Cloud Walker, All Fools' Day, Far Sunset

by Cooper, Edmund

  ‘Didn’t we?’ asked Paul. ‘Didn’t we see Death when we went up in orbit? Didn’t we see him when we blasted off on the long shot? Don’t we make a rude gesture to him every time we pop ourselves back in the cooler?’

  ‘I’m not afraid of dying,’ said Ann. ‘I’m only afraid of pain – and of being afraid.’

  ‘Poor dear,’ said Paul. ‘I’m the spectre at the feast. Dammit, Death just chucked a meteor at us; and it did hardly any damage at all. So he can’t be too interested in us, can he?’

  ‘I’m cold,’ said Ann, ‘but at the same time just a trifle lascivious. Let’s go to bed.’

  Paul stood up, smiling. ‘Lasciviousness is all,’ he said. ‘Thank God we don’t have to keep the house tidy. It’s another ten days, I think, before we have to slide ourselves into the freezer.’

  Ann took his hand. ‘That’s the thought that makes me cold. Meanwhile, come and keep me warm.’

  There was only one double berth on the Gloria Mundi. The crew called it the honeymoon suite. That was where they went.

  But even while Paul Marlowe was engaged in the act of love, even as he reached the climax, he was thinking about an appointment in Samara.

  There was still the taste of champagne in his mouth, and in Ann’s.

  But for both of them the taste was sour.

  TEN

  He woke up and found that he was trembling. He looked at his surroundings without recognition for a moment or two, but the disorientation was brief. Over in the corner of the room a string of smoke rippled upwards towards the thatch from the tiny flickering oil lamp set on the miniature phallus of Oruri. One or two flies buzzed lazily. By his side, the naked brown girl slept peacefully with one arm thrown carelessly across his stomach.

  He looked at the three stubby fingers and flattened thumb on her small hand. He looked at her face – neat and serene. An alien face, yet perhaps it would have raised no eyebrows in central Africa. Her serenity annoyed him. He shook her into consciousness.

  Mylai Tui sat up, bleary-eyed. ‘What is it, my lord? Surely the nine sisters are still flying?’

  ‘Say it!’ he commanded. ‘Say my name.’

  ‘Poul Mer Lo.’

  He shook her again. ‘It is not Poul. Say Paul.’

  ‘Poul.’

  ‘No. Paul.’

  ‘Poel.’ Mylai Tui enunciated the syllables carefully.

  He slapped her. ‘Poel,’ he mimicked. ‘No, not Poel. Say Paul.’

  ‘Poel.’

  He slapped her again. ‘Paul! Paul! Paul! Say it!’

  ‘Pole,’ sobbed Mylai Tui. ‘Pole … My lord, I am trying very hard.’

  ‘Then you are not trying hard enough, Mylai Tui,’ he snapped brutally. ‘Why should I bother to speak your language when you can’t make a decent sound in mine? Say Paul.’

  ‘Pol.’

  ‘That’s better … Paul.’

  ‘Paul.’

  ‘That’s good. That’s very good. Now try Paul Marlowe.’

  ‘Pol Mer Lo.’

  Again he hit her. ‘Listen carefully. Paul Marlowe.’

  ‘Pol Mah Lo.’

  ‘Paul Marlowe.’

  ‘Paul Mah Lo.’

  ‘Paul Marlowe.’

  ‘Paul … Marlowe.’ By this time Mylai Tui hardly knew what she was saying.

  ‘You’ve got it!’ he exclaimed. ‘That’s it. That’s my name. You are to call me Paul. Understand?’

  ‘Yes, my lord.’

  ‘Yes, Paul.’

  ‘Yes, Paul,’ repeated Mylai Tui obediently. She wiped the tears from her face.

  ‘It’s important, you understand,’ he babbled. ‘It’s very important. A man has to keep his own name, does he not?’

  ‘Yes, my lord.’

  He raised his hand.

  ‘Yes, Paul,’ corrected Mylai Tui hastily. Then she added hesitantly: ‘My lord is not afflicted by devils?’

  He began to laugh. But the laughter disintegrated. And then tears were streaming down his own face. ‘Yes, Mylai Tui. I am afflicted by devils. It seems that I shall be afflicted by devils as long as I live.’

