The Mount

by Carol Emshwiller

  Except I did.

  “You have to mean the things you do.”

  That nothing called me nothing. She knows what I am and she still calls me a nothing.

  She says, “I don’t need your name. When I say Nothing, or Nobody, you’ll know who I mean. Except I can’t imagine why I would be calling you, anyway.”

  I don’t care. She doesn’t matter. I could see that the minute I saw her.

  I go to the farthest wall and look at the picture of the arena and all those flags. That picture’s about me, not them. I’m the one used to be always down in the middle winning little statues of myself for the Hoots to put in their niches and getting ribbons for the Hoots to hang on their walls. Well, I wasn’t old enough for any real races. To tell the truth, I was only in two little practice races.

  From the corner of my eye, I see they’re holding hands.

  She says, “Put the book next to his stall, anyway. We don’t want to be anything like him.”

  “Yes, but. . . . Dear Lily, we are. You shouldn’t call him a nothing right in front of him.”

  “I’ll say I’m sorry. Maybe. Later. Maybe.”

  I can hear everything they’re saying, and they know it.

  “His father was the nicest Sam you’d ever meet.”

  Why do I have to have such a noticeable face? Everything was fine a few minutes ago, when she was the nobody, not me. Anyway, they can’t make me feel bad. They don’t matter.

  Chapter Twelve

  A half a day later a Hoot comes. He rolls right into my stall. He’s not afraid of me at all, but even though they know I’m a Tame, he has a little crop pole handy. He rolls in on a fancy, filigreed stool with a pink cushion. He’s dressed pretty much like a guard, only fancier, with a lacy collar and silky leg hiders. (They love our legs so much, and they don’t like their own skinny ones, so they often hide theirs under loose, split skirts.) First he takes off my lead rope and collar and clicks a kind of cluck, cluck, because of how my neck looks. He has scar paint with him, though.

  He brought me a fancy clean outfit. I suppose I’ll have to dress right in front of Lily, but why would I care?

  Except . . . first he shaves me! I’ve been waiting and waiting for this mustache to amount to something, and he shaves off what little there is of it. I know better than to protest. If I do, they’ll know I’m not completely a Tame and well-trained. For Little Master’s sake, I have to pretend to be. Besides, that’s all I ever wanted to be anyway.

  The Hoot harnesses me up, bit and all. Then, “Squat,” he says, “Near side.” Never in my whole life have I ever had a Hoot on me that isn’t Little Master. I’m so stunned I don’t know what to do. I hesitate, and then I pull away, but he jerks the bit—hard. It hurts a lot. I think about my father and how he almost had a fit when I put that stick in my mouth and how he didn’t want anything like that near me. For him it must have been like this all the time. No wonder. . . . No wonder a lot of things.

  I can’t stand any more jerking on the bit. I taste my own blood. I squat.

  But it turns out that he’s better on my bit than Little Master ever got to be, though he tried hard. This host is used to it. He doesn’t put any weight on my mouth at all.

  “Go,” he says. “Gently go. Through the door and to the right. Down the ramp. Then to the left. At the top of the hill, you will turn left again. You will follow the way to the igloo with the golden flags. You will trust in me, my steady, as a steady should. You will be knowing how I will keep you safe. Begin.” He gives me a strawberry. I almost forgot about those treats. Then he gives a gentle starting-up pressure with his legs on my chest.

  Lily and I look at each other just as I leave. She looks as if she cares about me and worries about me even after all the things she (and I) said. She makes a motion as if to say, “Take care.” I wish I dared to motion back. I wish I could say some nice last thing.

  I’m so upset I can’t remember anything he said, but his legs tell me which way to go, and he looks in the directions so I know. Makes me remember the happy old days (I didn’t even know how happy I was), and how our trainer used to yell at Little Master, “Look! Look where you’re going!” After, Little Master would slip me a secret treat, sometimes a strawberry, too, sometimes a bite of ginger candy.

  I was smiley back then.

