The Sparrow s-1

by Mary Doria Russel

  "You shall stand back a little, but watch carefully," Supaari whispered. "It is very beautiful. Like your 'landscapes. »

  Marc was charmed by this compliment but very worried that they were taking some terrible risk. Before he could say anything, the ceremony began, and since they were already in as deep as he imagined they could get, he decided to trust Supaari's judgment and God's plan.

  Moving slightly so he could see through the small gap in the curtain, Marc looked down into a little room of quiet perfection, the gray dressed-stone walls nearly mortarless and shining like polished granite, the floor paved with flags of something veined and figured like pink marble. There was a large, low, black stone bowl, filled with some colorless liquid, and around this knelt six plain-robed Jana'ata. At the knees of each was an array of pottery cups, containing pigment, and behind each, a small brazier in which some kind of incense had been set burning. The scent reached Marc just as the chanting began and although he had been told that these were artists, it all recalled for him the mood and awe of worship.

  Then, in time with the telling of some epic poem, leaning toward the bowl in a balletic movement of body and arm, the adepts each dipped their styluslike talons into the pigment pots and touched the surface of the black bowl's contents. For an exquisite moment, colors appeared: blending, spreading, dispersing in a radiant mandala. Again and again, the artists, chanting and dipping and swaying in time, touched the liquid surface with magic and color, the shimmering patterns changing with every hypnotic verse, the incense growing more powerful…

  Later, Marc would have no memory of leaving the box or of climbing into the chair again. The swaying rhythmic movement of the carriers merged in his mind with the poetry he had heard, and the ride back to the harbor compound of Supaari VaGayjur was a mixture of half-dreamt visions and floating moments of reality. Slumped against Supaari and staring with dilated eyes inside his fabric cocoon, Marc noted at one point with vague and distant interest that they were going past a public square of some kind. He saw through a space in the curtains three Runa publicly put to death, their throats slit as they knelt with their backs to the Jana'ata executioners, who stood behind them and drew their heavy claws across their victims' throats as cleanly and humanely as kosher butchers.

  This scene registered at some level, but Marc could not be sure if it was real or a doped hallucination. Before he could inquire about it, the image drifted away, lost in pulsating bursts of glowing color and rhythmic chant.

  It was not, evidently, a day meant for sobriety.

  Assured now that the lander fuel could be duplicated, George and Jimmy were alternately limp with relief and jubilantly keyed up. Awijan did not entirely grasp the motive behind the transaction just concluded but saw the foreigners' need for celebration and felt moved to make this possible for them.

  For a time, Awijan did not act on this feeling, for she was an unnaturally controlled and unspontaneous Runao, the product of several hundred generations of selective breeding and a thorough education. Supaari's first yard boss, she had quickly moved up to secretary, and he had always treated her as an equal, subordinate in position but not inferior. Indeed, Awijan's bloodlines were more ancient and in some ways superior to those of Supaari himself, a fact that he noted with characteristic amusement at the irony. And though the other Jana'ata merchants disapproved of Supaari's almost egalitarian relationship with the Runa in general and there was ungrounded gossip about him and Awijan, she had enjoyed full use of her own capacities and lived in a good deal of physical comfort. The price Awijan paid for her position in life was solitude. She had no peers, nor anyone to look to for guidance. She rarely ventured beyond Supaari's compound except on business, bearing proper identification and taking care to appear deferential to Jana'ata and Runa alike. She had no wish to arouse ei­ther outrage or envy. It made for a tense, compressed life. One had to have an outlet.

  "Tomorrow you shall return to Kashan," she told the foreigners, who had treated her with respect and kindness. "Someone would like to invite you to share a meal. Shall this be acceptable?"

  It was. It was altogether acceptable. And so, as Marc Robichaux was carried, dozing, through the streets of Gayjur toward Radina Bay, Jimmy Quinn and George Edwards followed Awijan out of Supaari's compound and into a Runa neighborhood a little distance inland from the harbor. Standing with her at a gateway, they found themselves looking into something like a restaurant or perhaps a private club, filled with Runa of many types, exuberant and louder than the humans were accustomed to hearing them.

