Vergil in Averno: Book Two of the Vergil Magus Series

by Avram Davidson

  However. Nothing new. Half, Vergil was minded to leave and get on with things, half he waited in hopes he would by and by hear from the musicians a song, either old or new…. Vergil dearly loved a good song, or any good music e’en sans singing…. Quickly the action shifted, Priam lumbered offstage; enter his son Prince Paris, and with the Prince the Lady Helen of Troy; she was the woman who had so lightly, briefly, looked at him outside. A fine, full figure of a woman.

  Paris: Come now, my Lady Helen! Why are you so bored? I know! It must have been the damned dull life you led, wedded to that oaf Menelaus! But come with me, and I shall show you that despite the fatigues of battle I am a better man than he — et cetera, et cetera, several bawdy declarations introduced as evidence to back his claim; chuckles from almost all the seats.

  Helen: (Faces audience as she is tugged along, bedchamberward, by Paris, who, presumably deafened by passion, of course hears not one syllable) Helen: O Gods! These Trojan trolls! At least when as a chastely wedded, bedded wife I was from time to time assuaged and solaced of my boredom now and then by some good man . . . not always Menelaus, to be sure…. She rolls her eyes, laughter from below; Paris, to emphasize the efforts he is making to drag her offstage, lifts his knees high and plants his feet down exactly where they were before; more laughter; cries of “Get a move on, Prince!” and “Want some help up there?” . . . but at least there, across the wine-dark, the dolphin-torn, the gong-tormented sea . . . a full half of the audience, catching on quickly to its cue, echoes: “… dolphin-torn …” And so on with the rest of it “… one heard at least, however cloaked in darkness, now and then some words in decent Greek!” Many laughters, doubtless for many different reasons. And Paris triumphed at last, off the two went, leering and winking, and then the music began to play an epithalamion, and not at all a bad one, with muffled amorous noises and now and then a small shriek from offstage-right.

  She who played Helen, was it her full form that affected Vergil? — for affected he was — her face, fair enough? Or merely some deep and primal response to the little-or-no-nonsense, despite the nonsense, sexuality of the stage business? When had he last been in a woman’s arms? Since how long? Too long. Too long. In whose arms, in which woman’s arms would he now wish to be? Poppaea’s, came the true reply. Of beauty as determined by fashion and as delineated by the sculptor’s wedge or painter’s brush, of such Poppaea had near none. Her skin was unblemished and her large gray eyes were fine: what more? Her face was nothing memorable, not even could he entirely have said as he had heard one veteran legionary say of an eastern queen, “She was so uncommon ugly it fair hurt your teeth at first to look upon her, but my Here, boy! after one week of but standing a-guard inside her door, I’d have sold meself to sit by her feet.” Ugly, Rano’s wife was not, for all that she had a figure like an undernourished boy’s; would Vergil have sold himself to sit by her feet? One Vergil, a Citizen of Rome, no more: yes. But as P. Vergilius Marius, Master in Philosophy, and all the rest of it, who had made long journeys and endured hard studies in order to attain mastery over many things, the first of which class of things had been his own self and soul and pride and patience and over them, well … no. Much would he give, but he would not give himself to be in further thrall.

  Besides (one voice said within him now, calm as a sage in the stoa), you have your duties to those who have engaged them. Besides (one voice said, cold, and with a touch of contemptuous surprise), it would be madness even to think of an intrigue with the wife of a magnate of Averno.

  Would it?

  — what voice was that? And yet another voice said but one word. And said it often.

  Poppaea. Poppaea. Poppaea …

  And there was, at last as at first, another voice yet, which had a more simple and a more accessible message, and in the end it was to this one that he hearkened.

  • • •

  The play concluded to Helen’s ringing screams as she watched, Homeric canonical text or no Homeric canonical text, Paris being slain in combat beside the reedy river of the Trojan shore — located, conveniently, offstage-right — curtain. A moment for the audience to taste the aftertaste. And then followed what critics were fond of calling, it being after all an easy call and one that required little resort to Aristotle or others, “a knockabout farce”; this subsided into a song and dance and a collection taken up in hopes that at least a few patrons would have forgotten having paid on their way in.