  Mylai Tui nursed his head on her breast, rocking to and fro, rhythmically. ‘There is a great sadness inside you,’ she said at length. ‘O Paul, my lord, it hisses like water over burning stones. Kill me or send me away; but do not let me witness such pain in one to whom I am not destined to bring the first gift of Oruri.’

  ‘What is the first gift of Oruri?’

  ‘A child,’ said Mylai Tui simply.

  He sat up with a jerk. ‘How do you know that you will not give me a child?’

  ‘Lord – Paul – you have loved me many times.’

  ‘Well?’

  ‘I have not worn the zhivo since I left the Temple of Gaiety and gave up the duties of a noia, Paul. You have loved me many times. If you had been an ordinary Bayani, by now I would have swollen with the fruit of love. I am not swollen. Therefore Oruri withholds his first gift … My Lord, I have sinned. I know not how, but I have sinned … Perhaps you will fare better with another noia.’

  He was thunderstruck. For in a terrible moment of clarity he saw that Mylai Tui possessed a wisdom greater than he could ever hope to attain. ‘It is true,’ he said calmly. ‘I want a child, but I did not know that I want a child … There are so many things I do not know … Yet, there is no sin, Mylai Tui. For I think that my blood and yours will not mingle. I think that I can never get a child save with one of my own people. And so I shall not send you away.’

  Mylai Tui sighed and smiled. ‘My lord is merciful. If I cannot bear the son of him who came upon a silver bird, I wish to bear the son of no other.’

  He took her hands and looked at her silently for a while. ‘What is it that binds us?’ he asked at length.

  Mylai Tui could not understand. ‘There is nothing to bind us, Paul,’ she said, ‘save the purpose of Oruri.’

  ELEVEN

  Three gilded barges, each propelled by eight pole-men, passed slowly along the Canal of Life under the great green umbrella of the forest. In the first barge, guarded by eight brawny priestesses, there was the small shrouded palanquin that contained the oracle of Baya Nor. In the second barge, guarded by eight male warriors, was the god-king, Enka Ne, the council of three and the stranger, Poul Mer Lo. In the third barge, guarded also by eight warriors, were the three girl children who were destined to die.

  Poul Mer Lo sat humbly below the dais on which the god-king reclined, and listened to the words of his master.

  ‘Life and death,’ said Enka Ne, in a voice remarkably like that of Shah Shan, the beggar, ‘are but two small aspects of the infinite glory of Oruri. Man that is born of woman has but a short time to live, yet Oruri lives both at the beginning of the river of time and at the end. Oruri is the river. Oruri is also the people on the river, whose only value is to fulfil his inscrutable purpose. Is this thought not beautiful?’

  The bright plumage rustled as Enka Ne took up a more comfortable position. Poul Mer Lo – Paul Marlowe of Earth – found it difficult to believe that, beneath all the iridescent feathers and the imposing bird’s head, there was only the flesh and blood of a boy.

  ‘Lord,’ he said carefully, ‘whatever men truly believe is beautiful. Worship itself is beautiful, because it gives meaning to the act of living … Only pain is ugly, because pain deforms.’

  Enka Ne gave him a disapproving stare. ‘Pain is the gift of Oruri. It is the pleasure of Oruri that men shall face pain with gladness and acceptance, knowing that the trial shall bring them closer to the ultimate face … See, there is a guyanis! It, too, fulfils the pleasure of Oruri, living for less than a season before it receives the infinite mercy of death.’

  Poul Mer Lo gazed at the guyanis – a brilliantly coloured butterfly with a wing span longer than his forearm – as it flapped lazily and erratically along the Canal of Life, just ahead of the barge containing the oracle. As he watched, a great bird with leathery wings dived swiftly from a tree-fern on the bank
s of the canal and struck the guyanis with its toothed beak. One of the butterfly wings sheared completely and drifted down to the surface of the water: the rest of the creature was held firmly in the long black beak. The bird did not even pause in flight.

  Enka Ne clapped his hands. ‘Strike!’ he said, pointing to the bird. A warrior raised his blow-pipe to his lips. There was a faint whistle as the dart flew from the pipe. Then the leathery bird, more than twenty metres away, seemed to be transfixed in mid-flight. It hovered for a moment, then spiralled noisily down to the water.

  Enka Ne pointed to the warrior who had killed the bird. ‘Die now,’ he said gently, ‘and live for ever.’