  We enter the igloo with the golden flags. It doesn’t have a long, low entrance, and it’s not even a little bit underground. The doors are so big we go in just as we are, him mounted, and inside, every Hoot is mounted. Inside I don’t have to lean over. No danger any of us Sams or Sues throwing up in here. I’ve never seen anything like it. I didn’t even know there could be a place like this. It’s almost as big as an arena inside.

  At first I can’t take it in: The shiny white walls, the scarves and banners, every host in shiny whites, and every mount with shiny, black, lacquered hair. Light strips are all across the ceiling. . . . It’s a wonderful place. Has my father ever seen it? Or anything like it? If he did, he’d change his mind. I’m even changing my mind. No, it’s that my mind is even more than ever the way it usually is.

  Then I see Little Master. I can’t believe it. He’s mounted on the shoulders of a different Seattle! But I’m right here. I’m here! I guess I must have made some kind of move, because my host jerks the bit—one of those flick-of-the-wrist little jerks. Little Master never did that. Of course I never had a bit in any real way till now. I feel helpless . . . hopeless, too.

  There are mounts that are always traded off from one Hoot to another, they’re used to it, but that’s never the way with us best ones. What does it mean to be a very special mount and not to have my own very special Hoot? And why would Little Master have to ride another when I’m here? I was waiting and waiting and waiting. Just for him.

  I can’t see. It’s too shiny. Even Little Master is too shiny, and he has a look in his eyes. . . . I don’t know what it means. A grownup look. A self-important look. He raises his head and looks down his nose—his still-flattish baby nose—at me.

  The bright ceiling lights make the Hoots’ big eyes glisten. Little Master’s starey stare seems to flash out at me.

  He’s mounted on an absolutely grand Seattle. Big as my father (by now I know big as that is rare), muscles all over, and greased all over so he glistens. He has a lacquered hairdo that sticks up and out. He has a perfect nose.

  I can’t stop looking at that mount. He’s where I’m supposed to be. Aren’t I big enough, or what? Did I get to be too much a Wild and too scarred and thin? Or maybe it is my nose that’s all wrong. I knew it. I always knew this would happen.

  Next to Little Master is The Magnificent, Munificent Present-Ruler-Of-Us-All. Not mounted, so he’s way below all the other Hoots, but there’s space around him, and he’s on a little platform so I and everybody can see him. This time he’s wearing fine clothes and jewels, but he’s taking everything off . . . slowly, one thing at a time. He starts with bracelets and earrings and headbands.

  “Has it?” The-Present-Ruler-Of-Us-All says. “Has it . . . has, oh, has? And all too soon? Yet, or, one hopes, not yet? And yet all? And still? So that the present . . .” He’s talking to other Hoots, not to any of us. They always simplify for us. “So that the present is a time gone by already?”

  He’s standing up on his little legs, no stool at all. He’s wobbling a lot. I think for sure he’ll fall. I think to go help him, but nobody else does, so I guess it isn’t supposed to be done. Besides, my rider (I don’t even know his name!) keeps a gentle pressure on the bit.

  I hear Little Master say, in a grownup Hoot voice with lots of grownup Hoot resonance, “It has.”

  By now The-Present-Ruler-Of-Us-All has taken everything off. He’s completely, absolutely naked. I’ve never seen that in a grownup Hoot. And I’ve gotten used to Little Master’s stronger legs. This-Present-Ruler-Of-Us-All . . . his legs are like strings, but his arms are strong. There’s a sex bud that I think means he’s a mother, but I’m not sure. They tel
l that sort of thing about each other by other ways, smell mostly, but also the way the voice resonates. Songs, too, because there are songs only sung by mothers.

  “I could have wished you to say no,” The-Present-Ruler-Of-Us-All says, “Yet a few more times or even once more a no, so as to bring us more slowly into the future.”

  “It is now,” says Little Master.

  “Is it you, this odd and other one of us, already ready to take a place that has not yet nor ever been taken in our time?”

  “Yes,” says Little Master.

  “I smell it,” says The-Present-Ruler, and, “So is this already the year of the beginning?”

  “Yes,” says Little Master.

  I’m proud of him all over again, how he holds himself, looking up and out. I straighten myself, too, so as to match him. I wonder if any of them notice and remember we belong together—that mine ought to be the shoulders he sits upon.

