I, Libertine

by Theodore Sturgeon

  Somewhere in midmorning there returned his daily-man, woeful adjutant to the slow parade he led: the doctor’s black rig bearing the priest, and a wagon with three laborers and a coffin for Mr. Barrowbridge, all summoned at dawn from Tatsfield. (Lilith had said “The Duchess said he was here, but we couldn’t find out … Lance, you loved him, didn’t you?”) They put him to sleep beside old Piggott, in a little burial ground which had not been used for three centuries; and when the priest said the right words, old Johnson said the real ones, without words; Lance, suddenly overcome, watching the spadesful of earth showering down, said an anguished thing within himself. Oddly enough, it was not said to Barrowbridge; it was “Ah, Piggott, if you forgive me I’ll …” and was never finished. It tore him, which he could ill afford, and he returned to the house and Lilith, who held him until he could talk again.

  And the talk came around again to the marriage … who talked it first?

  He didn’t know. … Well, what does it matter who first?

  “This time yesterday I’d have wangled to marry you or not, Lance, whichever suited me, and it wouldn’t have suited me. Now… oh, my darling!”

  “I have nothing, I shall never have anything of my own!” he had cried suddenly, remembering. And she had laughed and kissed him in the new tender way he had just learned was possible. “What’s mine is yours, beloved. What’s getting, as long as you get? What’s having as long as you have? Wouldn’t you have wanted the Kingston holdings? Then why not take them from me?”

  How to trust her? But surely, though she had words and words, could she counterfeit that light in her eyes, that never-before tone in her voice? And hadn’t she said … “Decide, Lance—a clear decision. If it’s no, promise, oh promise to see me whenever you can. Or … don’t promise that; just say no. But say yes if you can, even if you almost can; I’ll make up the difference for you, you’ll see.”

  Elaine.

  He had kissed Elaine once, and virtually this same thing had happened. But it had happened to both of them, whereas here, only Lilith was affected. He might be, but he wasn’t now, or wasn’t yet.

  He shook his bothered head confusedly. Lilith was away at noon, gone up to London to see Beasley, and perhaps the Duchess. She would be back tonight, or tomorrow.

  Once upon a time there was a prince, and he was invisible … and the wicked old witch was banished, and he took all the lands and castles and everybody could see him.

  (How do you kiss a wish?)

  “Mr. Barrowbridge!” he yelled at the top of his voice. Johnson popped out of the kitchen door and looked at him, wringing her hands. “What shall I do, sir?” Lance whispered.

  The brook bubbled and a bird sang. Somebody said something about a moth in a room of a thousand lights, safe on a cold candle.

  Years back in his mind, somebody said something about a libertine.

  “I, libertine,” murmured Lance Courtenay, “being of sound mind and clear faculties, do hereby depose and declare that all my life has been a grind and a climb; that in spite of how I might seem to the chaps in the City who think I am a young gentleman of leisure, or to Johnson to whom I am but a Power which comes and goes in mystery; or to Lilith, who loves me, or to Elaine Eustace, whom I love with all my heart …

  “Or to Barrowbridge, to whom I could have been but an ingenious incompetent …

  “Or to Piggott, to whom I was a serpent …

  “Or to Meadows, who calls me philanthropist, or Hepzibah, who says godling and genius …”

  His eyes began to sting, and he closed them and bowed his head, and breathed with difficulty. “Or to my mother,” he whispered, “who wants me the way I am more than she wants my death …

  “I therefore hereby and whereas,’ he choked, and shook himself, “do now and forever forswear the paths into which I am pushed, and choose those by which I shall profit; and the color of that profit shall be that for which I have been starved all my life—my pleasure. And because never in my life have I had life’s permission to develop the taste for simple pleasures, I shall pursue dark ones.

  “And the darkest direction for me now is to marry a woman of great property who loves me, and through her and her property to pursue, by falsehood and chicanery and insincerity, the Courtenay crest. I shall kill if I must to get it; I shall not regard it as a triumph unless I trample the innocents to get it, slander and slaughter and destroy; and all of this I shall enjoy.