  The man smiled. ‘Lord,’ he said, ‘I am unworthy.’ Then he took a dart from his pouch and pushed it calmly into his throat. Without another word, he fell from the barge into the Canal of Life.

  Enka Ne looked intently at Poul Mer Lo. ‘Thus is the purpose of Oruri fulfilled.’

  Poul Mer Lo gazed at the enigmatic waters of the canal. The barge had already left the body of the warrior behind it. Now a butterfly wing floated past and then the still twitching shape of the leathery bird, with the rest of the guyanis still gripped in its beak.

  Paul Marlowe, man of Earth, struggled against the dream-like fatalism which had caused him to accept the role of Poul Mer Lo in a dream-like and fatalistic world. But it was hard, because he was still enough of a psychiatrist to realize that two people were inhabiting the same body and were making of it a battleground. Paul would be forever the outcast – technological man, with a headful of sophisticated and synthetic values resisting the stark and simple values of barbarism. Poul was only a man who was trying desperately to belong – a man who wanted nothing more than peace and perhaps a little fulfilment in the world into which he had been thrust.

  Was it Paul or was it Poul who was travelling along the Canal of Life with Enka Ne? He did not even know that. He knew only that the great green hypnosis of the forest and the brightly plumed hypnosis of the god-king and the meaning of life and death were all far too much for the would-be fratricides who lived in the same tortured head.

  It was a heavy, languorous afternoon. By sunset one of the girl children in the following barge would be sacrificed against the phallus of Oruri in the forest temple of Baya Sur. Poul was fascinated. Paul was shocked. Neither knew what to do.

  ‘Lord,’ said Paul – or Poul, ‘which was of greater value: the life of the guyanis or the life of your warrior?’

  Enka Ne smiled. ‘Who can know? No one save Oruri. Was it not Oruri in me that bade the warrior be at one with the guyanis?’

  ‘Who can know?’ said the man of Earth. ‘It is certain that I do not.’

  The god-king’s councillors, crouching together, had heard the exchange in silence. But they were plainly unhappy that a stranger should question the act of Enka Ne. Now one of them spoke.

  ‘Lord,’ he said diffidently, ‘may it not be that Poul Mer Lo, whose life is yours, has a careless voice? The affliction may easily be remedied.’

  Enka Ne shook his feathers and stretched. Then he gazed solemnly at the councillor. ‘There is no affliction. Know only that the stranger has been touched by Oruri. Whoever would challenge the purpose of Oruri, let him now command the death of Poul Mer Lo.’

  The councillors subsided, muttering. Poul Mer Lo was sweating with the heat; but somewhere in a dark dimension Paul Marlowe was shivering.

  ‘See,’ said Enka Ne, ‘there is the first stone of Baya Sur.’ He pointed to an obelisk rising from the smooth water of the canal. ‘Soon there will be a sharp glory. Let no man come to this place without tranquillity and love.’

  Baya Sur was, unlike Baya Nor, no more than a single stone temple set in the forest and protected from its advance by a high stone wall. At the landing place about forty men – the entire population of Baya Sur – waited to greet the barges. The one containing the oracle was the first to pull in. The palanquin was lifted ashore carefully by the priestesses and carried into the temple. Then Enka Ne gave a signal and his own barge was poled in. He stepped ashore with a great rustling of feathers and with all the arrogance and brightness and mystery of a god. After him came the councillors, and after them came the stranger, Poul Mer Lo. No one stayed to meet the three girl children. Looking over his shoulder as he walked along the paved avenue that led to the temple steps, Poul Mer Lo saw them step ashore and walk gravely after him like tiny clockwork dolls.

  Before the sacrifice there was a ritual meal to be undertaken. It was in the great hall of the phallus where the only source of natural light came from the orifice of a symbolic vagina built into the roof. In the bare walls, however, there were niches; and in the niches were smoky oil lamps.

  The palanquin had been set near to the stone phallus. Immediately before the phallus there was a large bowl of kappa and several empty small bowls. The three girl children, silent and immobile, sat cross-legged facing the phallus. Behind them sat three priests, each armed with a short knife. Behind the priests sat the councillors, and behind the councillors sat Poul Mer Lo.