  "Jeez, it's like the wedding," Jimmy said, smiling broadly.

  They moved inside and Awijan led them to a corner where people made room for them on the padded floor. Huge platters of food circu­lated from hand to hand through the crowd, along with beautiful plates of jellied lozenges and these, George and Jimmy found, were delicious. There was no dancing or music but there was a storyteller and all around the room, there were games of strength and gambling going on and cash was definitely changing hands. Nudging Jimmy as they settled onto the cushions, George murmured, "I guess city Runa don't get porai as easy as country Runa."

  Soon even the reserved and self-contained Awijan opened up and joined in the raucous commentary on the storyteller's tale, and the two foreigners were delighted to find their Ruanja good enough to understand the funny parts. George and Jimmy and Awijan ate and watched and listened and talked, and at some point in the evening, one of the Runa challenged Jimmy to a sort of arm-wrestling compe­tition. Jimmy tried to beg off, saying, "Someone would be sad to make your heart porai," which he meant as courtesy but which was in fact exactly the kind of backward insult this crowd loved. So the two unlikely competitors squared off across a low table, Awijan coaching Jimmy with stupendously unhelpful athletic advice and George cheering wildly when Jim took two of the five contests in spite of being handicapped by the lack of a stabilizing tail. And they all three had some more of the jellied stuff, sweet and tart and cool on the tongue, to celebrate.

  The crowd's attention shifted then to another pair of happy combatants and Jimmy eventually lay back flat, his legs out straight, and put his hands behind his head, smiling serenely at Awijan and then at George, who sat cross-legged and motionless next to him. He is a wonderful-looking man, Jimmy thought suddenly. White hair sweeping back in silken waves from a tanned and splendid old face, George Edwards was the very embodiment of venerable dignity: Seneca amid a gathering of statesmen reclining on Roman daybeds, if you could overlook all the tails.

  As though feeling Jimmy's eyes on him, George turned toward the younger man. There was a pregnant pause. "I can't feel my lips," George announced, and then he giggled.

  "Me neither. But I do feel something." Jimmy pondered this feeling. It required the entirety of his concentration to identify it. "I feel meself suddenly overcoom with a startlin' desire to sing 'Danny Boy.' "

  George rolled himself into a ball laughing, fists pounding the cushion on either side of his knees with uncoordinated appreciation. Jimmy sat up and snaked out a long arm to snare another jellied thing from a passing tray. He frowned at it with unfocused but mighty scientific interest. "Jaysus, Mary an' Joseph! What d' fook is this stuff?"

  "Alien Jell-O shots!" George sang breathlessly. He leaned toward Jimmy to whisper something but misjudged his center of gravity and fell over. "Bill Cosby would be so proud!" he said, sideways.

  "And who d' fook would Bill Cosby be?" Jimmy demanded. Not waiting for an answer, he blinked at George with owlish deliberation and confided in his own South Boston accent, "I am hammahd."

  George Edwards spoke fair Ruanja, good Spanish and excellent standard English. He considered "hammahd." He compared the sound to many mental templates. He found a match. "Hammered!" George cried triumphantly, still sideways. "Trashed. Destroyed. Totaled. Wiped. Bombed. Smashed. Wrecked."

  Jimmy stared down at the small gelatinous timebomb shimmering innocently in his limp hand. "This stuff is great," he declared to no one in par
ticular, since George continued to chant his litany of synonyms, unperturbed by the lack of attentive audience. "You don't even have to take time off from the party to pee."

  And Awijan, who had not understood a single word her howling guests were saying, nevertheless gazed upon them with beneficent pleasure. For Awijan was wholly relaxed and utterly unconcerned about her peculiar life and its almost unremitting tensions: quietly and intentionally and magnificently drunk, among friends.

  Supaari was aware of his secretary's occasional need to dissipate the uneasiness she fell prey to, and although he was surprised that she had taken the foreigners with her to the club, he was not angry. Truth be told, he enjoyed the almost complete silence that prevailed during their first day's journey back to Kashan.

