by Parke Godwin
“Barion? Oh, that’s funny” A fresh spate of giggles took Purji. “He was very young and enormously impressed with his own theories, certainly with his lapses into poetry – I understand your Whitman adores him – but no. Never in his most self-congratulatory moments did Barion ever think of himself as a god.”
Speed persisted. “Did Coyul ever think of himself as such to your knowledge?”
“Coyul is a musician.” Purji’s amusement turned tender as she smiled at her beleaguered friend. “He would dearly love to hang a DO NOT DISTURB sign on some remote corner of the Void and just compose. As for being a god or a demon, as you conceive of them, neither vanity is in him.”
“No more questions. Thank you.”
“A moment,” Aurelius interjected from the bench. “Are we to understand that you consider godhead a human vanity?”
Purji’s brief hesitation represented a synthesis too rapid for most computers: an answer comprehensible to a second-century Stoic. “Among the best of humans, the concept of good for its own sake is an ideal. Among us it is a given.”
“A very good answer,” the magistrate considered. “As for vanity, certain of my imperial predecessors allowed themselves to be deified in life.”
“Lifetime is the key,” Purji said. “Yours span less than a century, ours close to a billion years. That’s a long time to cherish illusions, Imperator.”
“Yes, I’ve dropped a few in the last thousand years myself. Proceed, Mr. Helm.”
Purji tried to read Helm as he approached the witness stand; masked as efficiently as Speed. One had to go by surfaces. In the pale blue eyes, flecked with hazel and malice, she could read passion like a concentrated flame but nothing warm.
“You testified that to your knowledge, Coyul never represented or considered himself a god, is that not true?”
She had so testified.
“When did you arrive here? Only a few weeks ago, wasn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“Being elsewhere in the cosmos for considerable time, you weren’t in contact with Coyul for many ages; is that not true?”
“That is true.”
“Then your statement as to his personal attitude and ambitions toward godhead are based on former acquaintance rather than current knowledge, am I correct?”
Purji was forced to admit that as well.
“And the former emperor of Rome, our present judge, himself admitted that one or two of his predecessors accepted the honors of divinity before death. I won’t dwell on that except to note that power is an open door to such temptation. In your former testimony, you implied that you went under another name than Purji on an alien world. Would you tell us that name?”
“They called me Lua-lat”
“And they were called...?”
“Keljians.”
“Thank you and please bear with me,” Helm appealed pleasantly. “I am more interested in this sojourn than my colleague. For myself and the jury, would you enlarge? When did this occur?”
“In Earth terms, about six thousand years ago.”
And how did she come there?
“I was what you’d call a dropout from my society. Bored, looking far a little fun.”
“Lua-lat,” Helm repeated the name. “Interesting. These Keljians are human?”
“Very human. Among the most beautiful of your kind.”
“Names usually have a root meaning in any language. What is the meaning of Lua-lat?”
“It means spirit of love.”
“Spirit of love,” Helm echoed for the jury and spectators. “And you were among these lyrical creatures six thousand years?”
“Yes, I was.”
“A prolonged visit.”
“Not at all by our measure.”
“By any measure. What kept you there?”
“The people and the climate are lovely.”
“Please. Spare me a disingenuous reply. What status did you hold among these folk?”
“He’s going to gut her with this,” Coyul worried to Speed. “Can you object?”
“She mentioned the name in direct testimony,” Speed regretted. Too late he realized his original idea to use Purji as an expert witness on godhead would be vulnerable. He had switched to plain corroboration of Coyul’s testimony, but Helm picked up on her verbal slip about the Keljians. “She’ll have to get out of it by herself, unless I can find valid objection.”
Tell the truth, Purji, Coyul gashed into her mind. But don’t volunteer anything.
“I’ll repeat the question,” Helm said. “What status did you hold among these Keljians?”
“They looked on me as a fertility goddess.”
“A fertility goddess. Well. Despite your earlier testimony that Barion and Coyul modestly eschewed such titles?”
Purji tried to regain lost ground. “You must understand —”
“I do, madam.”
“The timing, the mindset when I arrived. They’d just begun to suspect, as your primitives did, that men had something to do with childbirth. For ages before that, women were a mystery, producing new people from their bodies every now and then. Women were therefore believed to have powerful magic working through them.”
“May we not be precise and call it witchcraft?”
“Objection,” Speed broke in, “The witness is stating a commonplace of modern science that Counsel may have missed in his headlong rush to militant faith.”
“Missed? The implication is naked!”
“Not so bare as your ignorance. Your Honor, must the court send Mr. Helm back to school for common knowledge before he is competent in this case?”
“The implications of testimony seem as obvious to me,” Aurelius ruled. “Witness will answer.”
“If you wish to use that term,” Purji conceded. “They’d just begun to grasp – no, let me rephrase that. What I described was part of their stone age – much longer than yours. Gradually they linked sex with childbirth, but the connection between women and magic as a popular notion lingered on. They considered me magical, appearing and disappearing at will. Gods always reelect the needs and nature of the worshipers. Keljian kings envisioned and carved gods like those of Egypt, a very sophisticated pantheon. The common people had more immediate needs and fashioned much like your own peasants. The need of men and women for each other became an integral part of faith. Sex meant children, children meant strength and prosperity. I filled a need, Mr. Helm. I never considered myself a goddess, but they did. The vacancy came up, as you might say, and I took the job.”