  Suddenly, there was a wild, desolate bird cry. Enka Ne strutted into the chamber in such a manner that, for a moment, Poul Mer Lo again found it necessary to remind himself that beneath the plumage and under the bright, darting bird’s head, there was only a boy. The god-king pecked and scratched. Then he gave his desolate bird cry once more and strutted to the bowl of kappa.

  He urinated on it and gave another piercing cry. Then he crouched motionless opposite the palanquin. An answering bird cry came from behind the dark curtains.

  One of the priests began to put small handfuls of kappa into the little bowls. The two other priests began to hand the bowls round – first to the girl children, who immediately ate their portions with great relish, then to the councillors, and finally to Poul Mer Lo.

  Paul Marlowe wanted to be sick, but Poul Mer Lo forced him to eat. The frugal meal was over in a few moments. Then daylight died, and the room was filled with the flickering shadows cast by the oil lamps.

  The god-king rose, strutted to the phallus of Oruri and enfolded it with his wings. Then he whirled and pointed to one of the girl children.

  ‘Come!’

  She rose obediently and stepped forward. She turned and leaned back on the phallus, clasping her hands behind it and around it. The god-king suddenly lay at her feet. There was an expression of intense happiness on her face.

  One of the priests pressed his arm under her chin, forcing her head back. Another knelt, pressing her stomach so that she was hard against the phallus. The third advanced with knife arm extended and with the other arm ready as if to grasp something.

  Enka Ne uttered another bird cry. From the closed palanquin there came an answering bird cry. The knife struck once, then rose and struck again. There was no sound.

  The hand plunged into the open chest of the girl and snatched out the still beating heart.

  Blood poured from the gaping wound on to the prostrate body of the god-king.

  There were two more bird cries – piercing, desolate, triumphant.

  Poul Mer Lo fainted.

  TWELVE

  The expedition, the religious progress, was almost over. So far it had taken eight days and would be completed on the ninth, when the oracle and god-king returned to Baya Nor. The three girl children were now safely in the arms of Oruri. The second had been sacrificed in a manner identical with that of the first at the temple of Baya Ver and the third at the temple of Baya Lys.

  Poul Mer Lo had learned not to faint at the spectacle of a living heart being torn from the body of a child. It was, he had been told, at the best rather impolite. At the worst it could be construed as an unfavourable omen.

  Now, on the eighth night shortly after the ceremonial death-in-life feast that followed the sacrifice, he lay restlessly on his bed in one of the guest cells of Baya Lys. He was wondering why Enka Ne had invited/commanded his presence on the journey. To accompany the oracle and the god-king on
a religious progress was a privilege normally reserved only for those who had distinguished themselves greatly in war or worship.

  Suddenly he became aware that someone else was in the cell. He sat up quickly and saw by the light of the small oil lamp a half-starved youth in a tattered samu squatting patiently on the floor. There was a covered bundle by his side.

  ‘Oruri greets you,’ said Shah Shan, rising.

  ‘The greeting is a blessing,’ answered Poul Mer Lo mechanically.

  ‘I sorrow if I have disturbed your meditations.’

  Poul Mer Lo smiled. ‘My meditations were such that I welcome one who interrupts them.’

  Shah Shan indicated the bundle at his feet. ‘My friend, of whom I think you know, bade me bring you some things that were found in the forest. He was of the opinion that they would have some meaning for you.’ He untied the piece of cloth and displayed the contents of the bundle.

  There was one plastic visor, two atomic grenades and a battered transceiver.

  Poul Mer Lo was instantly transformed into Paul Marlowe who, gazing at the odd collection, felt a stinging mistiness in his eyes.

  ‘Who found these things?’ he managed to say at last.

  ‘The priests of Baya Lys.’

  ‘They have found nothing else?’

  ‘Nothing … Except …’ Shah Shan hesitated. ‘My friend told me that it has been reported that a great blackened hole exists in the forest where formerly there was nothing but trees and grass. These objects are certainly very curious. Do they have any significance?’

  ‘They belonged to those who travelled with me in the silver bird.’ Paul Marlowe picked up one of the atomic grenades. ‘This, for example, is a terrible weapon of destruction. If I were to move these studs in a certain way,’ he indicated two tiny recessed levers, ‘the whole of Baya Lys would be consumed by fire.’

  Shah Shan was unperturbed. ‘It is to be hoped,’ he remarked, ‘that, receiving the guidance of Oruri, you will not cause this thing to happen.’