  By then Vergil was backstage, “backstage” having the geographical reality of the Plain of Troy. A man, perhaps the manager, who had been leaning against the wall, whence he could see the “stage,” turned his head and looked at Vergil with the same look of contained sardonic amusement with which he had been watching the scene; merely raised his eyebrows in inquiry. “I thought,” said Vergil, “that I might be allowed to have a few words in private with the Lady Helen . . . and I should try to put them all in decent Greek.”

  The man said, briefly, “Haw!” managing to get into the one syllable all the emotions of his look; then, “I am sure she would be very pleased.” The tone was civil, even sincere; some slight glance he let show which indicated that he himself would, would some slight circumstance be different, be pleased to have a visit in private with the visitor, be this with what tongue might be; but this was as brief as the single syllable. A coin changed hands, discreetly, politely, with no change of expression on either face. Vergil found himself in a curtained cubicle. He had been in such before. Presently, in came the actress, gave him a pleasant-enough look, if a slightly appraising one.

  “You seem decent,” she said, “but you are not Greek.”

  “Neither, I trust, am I a Trojan troll.”

  The woman chuckled. Clapped her hands. In came an older one with a basin of hot water, sponge, soft and scented soap, and a few cloth-pieces worn and washed till they were soft enough to serve as towels. “Let me get this muck off,” and, proceeding to remove her stage-paint, asked, “Well, what did you think of the play?”

  Barely he hesitated. “Evocative,” he said.

  This time she laughed outright. Then she murmured to the other woman, who put upon a tray most of the items which she had brought in, and went out. The woman “Helen” placed both hands upon his shoulders. “Are you going to give me a nice present?” she asked.

  “More than one, I hope.”

  She did not laugh now. “I believe you. I trust you. We won’t haggle. We will …” A moment she paused. “We will play our own play. This time I shall really be Helen. You will really be Paris. And now we are really together.” And added, “And alone.” It had grown dark. He did not ask nor linger thinking why, but moved closer to her. And what happened next between them was nothing, really, like anything that had ever happened between him and any courtesan or trull before. What he felt was no mere assuagement of need or indigency in satisfying a simple, essential lust; what he received with her was certainly none of the imitation passion, be it perfunctory or most highly skilled, that anyone may obtain for pay; however pay be made. He had rapted her away, in what guise he could not recall, from her kingly husband’s court, though not far off the martial camp-fires gleamed; she had been briefly fearful and fear at once gave way to relief and relief to wonder and to quiet joy; now and then the scented forest breathed for them and the faint smoke ebbed away.

  He scarcely gave thought, presently, to the heated scented water and the soap and the soft cloth and the ministrations performed with them. He was hardly aware of dressing or of being dressed. He was faintly sensible that there was more light, and, this being so, he moved again toward her and bent to place a parting kiss; slightly she turned her head, one of her eyes only could he clearly see, and there was that in the corner of that eye which was not her, which was not “Helen,” whoever “Helen” really was; who was someone else: in that sole gray glint, gone as fast as it appeared, was that which told him all, yet told him nothing.

  “Poppaea,” he said, faintly. The scene somehow shif
ted. The stage was bare. He stood alone. The door was open, he saw the street outside. “Poppaea,” he said. He moved his lips. No sound came forth. His legs trembled, yet they held him up, as he moved. He would have turned, he could not have turned, he no longer wished to turn.

  And in his silent heart his voice said, as his heart beat, beat, beat: Poppaea. Poppaea. Poppaea. Poppaea.

  • • •

  Rain in Averno. It came down in drops as hot, almost, as the waters of the bath, though much less cleanly. It came down slowly, as if it had paused to embrace the smokes and stinks and to absorb a measure of the “sweet airs,” it refreshed no one and nothing, it left soot streaks and stench of sulfur. It oozed down the pitted sides of the buildings like oil and, it may be, left them even more pitted than before. It thickened the filth in the streets and turned it into a sort of paste, a black paste perhaps fit, very fit, to use upon the binding of some evil and feculent grimoire. Rain in Averno.

