I did not answer him.

  'How did it get this far?' he asked again.

  'It was always this far. It is like a flawed statue. There are pits and cracks that are rilled by wax and never noticed until heat is applied. Most often they escape heat forever. Yet the flaws are still there.'

  'Who would have known?' said Lewus.

  'Most people do not know themselves, let alone their masters.'

  Lewus pointed to me and laughed. 'For someone as smart as you, you are the biggest fool idiot I have ever had the honour to meet in my life. Hello, idiot.'

  'Hello, idiot,' I said, and in his manner of greetings with clenched hands.

  'Hello, idiot,' he said.

  Olava protested the name calling. She wanted to know how I could pleasantly go ahead with a conversation with a man who had deceived everyone here and had entertained the possibility of killing me, and whose machinations had led to the death of the bad gladiator in the kitchen, which was a crime that would have to be contested -I being the accused - although it was manifestly clear who the guilty party was. All this was said glowering at Lewus.

  twenty seven

  They could not decide on what to do with me. There were many accusations against Lewus for deceiving them about his intentions and his knowledge of my language. When the accusations reached the level of full throat and became overwhelming in their annoyance, I stood between all of them. Lewus drinking, Semyonus drawing smoke into his mouth from a tube which fouled the air, and Olava, e
ver disciplined, sitting erect on the edge of a chair, needing neither drink nor food nor rest.

  'You two blame Lewus because you are afraid of your real problem,' I said.

  Lewus laughed uproariously, his massive orange-haired head bellowing to the ceiling. He had been quaffing great quantities of his beer, making the goblets seem like drops to his throat.

  'And you, Lewus, let them, because you also cannot do what you must do.'

  And Lewus asked what that was, as did Olava and Semyonus, the physician.

  'You must decide what to do with me, and you cannot. None of you is capable of making that decision.' Olava denied this.

  'You should be in a place conducive to your health and well-being,’ she said. 'And that is?'

  'At this point we will have to work on that,' she said. 'Because you don't know, woman.'

  'And Semyonus says you should be happy: in a place that would make you happy.'

  'I was, until he disturbed it,' I said, pointing to Lewus, 'and he performed his genius,' I said, pointing to Semyonus the physician.

  'We will find a way. We will first take care of you, Eugeni, and then pursue the proper legal things and notify the authorities,' said Olava.

  "The authorities? The authorities?' I laughed. 'Why is it people think the authorities are some form of gods with, either great justice or great, cunning evil, rather than the same plodding fools they see in their daily lives, and most of all in their mirrors? What is the matter with you people ? Authorities are people. They are like seeds and latifundia and every living thing. Every thing living serves itself. The purpose of an authority is to remain an authority, not dispense justice.'

  They will do the proper thing. Eugeni. There are people who do what is right.'

  'When it serves them,' I said. 'Only if the proper thing helps them survive.'

  Semyonus and Olava disagreed, but Lewus was deeply quiet.

  I told them what I told my son about the fruit, and how it made sweet meat, not for our pleasure, but for its seeds, and we only interrupt it

  'I can see how you would be cynical, Eugeni,' said Olava, but I did not let her finish.

  'What is the matter with you people ? We came here in a chariot that runs on fuel. I am told flying machines run on fuel, the lights above run on fuel. Everyone uses it Its discovery is so secret and of such enormous wealth in a land where people are not executed that Lewus, the server of the god Science, finds himself with a weapon to execute someone. He doesn't even know who. And your cult, Olava, and your wonderful government, Semyonus, give you so easily to this man, and you turn around and blithely tell me you will report this to the authorities. Who do you think the authorities are?'

  Olava said her cult would never endorse killing. Semyonus said the same for his government.

  'In previous times,' said Lewus. 'Olava's church has ordered people killed, and Semyonus's government now does it. You should know that. I am not the only person with a sin.'

  'You think I needed to be told these things, Lewus?' I said.

  "There was a bad period in my church when men did evil things,' said Olava.

  "They did what they thought served their interests, those deeds now not serving yours, woman.'

  Olava bit her reply short. Her kindness was like a cloak of stones to a swimmer. It reminded me of myself, of the me who always thought he had controlled events more than most men and was now so controlled as to be exhibited as less than an animal in the arena. For an animal will be allowed to fight. I was not even allowed that

  'You don't know what to do because you don't know yourselves,' I said. 'And by that I mean what is valuable to you. Right now, I vote for the grave, to which I tried to return, but could not overcome a too-well-trained lust for life. You, Olava, talk of Lewus's sins because if you dwell on that, you can delay deciding what happens to me after that'

  'You are right, Eugeni,' she said, clean and courageous as ever, 'for to admit a flaw in crisis requires enough strength to know the rest of you will not follow to the depths.'

