Jewel of the Moon: Short Stories

by William Kotzwinkle

They walked back to the stone bridge spanning the stream. He looked up it toward the next bridge, where two men stood gazing at the river. “We can ask them.”

  “Look,” said Marie, bending to retrieve a flower from the sidewalk. It was a magenta orchid, wrapped in cellophane and still fresh. Green ferns surrounded it and the arrangement was gathered at the base into a pointed stem. She looked up and down the street, but whoever had dropped the flower had disappeared.

  “It’s for Jung,” said DuJohn.

  “Yes,” she said, “I guess it must be. But we’ve got to find the cemetery first.”

  He turned back toward the bridge. The two men who’d been watching the water were gone, and for a moment he wondered if they’d been apparitions and the flower their work. Hadn’t Jung been called the Hexenmeister of Zurich?

  “The town’s not that big,” he said. “If we keep wandering we’re bound to come to it.”

  Marie led the way, into the kind of winding little street she liked best, a narrowness that spoke of horse-drawn carriages. DuJohn stalked the elusive feeling with her, of the venerable spirit hiding in old passages. It showed its gray beard momentarily and moved on, from lane to lane, promising to reveal more, only to vanish again. The labyrinth led higher into the hills, where the stone pavement ended and the houses fell away. The forest was ahead of them now.

  They climbed a wide path rising gently through pines and birch. Beside it the stream still meandered, down through the woods. The smell of pine brought DuJohn the feeling he always had in forests, of someone following close behind him—a sprite from the earth or a tree gnome. He’d cut a lot of trees down in his time, and once, on a spring day in the north woods, he’d apologized to a great stand of spruce that he and some other loggers were cutting through. A childlike voice had replied to him, Man is not our father, our father is the sun.

  Now, at the top of the wooded hill, he rested on a carpet of pine needles, and stared up through the branches. Man is not our father, our father is the sun. It had been a gentle voice, and he’d thought of the trees as dancers then, exotics performing for their father the sun—root dancers, limb dancers, the aspen the most delicate of the dancers, and the apple striking poses of great mystery.

  He put his arm around Marie. “ ‘There is none like thee among the dancers.’ It’s by Ezra Pound. I wish I could remember the rest. I’ve often wondered why I can’t memorize poetry. I practiced that piece of Pound’s every day for a year and I’ve forgotten it completely.”

  “That’s the sort of mind you have,” said Marie, from the crook of his arm.

  “There have been occasions when I could have come out with an appropriate line of poetry and impressed everyone.”

  “Thank goodness you didn’t.”

  “I suppose it’s a blessing in a way.” He closed his eyes and said again softly, “There is none like thee among the dancers.”

  The sun went in and out of the clouds, the forest alternating between gray and gold, settling finally on gray, which brought the wind. He felt the rumble of thunder moving in the earth, and they stood, and continued on. When the hilltop revealed its view, it was of a giant mechanical crane and the steel skeleton of a high rise. The great arm of the crane swung along the hillside. See Europe before it turns into Cleveland, a friend had told him.

  The high-rise side of the mountain took them to a steep winding street, and here the houses did not whisper of antique spirits. The drives, the gardens, the name-plates spoke frankly of sound investments. On one of the gates was a forbidding sign: Warnung—von dem Hund.

  “Beware of the dog,” said DuJohn. “There he is.” They looked over the shrubbery and saw a miniature schnauzer on the sidewalk. He was lost in a dream, staring into the grass. They stepped closer and he remained oblivious of them, involved in quiet doggy mysteries. The memory of a bone? wondered DuJohn, deciding it probably wasn’t, that it probably had to do with things less specific than bones, things so vague and fleeting that only a half-sleeping dog could begin to comprehend them.

  “Mein Herr Hund,” said DuJohn softly, and began writing the hund a letter: We saw your sign and ver vundering if you are der famous vunderhund. Knowing you are busy vunderhunding your premises and trusting this short note vill not distract you, ve are, faithfully, your admiring public.