  Although the entire city stank notoriously, except in limited spaces for limited times, when someone had a room sprinkled with an attar from the rose-red vales beyond Ragusa, or burned opobal-samum or some similar gum in a brazier; notorious though it was that all the city stank, this area through which he now picked his way was notorious even within the city for its own evil odors: its name, Canales, offered perhaps explanation enough, though none was offered for the plural form when there was but one canal. And that one for the most part hidden from sight by the moidering, bulking sides of warehouses. An ancient jest was much told by the magnates: “An’ he says, ‘Torto, why you don’t shore ‘em up, the sides o’ your warehouses, be bulging out already, you don’t see?’ An’ he say — ” Here the heavy face of the teller would play a series of grimaces intended to imitate that of “Old Torto,” and these alone always brought heavy chuckles. “ — he say, ‘Why shore ‘em up? It ain’t failled down, yet.’ ” Great laughter; the point of which, it was often explained, being that if Torto (or anyone) had shored up the tottering walls, it would need have been at his own expense, whereas were they actually to fall, and thus constitute an obstacle, the cost of repairs by reason of some ancient legal quibble grown to the status of a municipal privilege would be paid for out of the taxes levied on the property of such aliens whom a particularly hard fate decreed should die in the Very Rich City. This too-often tale was, Vergil by and by realized, not intended merely to indicate commercial acumen as it was to delineate certain aspects of the character of “Old Torto.”

  But the warehouses, however nasty, belonged to the magnates (however nasty), and thus were under the protection of their city’s “stern and meritorious laws” — laws intended largely to protect the trade and commerce, not all the city as such, as of the magnates in particular, whereas these streets (so-called), these lean lanes and mean alleyways and passages: into these would no great magnate venture. Much danger, little reason. The only legitimate trade carried on seemed to be that in the dung-locks shorn from around the scuts of sheep, a trade considerably less lucrative than that in goat’s-beards from Spicy Araby; now and then from some dusty doorway came evidence that anyway one heap of filth-clots was deemed dry enough to be beaten under some pliant substance with cudgels, to loose the dung from the locks, or partly so — else the process of washing such “wool” would be even more tedious. And more costly. Perhaps the rain, slow and sullen, had driven this trade indoors. Nasty as it was — some sight quickly glimpsed of thralls with heads wrapped up in cloth beating and thrashing piles from which arose a thick dust — the trade was legitimate. It was, presumably, even useful. Probably the stuff of which coarse carpets, floor-druggets, donkey-pads were woven had their sources there. He coughed as the dust reached his nose and throat, walked more quickly on.

  Did not slow down nor answer the swift-flung taunt, “Hey, Gypa! Like the ‘sweet’?”

  Not long before that morning, in a rare unguarded moment, he, allowing his thoughts to come aloud, had murmured, “Wisdom, guidance, vision, truth …”

  And Iohan, who had been engaged in some small task or other there, up in Vergil’s rented rooms, promptly said, “Why, ser, you might try scrying for them things: pour ink-squid in my palm and sleepify me, ask me what I see. If you like.”

  Briefly Vergil considered; briefly he said, “Such could only be of use, I believe, with some lad younger than you, pure of life by reason of youthful innocence.”

  His servant, sans so much as a boastful smirk, a look of abashment, shame, even a wry smile not, had said, simply, “Ah, I has forgotten that. To be sure, ser, them hands has held things other than master’s foot. Well. Therefore.” And to his tasks returned.