  'And the same for all of you. This crisis now confronting you -a fine performance that is by some quirk of time now called a crime - has put before you what I had to face by my quirk in the arena. The world is coming down on all of you. What do you want to save? I was lucky. I had my loves. For most people those decisions are never made, the grave ending the debate before it begins. But not for you.'

  'You were lucky,' said Lewus, 'and Semyonus says so too, but I think you are wrong, gladiator.'

  'How?'

  'About you. Your time of decision was not running from the arena, for those are the immediate problems of life whose answers are apparent. You cannot tell me, gladiator, that running for your life is a decision.'

  And I laughed. For he was right.

  'Your decision was whether you would kill Publius, and you made the wrong one. I think.'

  'There is nothing to think about. It was wrong. I know why I did it, but it was still wrong. I said no to many things that day when I said no to Rome. I said who I was. I was Lucius Aurelius Eugenianiis and how dare they put this piece of trivial nonsense beneath my sword for their imaginations. They never knew how really good I was, because they wanted their dreams satisfied. Only a few knew, and I served the mobs. They did not know my mother, who was a good woman, and better than all of them. She would never, for someone else's approval, signal my death, as Publius' mother did his. Neither would Miriamne.

  'My mother was beaten in the fields when they hauled me away in chains. They had to beat her cries out of her. My mother, who was so unimportant she did not even have a name in a bill of sale, was better than all of them. I was ashamed of her. Yes, I admit it. I was ashamed of her because she was beaten.

  'That day, my last day in the arena, the horrendous day, I was proud of my mother. I was proud of me. I was proud of Miriamne, whom I loved and love today, strong as the day I left her. I, the only one with memory of her, love her this day as I did in my last thoughts in the German Sea. As I did Petronius at the German Sea.

  'For I confess to you now, as a child I did not hate those who beat my mother, but in a way hated her for making me ashamed she was beaten. I was sorry. But am sorry no longer.'

  In hot tears, I took my blade and threw it quivering into the wooden floor as I had thrown it into the sand. 'No,' I screamed. 'No.'

  And if Rome could not hear it, that was all right. They had not heard what I was saying when I said it. That was why they had to find so many reasons for why I did what I did.

  'Semyonus says,' said Olava, 'that now he believes in his form of government more than ever. For his government, he says, has freed the masses from slavery.'

  'Masses?' I asked.

  'The lower classes, the bulk of people,' said Olava.

  'If that is some form of advanced government, we are back on the latifundia. For that is how my mother was treated. You call people "masses" when you treat them as a lump, as a hundred slaves more or less, as an army if you will. Nobody ever knew a mass or loved a mass or even paid the respect of hating a mass. In a small way, being treated as the Roman given to you, I have suffered my personhood going, a living death adding to my great sadness. An emperor looks upon his lower classes as a mass, a patrician looks upon his latifundium slaves as such, for his house slaves usually have names.'

  'Semyonus says you do not understand. He is part of the masses.'

  'If he has a name, he is not. If he is human, he is not. That is the convenient lie he tells himself. I have been wrong. All of you can continue your self-deceptions; this crisis just makes them a little bit more difficult to sustain. However, with perseverance, you can keep them comfortably to the graves and never pay the price.'

  As was natural, Olava, the strong one, spoke first:

  ‘My self-deception - my lie - was that I loved a language so much that I feared losing my soul. It was not the language I loved so much as it was escaping from the world my Dominus, my God, had given me. I liked my world better than H
is.'

  As was natural, Semyonus did not know what I was talking about, which meant he had chosen the warm, easy way. But Lewus with a great sob in his big body, gave himself to tears.

  And thus the three of them began talking with an open heart I had never seen between them before. They did not invite me into this but talked deep into darkness outside, as I watched. My blade upright from the floor stuck solid between them all, as if they all shared it.

  When I tried to interrupt. Olava answered that all three were serving themselves and their interests and that it was not my concern.

  'With you three, it is my concern,' I said.

  I dozed and was roughly awakened by Semyonus. His eyes were ringed with red, for he too had been crying. Of all of them, Olava was without tears; rather, her grim determination was even more grim.

  'We have all decided what we will do,' said Olava. 'We have decided that we want you to know what we have done, and who we are.'

  'I know.'

  'No, you don't,' she said

  'I understand the machinations of your masters better than you.'

  'To a degree, yes. But we are talking of what we are. We want you to know that none of us thinks those we serve are evil. Semyonus believes his government is the great hope of what governments can be and is on a road towards that. Lewus points to his latifundium as enabling man not to be a pack animal and to live past thirty years. I believe my cult is the path that everyone should take, for the one right destiny for every man, and that is God, my God, whom 1 believe is the God for all. This we want you to know because we do not hate whom we serve.'