  “Kindness has always been our policy,” The-Present-Ruler says. “If it is to come about, we turn (as Sams and Sues might say) our other cheeks. Not swarm and die in clusters, but for the sake of kindness. Let be. Time enough for another policy at some later date.”

  Then he turns away from Little Master and waves his hand to all us mounts. “You primates were the best we ever had. But we will take care of you as always. We made this promise to you from the start. We saw your legs and said to ourselves, ‘These new and precious creatures must be preserved and cherished as we preserve and cherish every part of our very selves.’ You are our hearts’ desire.”

  I’m thinking, yes! Yes to being fed and taken care of! And yes, we are the best. Even back on the Hoots’ own home planet, they had none better. This is not the first time they’ve told us that. Even Little Master, Future-Ruler-Of-Us-All, said it, his arms around my neck, his breath in my ear. And many times.

  “Listen!” The-Present-Ruler-Of-Us-All says. “The naked truth as we all, and even you mounts, know it. See me vulnerable and helpless. More helpless than even the least of the smallest of you. Smell! Look! It’s your world. Now we give it back to you.”

  I knew it! I knew they’d do the kind and caring thing. I wish my father could be here to see how kindness is the best policy, not voting.

  All of a sudden there’s a tearing, banging racket, and a shower of glittery stucco comes down all over us. A large part of one wall of the igloo collapses, and there stands us . . . our army of scraggly, unkempt Sams and Sues . . . not a single decent hairdo among them, not a single shiny white—except where pieces of stucco fell on them, hats, either stolen or handmade. None match. Nothing matches . . . handknit vests, leggings. . . . Some of the surcingles . . . belts, that is, are just ropes.

  And here’s my father, right out in front, looking the worst and Wildest of them all. I’m ashamed of having anything to do with him—or with any of us.

  I yell, “No! Not now!” and get my bit jerked again. I want to lean over with the pain, but I can’t, because my host holds the reins too tight and has his legs braced around me so as to hold me straight. I have to keep standing at attention. My yelling was lost in all the tearing-down noises anyway.

  Then it’s suddenly quiet. Something about The-Present-Ruler-Of-Us-All, there, completely naked, and everybody around him standing so still, makes the Sams and Sues stand quietly, too. As they should. Everybody sees how important this is, even us Wilds.

  But The Munificent, Magnanimous Present-Ruler-Of-Us-All is munificent . . . magnanimous . . . even with half his igloo fallen down around him. He says, “Come in. There’s no need to stand there like that, all in rows.” He raises his head and bares his neck, ready to receive the leap-and-choke again. He looks grand, even though naked, and even though in the most vulnerable pose there is for a Hoot to make (or us, too). His voice is high and fluty. It sings out both in a grand way and a soothing, cooing way.

  “This is the right place and the right time. Come in. And welcome. We have given over. Here are the keys to the food cabinets. You may eat. And the keys to the arena and the flags. You may race.”

  He raises his hands as if to give keys, though there’s nothing in them.

  “Out of the kindness in our hearts, as you know us to be kind, we have given all to you. We have no thoughts for ourselves, but think only of what’s best for you. When have we ever not done so? Please. Enter.”

  Nobody moves.

  “Enter.”

  Nobody moves. Neither us nor them.

  I chew on my bit. It makes a little metal-on-metal sound. I taste my blood.

  I see everything so clearly: My father, glistening, but I know with sweat, not oil, hair plastered to his forehead. . . .

  Time goes by. I’m thinking I can feel it, the way Hoots talk of time, as a thing you can touch and see and smell.

  What if I spoke out? What if I accepted for us all? Yes! And so fast my host wouldn’t be able to stop me until it was too late?

  I yell it, then. “Yes! We accept.” And get another painful jerk on the bit.

  But Little Master shouts . . . it’s more like singing. A “Noooooo!” A long, long “No” that resonates, echoes . . . and even when it dies away it seems to hang there. (How do they do that? I’ve lived with him all this time and never understood it.)