  They walked on and, after the first bend, the road down the hillside turned so suddenly steep that their legs were forced into awkward steps, like two wooden puppets. But other footsteps sounded behind them, and they were swiftly passed by a young man carrying a briefcase, who glided loosely down the grade as if he had wheels in his feet.

  “He understands this hill,” said DuJohn.

  “We should have asked him directions to the cemetery.”

  “We’d have broken his stride. He’s like those Tibetan mailmen who can run for days in a trance. It’s forbidden to speak to them.”

  They rounded the bend; the walking man was far below already. DuJohn tried to loosen his own stride, unsuccessfully. One has to train, he reflected, learn the fine points. He crouched, trying to find the natural downward flow, saw a door opening in a townhouse ahead of him and quickly straightened, not wishing to look like a demented American.

  A woman appeared in the doorway, leading her two children. They walked to the drive and got into a new Mercedes. As she slipped behind the wheel, the woman glanced at DuJohn. She was nearing middle age with grace, her hair pulled back in a severe and flattering line, her body trim. But DuJohn caught something in the glance, or was it in the air of the house, like a sigh that escaped from every pore of her graceful life. He suspected she did not know how to glide down this hill either.

  At the bottom of the hill, they entered the main street of Küsnacht again. The shops had now closed, their windows shuttered; he saw the open doorway of a newspaper office and went to ask directions there, and found in the outer hall a large street plan of Küsnacht. There were two cemeteries, green areas marked with crosses, one at each end of town. He carefully traced the line they had to take, stepped outside, got his bearings, and started off. A few blocks later none of the streets bore the names he sought. “Well, either way we go is correct,” he said. “We’re bound to find one cemetery or the other. How’s our flower holding up?”

  He looked into the fragrant interior of the blossom, but it was not the flower it had been at sunrise, its life seeping slowly away.

  They walked on, expecting the cemetery to appear at every turning. It shouldn’t be this far, thought DuJohn. I’ve gotten turned around and we’re headed for the cemetery at the other end of town. Well, process of elimination. We know Jung’s buried in Küsnacht.

  “Do the street signs look familiar yet?” asked Marie.

  “No, I don’t know where we are.”

  “We can ask that woman,” she said, nodding toward the corner of the next block, where a stout Frau was pushing a wheelbarrow along her sidewalk.

  Instead, he led them toward a wooded area below, that might mark the far end of Küsnacht, where the cemetery should be. They found railroad tracks. He sat down with a sigh on the embankment and Marie sat beside him, the flower in her lap.

  His legs were starting to tire, and the day was turning colder. A shadow of complaint started to cast itself across his mind— I’m worn out and we’re wandering around like a pair of idiots —except that he knew the only way to wander around was precisely that way, like an idiot. Then the enchantment had a chance.

  But it would have no chance at all if he started grumbling about tired feet. A letter was in order, to the first spirit of the day: Dear Mottled Swan, we saw your glorious mottled plumage and excellent pink bill, and shall always think of it with vunder and admiration. Respectfully, your secret friends.

  “Maybe if we tried this path,” he said, standing. They followed the path, which ended in a backyard. “This isn’t the way to the cemetery.”

  “Maybe,” said Marie quietly, “we should ask the woman with the wheelbarrow.”

 
They retraced their steps back to the street, where the Frau was tipping a barrow of wet cement into a sidewalk form. There was a cemetery in this direction, she informed them, but it was on the top of the hill, very far. “It’s the old cemetery. I do not recommend walking there. Try the new cemetery, that way,” she said, pointing in the direction of the newspaper office, from which they’d started.

  They walked on as instructed, but DuJohn was certain the woman was wrong. “Jung’s buried in the old cemetery on the hill. I’m sure of it. The commanding view. That’s Jung’s style.”

  “But she said we should try the other one, the new one.”

  “Yes, but she doesn’t know who we’re looking for. I mean, a person gets buried where they want to, not where the lady with the wheelbarrow thinks they should be buried.”