  “So never again will life, or Elizabeth, Duchess of Kingston, stay me; there is nothing more she can do to me; she has done it all.

  “Never again will the idea of destiny tempt me; no fortune unwrought by a man himself is to be trusted. A man makes his own fortune. I have fought and striven all my life for the simple thing of having a decent man call me a decent man—just that—and since destiny has never had that for me, I’ll have no more to do with destiny.

  “Hereafter, then, let it be Lilith and the libertine. I shall make her very happy, and the rest of the world—afraid.”

  It grew dark and late. Lily had gone up to town unattended; he should have got someone to go with her; he hoped she had secured someone to come back. He ate a cold mutton sandwich and changed his shirt for a better one, and changed his boots twice. He tried to read, and he tried to write to Meadows to explain matters. When the rider clumped into the stable yard he whipped a comb through his side hair, ran to the door, and flung it open to the first sound of footsteps outside. “Yes, darling—yes!” he cried.

  “Righto. What? What?” said Sir Gregory Eustace, blinking in out of the dark. “Courtenay. I say, good evening, what?”

  “Oh, sir, I do beg your pardon,” said Lance, overcome. He pulled himself together. “Come in, sir, come in. I was … uh … expecting, you know, someone else.”

  “Sh’d say so. Yes. Darling, what?”

  “Oh yes,” said Lance. “T. D. Darling, you know, Holcomb barrister. Nice chap.”

  “Nice chap, yes,” said Sir Gregory. “Don’t know him.” He stood in the middle of the great hall while Lance got out the port.

  “What can I do for you, sir?”

  “Like old times, what? Accept, ah, apology.”

  “Apology? I? Sir Gregory, what on earth …”

  “Way I acted. City. Shakin’ jolly-well fist. That sort of rot.”

  Lance recalled, now, in that awful moment when the yellow carriage met him, Elaine running toward him in some sort of distress, and at the corner, the small angry figure of the baronet. “Why, sir, I noticed nothing.”

  “Decent of you, but haw! must confess. Very angry. Book, y’know. Gibbon, Decline and Fall. Blamed you.”

  “You were angry at me because of the book?”

  “Way you handed it over. Source book. Hah! Blooming masterpiece. Never do anything like it in three lifetimes. All my work, up the spout, what? Years. Thought you were making a fool o’ me.”

  “My dear Sir Gregory, I didn’t read a blessed thing in the book but the title. I heard it was good, that’s all.”

  “Thought o’ that later. Upset, y’know. Forbade Elaine speak to you. Hah! Defied me, see that? Right on London street, what? Lots o’ pepper, that gel.” He raised his glass. “Cheers.”

  “Cheer’o. … I’m terribly sorry if the book …”

  “Not’tall, old chap. Good of you. Well, I’ll pop. Very, very decent of you. ’Night.”

  Lance saw him to the door. “Good night, sir.”

  “Start on something else now. Blessed ’f I know what, what? ’Night. Very decent of you, old chap.”

  “Good night.” He held the door open and looked out into the blackness, hearing a dwindling mutter around to the stable yard of “Decent of you. Awfully decent. Decent chap. …”

  It grew really late, and Lance’s worriment reached a peak and passed it. If she’s not here by ten, he thought, then she’ll stay over and be here tomorrow. And as he concluded this, he heard the hoofs outside. He ran to the door, and snatched it open at the first step, saying nothing at
all this time.

  And a good thing too; it was a dusty footman—Haines, of Blanton House.

  “Ah. Good evening, Haines.”

  “Evenin’, sir. Letter for you.”

  Lance took the letter curiously. It bore his name, nothing else, on the outside, and was sealed without a signet. He left it on the hall table and brought Haines a shilling and a spot of brandy. “Thankee’ sir,” said the man, and with simultaneous motions threw the brandy down his throat and the shilling into his pocket. He saluted and left.

  Lance took the letter to an easy chair and sat down with his back to two candles. Something told him he must settle himself and take this at ease.

  He opened it and grunted. Lilith.

  He read:

  My very darling:

  I must say what I have to say briefly and quickly, or never say it at all.