  If nobody moved before, they certainly don’t now, not with that big No hanging there. Why did he say no? What does he mean by that? I’ve completely lost track of whose side either of us is supposed to be on.

  My father sees me then, with the Hoot on me and maybe blood on my lips. (I keep licking at it, trying to keep myself cleaned up.) He goes crazy . . . even more than usual. He looks as if he knows who that Hoot is. He leaps towards me. No man that big could leap that high, but he does. Guards are on him right away . . . and, as always happens, their mounts’ boots trample him. Could be by mistake, except those guards are bad. But I only see the beginning of it.

  Suddenly fireballs are all around. Flashes from both sides, and a great whoosh of flame, mostly out the broken ceiling and up into the sky. Our fireballs are drawn up—sucked up with those of the Hoots’—so mostly harmless. And our army . . . milling around and not doing anything useful.

  I’m closer to The-Present-Ruler-Of-Us-All, and there he is with his neck still stretched out on purpose to look vulnerable. But he gave a signal at the same time as he pretended to give up. I saw it. I think I saw it. Not every one of us Sams would see that, but I’ve lived with Little Master too long and too closely (lived with, not just trained with) not to know a lot of extra things about Hoots.

  I buck. I’ve never done that in my life before. I hardly even know how. I lean and twist and jump. I use my hands, too. I pull him off me. I spit out the bit. He’s a good rider, but I get rid of him.

  Then I leap, too, to help my father. Even as I’m leaping, I think: Why am I helping? I know it’s hopeless.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Next thing I know, I don’t know anything. And then somebody’s calling me who doesn’t know my name. Calling: “Young Sam. Young Seattle. Are you all right? Beautiful young Seattle. . . .”

  Is it me they mean? In spite of my scars and my nose?

  I try to move, but everything hurts.

  “Are you all right? I’m sorry I called you a nothing. You’re not, and you never will be.”

  The bed is soft. All around me everything is a nice green. I shut my eyes and try to think.

  “Are you hurt? Beautiful Seattle?”

  I turn over and open my eyes again, and there it is, the arena, right in front of me, all shiny and bright. At first I think it’s real. I think I must have collapsed after a race. They’ll say I’m too young. They’ll say I’ll have to wait till next year before I can race again or I might permanently hurt myself.

  I jump up fast to show I’m all right. And fall flat on my face. But there’s a rug.

  Somebody says, “Wait. Lie still. Please.”

  I look over and see the thin white bars. I’m right back where I started, and the
re’s the mistake, Lily, across from me, saying, “Please.” I can’t believe how glad I am to see her.

  I sit up, and right away I see I’m hobbled. I’ll only be able to take tiny steps, or maybe just hop. This is the scariest thing that ever happened to me. Ever! I’ll be a nothing. I’ll be like that Bob who cleans up—as worthless as he is. A mistake just as much as Lily. I start to shake.

  I try to say something, but my lips are stiff and my mouth is sore inside. All I get out is two whats: “What? What?”

  “You’ve got blood on your lips.”

  I get up and start jumping towards the sink. I’m dizzy, and jumping doesn’t help. I have to stop and sit on the bed.

  “Wait,” Lily says again. “The blood doesn’t matter. I’m sorry I mentioned it.”

  I lean over with my head on my knees and sit like that for a while. I don’t even know what happened. And what about my father? I was going to help him. I didn’t even have a chance to do something brave.

  “I wish I could do something to help you. What can I do?”

  I finally manage to get my mouth around some words. “There isn’t. . . .” And then, “Nothing.” Then I say, “But my father?”

  “Bob knows. He always knows everything. He’ll be here. Don’t worry.”

  And there he is. I just have time to jump little jumps over to the sink to wash my face and rinse out my mouth and he’s here, shuffling along, dragging his leg, leaning on his vacuum. He’s hurrying as fast as he can and he comes straight to me.

  First he sees me: He laughs. It’s a big man’s laugh—like my father would laugh if he ever laughed. It’s not a cripple’s laugh. He shakes his fists over his head. I know that means well done, but I don’t know what for. First I think maybe he’s happy that somebody is worse off than he is.