  However, he continued on, letting himself be led in the wrong direction, though he knew Jung was buried on the hill. But we’ll go to this other cemetery first and look at every stone and then come back and climb the hill to the old cemetery. If we get there in the dark it doesn’t matter.

  They came to the newspaper office again. “Let me check the map one more time.” He went inside, found Lake Zurich at the bottom of the map and realized he’d been looking at it upside down, in the manner of a true path finder. The cemetery should be right around the corner.

  “I think it’s that way,” said Marie, “by the church we went to at the start.”

  They crossed over the stone bridge again, past the little stream, walked one block and saw the green lawn dotted with headstones. It was a small cemetery, surrounded by business and residential streets. “I’m sure the Warlock of Zurich’s not buried here. There’s too much noise all around—no communion with nature.”

  “We should look anyway.”

  “Sure,” said DuJohn. “We’ve got to.” He started at the extreme corner and began a methodical examination of each stone. He looked up and saw Marie wandering casually down the gravel lane. That was not the way to look, of course, but he didn’t want to seem overbearing. He’d keep his mouth shut, look at every single stone himself, and in that way be absolutely certain Jung wasn’t there.

  He completed the first row, began on the second, studying each name carefully. A systematic approach is sometimes necessary, if uncertainty is not to creep in and take over one’s mood. We’ve got that high hill to climb to the old cemetery and we want to be absolutely sure we’re on the right trail, in order to open ourselves and flow with the undercurrent of the day. Jung is up there, where the view is, where the wind blows, where the old Swiss are buried.

  Marie’s whistle came to him, from behind a row of trees. As he turned the corner of the leaves, he saw her kneeling, placing the orchid into the earth, among other flowers. A small stone pool of water graced the edge of the grave.

  So this is it, thought DuJohn, kneeling to read the gravestone:

  Called or not, God is always present

  Star Cruisers, Welcome

  The ramp touched down in stone and rubble, and captain and crew descended. Here on the abandoned fringes of the city, they could move with impunity. On all sides were dilapidated buildings—windows broken, doors hanging off their hinges. A navigational assistant spoke over his map. “The inhabitants call it the Bronx.”

  “A wretched place—”

  “Its degenerate quality, sir, is typical of all areas adjacent to the planet’s civilized centers.”

  The captain turned back toward his spacecraft and was reassured by its hum of vigilance. Surrounding it were bands of vibrating light which none could approach without triggering annihilation. Its landing struts balanced it in a vacant lot between two dark buildings in a desolate landscape. No life moved, up and down deserted streets, and he anticipated no intrusion; should there be one, the ship could take care of itself.

  “Will the inhabitants be of any practical use?”

  “Something like pack animals, I suppose.”

  “You expect no resistance?”

  “The creatures are retarded. There’ll be some token fighting, but after a bout or two, they’ll give in, I promise you.”

  The robot guard flanked the expeditionary group, and the party went forward. Doorways were investigated, found empty. Every building was abandoned. “The fleet can land here, as we thought. Conquest of Manhattan should take no more than an hour. The entire planet shall fall in similar fashion.” The colonel’s brilliant eyes glowed as they swept the landscape. “We’ll level this area and Doctor 5’s group will begin their cycling. The stone will be delicious, I’m told.” The colonel’s mouth made a loud grinding sound, and the captain’s mouth repeated the feeding reflex with an ominous echo.

  “Hungry?” quipped Doctor 5. “We’ll eat soon enough. This whole altar of forgotten nourishment will be devoured. What creatures, not to have savored their finest delicacy, the planetary body itself.”

  “They eat only its by-products, sir,” said an assistant. “That is their evolutionary path. It creates no strength, but it does leave the planet intact, while we have devoured ours and a good many others.”

  “We are titans of hunger,” said the colonel. “That is our greatness.”

  The captain looked at the colonel and smiled at the old soldier’s mindless repetition of the army line. A little stale, perhaps? But where would we be without them, when there are worlds to be eaten?

  The doctor and his team dug in the pockmarked street, whirling to great depths in seconds and bringing up layered samples. Analysis was performed and Doctor 5 nodded as each specimen was graded. “All quite satisfactory. We can digest the planet to the center, even here in this wasteland, this Bronx.”