  It was after, later that day, day having descended into night, serious considerations as to which form of divination might be best, and no conclusion reached, that Vergil had with a sigh or so retired for sleep. The fierce fat flies of Averno, so tormentful of mornings, had by night flitted themselves into corners and so were silent, all. All, that is, all save one, so absolutely enormous that Vergil exclaimed, almost dismayed, “This fly is big enough to have a name!” He heard the voice a-close to him mutter, “It have a name, bold boy,” in a throaty, Saracen accent; “it have a name: and it name be Baalzebub. And it be lord of flies.” Vergil gave a scornful snort, considered that some would surely try to kill said fly. He captured it instead, placed it in a bottle, and stuffed the neck with cloth. Only then did he turn to see what Saracen this was: saw no one, Saracen or other. Shrugged. Would have made urgent effort to kill it (some would) — there in the bottle, still, might it not die? He did not arise from bed; it did not die, from time to time it buzzed and thrumbled. He bethought him of its proper name, not that other name, he conceded that it had another name indeed, another sex indeed, he did not care to call the matter into clarity. He slept, he woke, he woke, he slept. Later that night, as he watched by the flickering wick he’d thought best to keep burning, he saw an equally enormous spider come spinning down from the ceiling on invisible thread; fly bumbled and buzzed and flung itself about. The spider, finding no way in, had determined to set snares if ever the fly found its way out; had spun and spun and spun. Something exceedingly odd about the lay of the net had called Vergil’s attention. There seemed some pattern in it more than mere reticulation, there seemed some thing in it, in it or about it, of which he was meant to be sensible.

  Of which he was.

  But what?

  And, indeed, as the wick smoked and flickered its tiny flame and the shadows danced their fitful measures, it did seem to him as he lay between his own clean sheets on the horsehair bed-pad, sheets for the moment at least cool against his flesh, that there was something not merely slightly familiar in the pattern of the spinning: but something which he absolutely knew.

  This being so, it was not bafflement he felt, but some odd sort of satisfying comfort and contentment. Intermittently the massy fly thrumbled the night through. But Vergil did not hear it. Vergil slept.

  Now as he walked through this the wretched-most section of the wretched and Rich City, slowly Vergil became aware, first, that something was bothering him, and, second, that something had been bothering him. He was not sure if it was or was not the certain uncertainty of his position here in hell . . . or its suburbs. He had been through something like this the night before. He had slept, yes, but he had not slept well. There had been, so it seemed, some weight upon him. He turned, it shifted; he relaxed, disposed himself, it returned. What was bothering him and had been a while bothering him as he walked now through this dirty district which lay the other side of “the fiftieth gate of corruption” was much the same. It was not sharp. It was …

  “The black weasel sits upon his shoulder,” a voice said nearby.

  And another voice added, “Aye, and squats upon his breast.” Even as he turned to look, Vergil realized that both voices spoke the truth. And then, so slowly that he seemed to himself to be miming, as though an actor deliberately prolonging some stylized motion, he did turn, and wondere
d how, even, how he could . . . how he would even pick up one foot now and set it down in front of the other . . . how he was with effort turning his body to look: he knew that the black bile, it was — he thought, suddenly, for the first time, sharply, of the lute’s strings — which had been rising and spreading through his body the morning long, of all the four humors perhaps most to be feared. It was indeed the black weasel which squatted on his breast, though he was not lying down, that sadly familiar weight upon his heart, the woefully well-known sucking-away of his very breath: he knew it now, but knowing did not help, it did not help at all; it may have been in some measure the result of being in this hideous section of this hideous city, but it had been the same elsewhere: The gods be thanked, though often, not always. It was as though he were drowning, and yet if the one hand which could save were to have been stretched out direct in front of him and in the easiest reach . . . in respect to physical distance, easiest . . . yet he could not have lifted his own hand to take hold. Was it perhaps not the black bile, the humor now overbalanced and overbalancing, but was it the black choler, that evil humor, that other string upon the lute which was man’s body: the melancholia of which the old country Greeks spoke? They who still called the cat the weasel?

  It seemed as though all was useless, all futile: his having come, his having tried, his being here now; and in the name of all: why here? . . . all for no purpose.

  And still he, slowly, slowly, turned.

  There was no one there.

  From another corner came a laugh.

  It was not a laughter bursting forth, neither was it some evil scorn. Merely . . . what it was. And so, with immense effort, now, here in this empty place of filth and rubble between other places of rubble and filth in the form of buildings crumbling into further filth, and yet more rubble, and further rubble; once again he began that difficult and painful turning. Was it some curse, sudden or slow? The weight of all the world lay upon him; still he turned.