  I have told the Duchess that we would marry if it suited you. She said immediately that we must not. I’m afraid I rather lost my head at that but now I confess she is right. Her reason, and this is exactly what she said, is this: “If you marry him, I shall tell you who your mother is.”

  Lance, I can’t tell you what she means—I don’t know. I have known her all my life. I have not known anything of my parents. And darling, it does not matter whether or not her horrid suggestion is true—she would use it, you know she would.

  I told you she would punish me because I wanted to leave her. And you know how far she will go to punish you. There is nothing we can do, my darling. She has won again, as she always wins.

  I was free to come to you and tell you, but I dare not. I shall remain in England … she is keeping her promise about the Kingston lands here, but I mistrust it; doubtless she will let it all revert to the Meadows when she dies. I have earned her hatred, and I think that she would express it so.

  Beloved … oh, my beloved … go to your Elaine and be happy with her. High enough is—high enough, my dear.

  Your own,

  Lilith

  P.S. If you think of me as a sister, then at least you may love me a little.

  There was a spatter of tears across the shaky postscript.

  Slowly Lance lowered the letter to his knee and bowed his head.

  Strike Elizabeth Chudleigh with a zephyr and she’ll respond with a hurricane.

  Lilith … Lilith … (Lilith was the devil’s brother.)

  (Who the devil had told her about Elaine?)

  I … devil?

  “Oh, no!” Lance said aloud. And as he said it, madness trickled out of him like a dark fluid and lay all about him before it evaporated spiritously, leaving of itself no trace; and he saw the meaning of that pleasure which had eluded him all his life.

  He had striven for what Barrowbridge felt he should have, so hard that when fortune handed him a silver platter piled with happy fruits, he was suspicious even of the platter, and especially of the donor. He had taken as his own the revenge of an old man, confusing it with the bright, dark desire to be a libertine—a devil if you like—that lives in all men. And after all, there had been Lilith.

  But when, he demanded of himself, were you ever something that you wanted to be, when did you strive for something because you wanted it? Where is the one thing you have ever found that you wanted?

  Unaccountably, he felt wonderful. Marvelous. He closed his eyes and looked at tomorrow, and made a wish. He kissed the wish.

  AFTERWARD

  THE STORY OF ELIZABETH Chudleigh is substantially true; she was, and she did, all the things herein described. She was undoubtedly an extraordinary woman. Perhaps it would be of interest to the reader to know what happened to her afterward.

  She left England in 1776, after having been found guilty in the trial by the House of Lords, and never returned.

  She finally repaired to St. Petersburgh, where she became fast friends with Catherine the Great. There she built a fabulous estate, calling it Chudleigh. Catherine was nine years her junior—specifically, 50 to the Duchess’s 59 years; and one of the most intriguing of conjectures is the nature of the reminiscences these two colorful old biddies must have shared over their tea.

  Elizabeth, Duchess of Kingston, died in 1788 at the age of 68, and the title died with her. The estate did indeed go to Charles Meadows, a nephew of the Duke, though Evelyn Meadows, who had brought the suit for bigamy, was still alive.

  These odds and ends might be of interest to you, too, as they were to me:

  The suit for jactitation of marriage has descended to the common law and is a legitimate action, though still extremely rare.

  It was not until 1835 that consanguineous marriages in England became automatically void. Before that, they were voidable but quite binding and valid until voided.

  The earldom of Devon, which died in Padua in 1556 in the person of Edward Courtenay, was twice gained and lost, once by a Blount and once by a Cavendish. In 1831 one William Courtenay, a respected clerk of Parliament, equipped with a far-reaching genealogy and the fact of omission of the de corpore suo clause in the ancient Courtenay patent—that is to say, technically succession need not follow from the duke’s issue, but was allowable from a collateral—actually succeeded in reviving the title, and it still exists.

  AFTERWORD

  THE AUTHOR URGES HISTORICALLY minded sharpshooters to draw their beads on this narrative, and wishes them good hunting. They will find certain licenses in my Libertine—as a small example, the unseasonably warm weather when everyone knows Elizabeth’s suit for jactitation took place in February 1769—and more power to them. When they are done, let them proceed to Aesop and delete everything they find there about talking animals.