  “Caution.” The electronic voice of the robot guard sounded, and the machine sped forward. The captain moved up beside the guard. “What is it?”

  “There.” The robot’s arm extended, toward a dark alleyway between two buildings. The captain sent the robot down it first, and then the group followed.

  “What’s he picking up?”

  “I think he’s oversensitized. I’m not getting anything from the environment, are you?”

  “Probably the local rodent. Not much to worry about. Overly cautious, these mechanical monsters of ours.” The doctor slapped the robot on the back.

  “Caution.” The robot repeated its observation, its electronic eyes illuminating a section of wall, on which large sprawling letters had been painted:

  WALTON AVENUE BALDIES

  “What could that mean? Bring the squawk box.”

  The sprawling letters of the message were copied into a small pulsing instrument, which received them with an internal whisper, clicked several times, and addressed the group. “Walton . . . Avenue . . . thoroughfare in suggested Landing Area.” The machine paused, clicked again, continued. “Bald — ies. Hairless beings? Need additional input.”

  “No need for that,” said the doctor. “Unimportant rubbish, like everything in this place. Switch it off.”

  The expeditionary party turned and withdrew from the dank corridor. “That glow in the sky ahead. That is the great city of Manhattan?”

  “Easily surrounded by air and water. It’ll be totally cut off, while our main garrison sets up here, in the more spacious if somewhat revolting Bronx.”

  The team started back up the darkened streets, toward the landing site, moving uninhibitedly now, through the desolate place. “Robot 2, continue forward there, no shuffling.”

  The robot’s firing arm came up. “Enemy attack.” The chilling mechanical indifference of its voice ran through the captain’s brain, and he hurried forward, waves of alarm tingling through his mental coils. Then, turning the corner where the robot stood, he saw a sight he’d never thought to see in a thousand years’ traveling of the galaxy.

  “Impossible! It can’t be—” He stood, ashen-faced, trembling, despair filling his soul. In another moment Colonel 12 was beside him. “What—”

  “The ship . . .”

  It stood before
them in the moonlight, its hull stripped. The landing struts, wheels, brakes, were gone, and the ship had been tipped on its side like a beached whale. Its armor plate, capable of withstanding atomic attack, had somehow been pried off, leaving only a thin shell over the frame. The power hatches were open and the ship’s primary guidance systems were hanging out in a tangle.

  Rockets were gone, along with bomb loads. Even the portholes and cockpit windows had been dismantled, sockets gaping blindly at the sky.

  The captain raced up the steps into the ship. A ruined interior awaited him, walls torn open, wires ripped out. He stumbled forward. The finest cruiser in the galaxy, reduced to junk inside an hour.

  On all sides was destruction, every piece of hardware removed, including door latches. He stepped through into his command center. It lay in pieces before him, the brain of the ship lobotomized, cut, torn out, clipped off. He went to an automatic recording device, one of the few units left untouched. He pressed it, and the machine clicked on, replaying the sounds of the last hour.

  “That’s all the copper wire. Ought to bring five, ten dollar . . .”

  “. . . nice move, Benny. Fernando, get the chrome, an’ those headphones. . .”

  “. . . Larry, grab that tv screen . . . and those revolvin’ chairs . . .”

  “. . . the whole fancy-pants burglar alarm system. Should be able to sell that somewhere . . .”

  “Hey, you dudes done in there? We foun’ the booze.”

  “Tha’s some weird-smellin’ juice. Sure it ain’t hair oil?”

  “Gonna drink it anyway . . .”

  The captain switched the recorder off and stumbled his way back into the corridor. Colonel 12 was standing there amidst the wreckage. “. . . a miscalculation . . . our reconnaissance . . . nothing like this was reported . . .”

  “Reconnaissance,” muttered the captain, looking at his dismantled cabin. His personal possessions were gone—his sun cups, his store of the wines of Canopus, other treasures gathered from around the universe. “They’ve ruined us, Colonel. In less than an hour.”