“And allowed yourself to be worshiped as a pagan deity.”
“Object to the word ‘pagan’.”
“Sustained.”
Helm whirled on Aurelius to protest. “Your Honor —”
“Counsel will allow my authority on this point.”
“Not without the taint of bias.”
“With none, sir. As amicus curiae, friend and informant to the court record. The term ‘pagan’ has no relevance where there is no established orthodoxy. In my own time,” Aurelius pointed out, “your faith was considered a radical cult. The pejorative use of ‘pagan’ arose only as your cult prevailed.”
“With all respect” — though Helm’s tone grudged it — “Your Honor may not understand all that is at issue here.”
“On the contrary.” Aurelius did not bother to conceal his weariness with the self-evident point. “Sustained. Get on with it.”
Helm swallowed his irritation with visible effort. “You allowed yourself to be worshiped as a deity?”
“I’m afraid so,” Purji acknowledged.
“Which would hardly seem beyond the fell clutch of vanity – also noted in conversation with the bench. As for filling their need, one can readily believe you an inducement, if not to fertility, at least to procreation.” Helm turned out toward the spectators and the television monitors. “Were you not in fact little more than a temple prostitute?”
Generally bored by the dry stretch of academic de
finitions, the audience came awake with new interest.
The term escaped Purji at first. “Temple... oh yes. Your ancient Babylonians had such a custom. No, my function was different.”
“How?” Helm pressed in on her. “Did you not copulate with Keljian males?”
“Of course; that’s part of the job.”
“Would it not be accurate to say: with any male who desired you?”
Purji struggled to gear her mercurial and vast mind to his narrow line of attack. “Chosen males at chosen times. Why do you harp on –?”
“By any definition, weren’t you a glorified prostitute? Not merely, as you so blithely suggest, a tourist off on a lark, but a whore. In fact, the Great Whore!”
Cresting a tide of applause and vociferous agreement, there came the Oat, unlovely voice of Letti Candor —
“That’s what we’d call her in Kansas!”
The timing as much as the sentiment evoked a burst of laughter from all quarters of the Megachurch. Aurelius pounded for order as the derisive good refused to abate. “Order! Silence, I say! This court has authority to close the hearing to spectators, and so it will if —”
“You may not.” Helm turned on Aurelius, pure vindictive steel. “This is the House of God. You may not close this place to any Christian soul. You will not.”
Applause and cheers greeted the challenge as the court clerk conferred with Aurelius in hurried whispers.
“The court is reminded that Counsel is correct. I may not remove anyone from this place.” Another flurry of cheers mixed with more pointed sentiment.
Aurelius waited them out, choosing his words with care, “Defendant has already implied that I might be biased against him. I refer Defendant and his counsel to the distinction between religion and cult as they were understood in the Roman Empire during my reign. That empire no longer exists in any legal sense, therefore objection to bias is as invalid as any lingering imperial attitude, and the jury is so reminded. The court is less biased toward either side of this contention than any judge from any Christian sect could hope to be. I may bar no one from this place, but if it is necessary to the dignity of these proceedings, I can and will change venue and hear the remainder of this case in the Void.”
The damper was effective. In the press box, Nancy Noncommit hissed into her headset, “Shit, that’s all we need.” She hated any trip across the Void, no matter how brief. No one wanted to be out there for any time or any reason. Aurelius gave the house at large time to meditate on the alternative before motioning to Helm.
“Counsel may proceed.”
“Object,” Speed drawled. “Use of the words ‘prostitute’ and ‘whore’ prejudicial.”
“Question arises from testimony,” Helm rebutted very much as Speed knew he would.
“Overruled, but Counsel will show the reasoning of his interrogation.”
“Your Honor, my reasoning derives from the most ancient basis of Western faith, the Hebrew texts. Purji, are you not in fact the Arch Whore herself? Lilith, the very demon and embodiment of lust?”
“Oh, Lilith.” Purji’s brows elevated in recognition.
“I thought you would recognize the name.”
“Yes, I learned Hebrew this morning. Thought it might help. Lilith is...”
“Yes?”
“A very primitive concept.”
“I would say basic.”
“The Hebrews borrowed her from the Assyrians. Not only a rebellious demon of lust, but rather inconsistently a destroyer of children.”
“Come now,” Helm snapped at her. “If the dark is part of us, as Coyul said, then surely there can be no good without its counterpart evil, as no solid object can stand in sunlight without a shadow. This also is basic. Do you deny that you are Lilith, the embodiment of lust, rebellion and destructive jealousy as Coyul himself is the Devil?’’
“Of course I deny it. I’ve already said —”
“Not Adam’s fast partner in lust? The very uncontrolled spirit of abandon itself?”
“Objection!” Speed was on his feet, an angry edge to his prairie twang. “Objection!”
“And I object to your continual harassment with pointless interruptions!”