  In short, this is a fable, written by and for the dilettante of the fabulous. It was extraordinarily easy and pleasant to write and it is hoped that it is correspondingly easy and pleasant to read.

  Acknowledgment must be made to those without whom the book and the author surely never would have been known at all. First, there is Mr. T. H. White, whose Age of Scandal served up Elizabeth Chudleigh, hot and crackling in her transparent gown. Mr. Theodore Sturgeon assisted nobly with the research, Mr. Jean Shepherd pushed and pushed at the author until he was, in the world of books, born; and last mentioned but first of all, the Night People whose battle-cry is Excelsior, and whose humor and forbearance are really responsible for the work.

  A Biography of Theodore Sturgeon

  Theodore Hamilton Sturgeon (1918–1985) is the acclaimed author of eleven novels and more than two hundred short stories. Considered to be among the most influential writers of science fiction’s “Golden Age,” he won the International Fantasy Award for his novel More Than Human, and the Hugo and Nebula Awards for his short story “Slow Sculpture.”

  Born Edward Hamilton Waldo in Staten Island, New York, Sturgeon was the son of Edward Molineaux Waldo, a paint and dye manufacturer, and Christine Hamilton Waldo, a teacher. At the age of eleven, following his mother’s remarriage, his name was legally changed to Theodore Sturgeon.

  Sturgeon began writing stories and poems during the three years he spent working as an engine room laborer on a freighter. Beginning in 1938, he published short stories for genre and general market publications including Astounding (now Analog Science Fiction and Fact), Unknown Worlds of Science Fiction, and Argosy. His groundbreaking short story “The World Well Lost” (1953), which was among the first science fiction stories to include positive themes of homosexuality, went on to win the Gaylactic Spectrum Award in 2000.

  Sturgeon’s 1953 novel More Than Human was considered groundbreaking for science fiction in its stylistic daring, fine characterization, and visionary impact. Offering the idea that the next step in human evolution was a gestalt organism composed of people with different and strange talents who “bleshed,” More Than Human was an inspiration to many in the 1960s counterculture, including artists and musicians such as the Grateful Dead and Crosby, Stills and Nash.

  In the 1960s, Sturgeon ventured into television writing
, penning the screenplays for two of the most popular Star Trek episodes: “Shore Leave” (1966) and “Amok Time” (1967). He is credited with inventing the story of Spock’s sex life, as well as the famous Vulcan greeting, “Live long and prosper,” and (with Leonard Nimoy) its accompanying hand signal. Two of Sturgeon’s stories were adapted for The New Twilight Zone, and his novella Killdozer! (1944) became a television movie in 1974. He is also the creator of Sturgeon’s Law—90 percent of everything is crap—which he developed to counter the common denigration of science fiction as a genre.

  Beloved by critics and readers alike, Sturgeon inspired a generation of authors across genres, such as Samuel R. Delany, Michael Chabon, Jonathan Lethem, Octavia E. Butler, Karen Joy Fowler, and Rad Bradbury. Kurt Vonnegut considered Sturgeon to be one of the best writers in America, and Sturgeon served as inspiration for Vonnegut’s recurring character, Kilgore Trout.

  Survived by his seven children, Sturgeon died in Eugene, Oregon, on May 8, 1985. In 2000, he was posthumously inducted into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame.

  The decree wherein Sturgeon is officially adopted by his stepfather (William “Argyll” D. Sturgeon) and his mother, and his last name is changed accordingly, from “Waldo” to “Sturgeon.” (Photo courtesy of Special Collections, Kenneth Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas.)

  Sturgeon’s report card from the Pennsylvania State Nautical Schoolship “Annapolis” postmarked April 10, 1937, showing his rank as last in his class of cadets. (Photo courtesy of Special Collections, Kenneth Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas.)

  Sturgeon with his third wife, Marion McGahan, and (left to right) daughter Tandy (b. 1954), son Robin (b. 1952), and daughter Noël (b. 1956).

  A typescript page from More Than Human with handwritten edits. (Photo courtesy of Special Collections, Kenneth Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas.)