  The second day was a little more animated but now the foreigners were thoughtful. Supaari suspected that they would have a great deal to say to one another when they reached the privacy of their homes and companions in Kashan. He knew from their meals together and their questions and comments that Gayjur had not disappointed them and that his hospitality had been appreciated. This pleased him. He now looked forward to doing the same for Ha'an and the others, more confident that he could control the situation in the city.

  Supaari recognized that the silence on their last day of travel was of a different quality, although he could not have known why. In fact, as they came around the last bend of the river and Supaari tied up to the Kashan dock, Marc Robichaux, George Edwards and Jimmy Quinn were preparing themselves to be met by people in mourning.

  Knowing that D.W. was close to the end, they'd offered to postpone the trip to Gayjur but he'd insisted they go on, not trusting Supaari to make the offer a second time after stalling them a whole year. So they had said their good-byes before they left. Now, they could see Sofia spot them from her terrace and watched as she and Sandoz picked their way down the cliffside to the dock. The ravaged faces of Emilio and Sofia told them, they thought, all they needed to know. Climbing out of the boat, Jimmy went to his wife and stooped low to hold her while she cried. Marc Robichaux, taking in the obvious, said quietly, "The Father Superior." Mute, Emilio nodded but continued to look at George, as he had from the moment he'd emerged from the Quinns' apartment and come within sight of the returning travelers.

  "And Anne," George said, uncomprehending but certain, the heart in him going dead.

  Emilio nodded again.

  The Runa were still out harvesting anukar, so they were alone. Supaari came with them to Sofia and Jimmy's apartment, having been told only that Ha'an and the Elder had been killed. He was shocked and could see the distress all around him. They love one another, he thought, hardly knowing whether to envy or pity them.

  Fia, the tiny one with the black mane, told the tale. Knowing Supaari had been fond of Ha'an, she repeated parts of it in Ruanja for him. Dee and Ha'an were killed by some kind of animal, she told him. "Manuzhai and the others told us to be careful for djanada. Someone thinks a djanada attacked them."

  "This was not an animal. Djanada are Jana'ata, do you understand? But these are dishonorable men. The killer was VaHaptaa," Su­paari said, making his contempt obvious. "Do you understand this word? Haptaa? In Ruanja, it is brai noa."

  The small, dark interpreter spoke for the first time, in Ruanja first and then in H'inglish for the others. "Brai noa. Without a home. Va­Haptaa is 'from nowhere.' Landless, perhaps."

  Sandoz, Supaari remembered then. He had learned the names of Ha'an's companions slowly but had trouble with the interpreter's. Meelo, the Runa called him. And Ha'an had called him Emilio. And the Elder had called him Son, and the others called him Sandoz. So many names! They had confused Supaari at first. "VaHaptaa are criminals," Supaari explained. "They have no place. They are outsiders: n'jorni." He searched for some simple parallel. "Do you recall the first day of our meeting? Someone was angry because it is a crime to take meat without permission. This taking is called khukurik"

  "Poaching," Sandoz said, lifting his chin to show he understood.

  "VaHaptaa take without permission. Khukurik is not permitted. You should kill that one if you see him again," Supaari told them. "Someone would thank you for this service. And the VaKashani will also be grateful. VaHaptaa are dangerous to them: djanada, do you un­derstand?"

  They did now, they thought. Too late, but now they understood.

  Supaari bid them farewell after that, feeling it was time to leave the foreigners to their own death rituals. Sandoz accompanied him to the dock, always courteous if he understood how to express respect. Supaari knew the foreigners well enough now to realize that insult was always born of ignorance, not malice. "Sipaj, Sandoz. Someone is sorry for your loss," he said, climbing down into the boat.

  Sandoz looked at him. The strange brown eyes were less disturbing to Supaari now; he was used to the tiny round iris and knew that Sandoz and the others did not see through some sorcery but in a normal way. "You are kind," Sandoz said at last.

  "Someone will return before the end of Parian."

  "Our hearts will be glad of it."

  Supaari cast off and backed the powerboat around the dock, turning it into the southern channel toward the village of Lanjeri, where he had business to attend to. He looked back once before his boat rounded the bend and saw the foreigner still standing on the dock, a small black silhouette against the Kashan cliffside.