They faced each other, the rest of the court forgotten. Noncommit and Cataton pained the ears of their technicians to catch every second. Noncommit hadn’t caught live stuff this good since the fascist leader Roy Stride got a juicy tostada in the face and his erstwhile girlfriend called him an asshole for a fifty-share of fascinated post-life viewers. Helm knew the cameras were on him and played to them now. “Let all of this go in the record,” he demanded.
“Damn you, you little —”
“Counsel for Plaintiff is out of order!”
“I don’t have a word for you, Helm. The witness has testified she’s an alien —”
“Alien as any demon!”
“You’re trying to blacken her with a naked appeal to ignorance and superstition.”
“Order!” Aurelius commanded. “Counsels will both come to order before I hold them in contempt.”
“By God!”
Coyul blinked open-mouthed. The lurching, clumsy Speed had suddenly become a monolith before him, “Put me in contempt then. He’s the hanging judge with this primitive cant and spurious dragging in by the heels of medieval metaphysics. By all that’s decent and holy, Helm, I’d like to put you on the stand and ask what glorious chapter of the Inquisition you illuminated.”
“None, sir, but for such great purpose —”
“For God’s sake, man, Can’t you conduct yourself like a gentleman?”
“Gentleman?” Helm appealed the proposition to his audience for its sublime absurdity. “Is that all you can bring against me, all you can weigh against my holy cause; that in a matter of such eternal pith and significance, I am no gentleman?” He dismissed the suggestion with utter contempt. “Christ my witness.”
“This is heaven,” Cataton glowed. “Stay on them both. I love it.”
“The Devil himself has been considered urbane,” Helm seethed. “As he sits here before us, certainly I can find no better description. Chivalry? You ask such hollow considerations of me when I confront the greatest lie of the ages?” Helm’s voice broke with his effort. “Here in this tormenting place where the faithful find not the City of God but only this ambiguous limbo, venal and mundane as any earthly wallow? You charge me with bad manners when the cosmos cries out for one answer and this creature on the stand defiles every thing that —” Helm halted mid-thought, trembling. “Let me tell you plain. I have broken such things as her on the rack and would again. I call on Christ to witness I would put my own flesh and blood to torture for such a cause, even my own body, purifying my means by their holy end.”
“As did the Inquisition!” Speed slammed back at him, “Your Honor, I apologize to the court for my interruption and remarks. The censure of Counsel’s tactics is your province, not mine.” Speed clumped back to his table, muttering to Coyul as he sat down, “How’d I do?”
Coyul was surprised. “You mean all that was calculated?”
“Oh, my heart was in it. Also my method.” The church was full of Americans. One thing Americans had always suspected were Europeans and their influence. One thing the common people always aspired to – and Speed came from their heart – was to be ladies and gentleman. They might deny it in an egalitarian flush on the Fourth of July, but the old yearning was there.
Helm could only accede with as much grace as possible. “My apologies as well, Your Honor.”
“Thank you... gentlemen,” Aurelius accepted with an acerbic smile. “Nice of you to return the court to me. One more outburst from either of you and venue removes to the Void.”
“Defense withdraws the question out of deference to Counsel’s fragile sensibilities.”
“That’s white of you,” said Speed. “Can you spare it?”
“Please don’t withdraw.” Forgotten in the flurry of emotion, Purji enjoined Helm. “I would l
ike very much to answer the question.”
“It is withdrawn,” Aurelius instructed her, “You need not.”
“But I would, Imperator.” Purji’s smile made Aurelius momentarily forget his Stoicism. “Mr. Helm’s question reflects a deep faith if not a profound understanding, and deserves an answer.”
For the benefit of the jury, Helm noted, “One cannot fail to note that Lilith and Lua-lat sound suspiciously alike.”
“Or lily,” Purji reminded him. “A flower associated with the resurrection of your Christ. The similarity of sounds from one language to another is a shaky argument, Mr. Helm.”
Furthermore he had repeatedly mentioned “the uncontrolled fire of lust” by which she assumed he meant the dangerous female principle uncontrolled by worried males, implying that it must somehow be controlled. Another commonplace, predictable when the human mind tried to separate spirit from flesh, calling one holy and the other impure. The old dichotomy of light and dark, chaos and order.
Listening to her, Coyul remembered saying as much to Barion when they stood over that flea-bitten ape at a Pliocene waterhole. But no, you had all the answers.
“In this unnatural schism,” Purji went on, “the very heart of religion becomes schizophrenic. What you call pagan rites are as much a part of the process as what replaced them, and with a valid truth of their own. Forgive me.” She massaged her temples to ease the strain. “Among my own kind so much of this is expressed in accepted formulae, it’s hard to conceive of anyone debating it. The people, the poor, always have a sharper sense of reality, living so close to it. Mostly they were the poor who came to me for their marriage rites. Dazzled when I blazed on my altar and then descended among them in flesh. They built the temple and the rites were theirs, prized by them. They brought loaves baked from the best of the little grain they could spare, fruit from their few trees, even roast meat from their own herds, barely afforded but never grudged on a wedding day. Now and then their masters might eke out the feast with leftovers and feel complacently virtuous, much like yours.