  The long evening passed with George alternately sitting and pacing, sobbing suddenly and then laughing through the tears, telling Jimmy and Sofia stories of Anne and of their marriage, and then falling silent. It was almost impossible to go home to where Anne wasn't, but George finally moved to leave. Sofia burst into tears again, undone by memories of her widowed father's grief and by her own sadness and by the thought of losing Jimmy as George had lost Anne. Pressing George's hand against her belly, she said with fierce conviction, "You are this baby's grandfather. You will live with us." And held him until the crying stopped and got him into the bed Jimmy made up. The two of them watched over George until at last he slept.

  "I'm all right," Sofia whispered to Jimmy then. "See about Emilio. It was bad, Jimmy. You can't imagine. It was terrible."

  Jimmy nodded and kissed her and left to check on the priests, neither of whom had been seen for hours. Stooping to peer into their apartment, he saw how things were and motioned Marc outside. "D.W. would tell you to write up the damn report," Jimmy said very softly, stepping back to the far side of the terrace with Marc. "It can probably wait until tomorrow, if you don't feel up to it."

  A fitful smile appeared on Marc's face, pale in the moonlight. He understood that he was being offered a good excuse to shirk his real duty, which was to comfort Emilio somehow. He regretted his own lack of pastoral experience. What could one say? Sandoz, he knew, had been prepared for the Father Superior's death, but Anne, too—a staggering blow, to lose them both at once, and horrifically. "Thank you. I shall write the report tonight. It will be good to have something to do."

  Marc ducked into the apartment for his tablet, hesitated, and then picked up the Father Superior's, with its preprogrammed transmission codes; Yarbrough had shown him how to use it, knowing this day was coming. He looked to Sandoz, concerned that this practical reminder of D.W.'s passing would distress him, but Emilio seemed not to know Marc was in the room. Returning to the terrace, Marc told Jimmy quietly, "I shall be in Aycha's apartment." He turned back toward Sandoz and then faced Jimmy again, giving a small shrug.

  Putting a hand on Marc's shoulder, Jimmy looked past him at Emilio sitting in the gloom. "It's okay. I'll see what I can do."

  Jimmy went inside. For a while, he was as helpless as Marc had been, unable to imagine what was keeping Emilio from falling apart. The Irish weep and drink and sing and talk at a wake, so George's reaction had seemed normal and predictable to Jimmy, a kind of grief he understood. But this…You poor macho bastard, Jimmy thought suddenly, realizing that Sandoz probably just wanted some privacy so he could finally cry without wi
tnesses and shame. Jimmy got to his feet but then hunkered down on his heels so he could see Emilio's face. "¿Quieres companeros o estar solo?" he asked gently, to be sure before he left Sandoz alone.

  "Soy solo."

  Jimmy was almost out of the apartment before he caught the change in the verb and went back. "Mirame, 'mano. Look at me!" he said, dropped down to Emilio's level again. He put his hands on Emilio's shoulders and shook him a little. From a great distance, Emilio's eyes came to him. "You are not alone, Emilio. Sofia loved them and I loved them, too. Do you hear me? Maybe not for so long, maybe not so deeply, but truly and well. We loved them, too." It was only then, saying it, that the reality of the deaths hit Jimmy, and no burden of stoicism dammed up his tears. Emilio's eyes closed and he turned his head away and then at last, Jimmy understood the rest of it. "Oh, Jesus. You're not alone, Emilio. I love you. Sofia loves you. And our kid's gonna need an uncle, man. You're not alone. You've still got us, right? Oh, Jesus," he said again, taking Sandoz in his arms. "That's better. Thank God! That's better…"

  It was over sooner than Jimmy thought was good for him but at least there'd been some release. Jimmy waited until he thought the time was right and then, wiping his own eyes on his sleeve, lifted Sandoz to his feet. "Come on. No one sleeps alone tonight. You're coming with me." He steered Emilio out of the apartment and, voice roughened by tears, called to Robichaux, "Marc, you come on up to our place, too. No one sleeps alone tonight!"