[The Wandering Jew 1] - My First Two Thousand Years the Autobiography of the Wandering Jew

by Viereck, George Sylvester

  “It is la Festa del Grillo, uncle! Summer! On such a day surely I may have a fling at life…”

  The Baron laughed.

  How had I been so unobservant? The handsome youth was a girl! The scoundrels that accosted them suspected aright. Nevertheless, there was in the slim, graceful figure, a touch of something that justified the boyish mummery.

  “Uncle,” said the other, “we have invited these gentlemen to be our guests.”

  “Splendid, Antonio,” the uncle remarked.

  Antonio, slim and impetuous, was evidently a boy. However it imposed no strain upon the imagination to regard him as a girl in disguise. Without being effeminate he still had that first bloom of childhood, which is either sexless or epicene.

  “Is it proper really,” I asked, “to intrude upon you in this fashion?”

  “I insist, signor, you must be my guests,” the Baron replied.

  “I asked the young gentlemen—or as I notice now—the signor and the signorina, whether they were quite certain they were not inviting…most sinister characters.”

  “Sinister characters!” the uncle laughed. “I do not think a gentleman can ever disguise himself.”

  “It was easy for the signorina to masquerade as a lad.”

  Antonia clapped her hands. “I am so glad I deceived you.”

  “You ought to see me dressed as a woman,” Antonio interjected.

  “Oh yes, he is wonderful!” exclaimed Antonia. “He should have been a woman…and I a man, really.”

  “Silence, woman,” the boy commanded gravely, “or I shall presently chastise you.”

  Antonia laughed. “You should have heard him threaten the three scoundrels that were annoying us, Uncle. ‘It is fortunate for you that we left our swords at home. Stand aside, let us pass, or tomorrow you shall swing from the gibbet.’ ”

  Everybody laughed.

  “Really, signor, these young scatterbrains are keen at reading faces. They take after their mother, my sister, a remarkable woman. May her soul rest in peace!”

  “We hesitated to accept your invitation because we are strangers in Florence and have no wish to transgress upon your kindness. I am Count de Cartaphile of Provence.”

  “Count de Cartaphile!” the Baron exclaimed. “A descendant of Count de Cartaphile who single-handed slew a regiment of infidels and captured the Holy Sepulchre almost alone?”

  I nodded.

  “What a fortunate coincidence, children!”

  Antonio and Antonia looked at me with new interest.

  “What an honor, Count…and what a delightful surprise! I am writing the history of the Crusades. How often I have spoken to my nephew and to my niece about the exploits of your ancestor, and his companion, the Red Knight! I once wrote to you to Provence but evidently my message, entrusted to a wandering scholar, failed to reach its destination. You must be our guest, Count—as long as you remain in Florence.”

  “Yes, yes,” the children insisted.

  I promised to stay overnight.

  Baron di Martini showed me the garden and orchard which surrounded the castle. Kotikokura walked behind us between two large dogs, black as charcoal.

  “The more I read about the chivalrous deeds of Count de Cartaphile and the Red Knight, the more fascinating those two characters become.”

  We walked in silence for a while in a deluge of flowers.

  “Do you think it really possible, Baron, for two knights such as the Count de Cartaphile and the Red Knight—single-handed—to capture the Holy Sepulchre from a thousand defenders?”

  I looked at him quizzically.

  He nodded. “Sheer physical strength is not enough. Your ancestor may have known the secret word that enlists invisible powers. Both he and the Red Knight, too, undoubtedly called angels in armor to help. The hosts of Heaven were their retinue.”

  “I am familiar with these legends. Our family chronicle tells that the Red Knight appeared in several places at once…”

  “Space and time,” the Baron replied, “are not subject to immutable laws. Their limitations are more elastic…”

  “Are you,” I asked, “a mathematician as well as a historian?”

  “Why?”

  “In my youth, I had a friend—a distinguished Arabian mathematician—who resembled you very much, Baron, and I often noticed that those who resemble each other physically have much in common mentally.”

  “Our thoughts shape our features, no doubt.”

  “Or, perhaps, our features shape our thoughts…”

  “Truth,” the Baron replied, “is an equation permitting of many solutions and it is sometimes difficult to draw a clear line of division. Even sex and personality are not always defined. Human character, too, may be a double equation. The unknown quantity may stand for both good and evil.”

  “You are indeed a philosopher.”

  “My nephew and niece,” the Baron continued, “are a double equation. They look alike and they think the same thoughts. You can substitute one for the other…”

  “Remarkable children,” I added.

  “And very lovely. But there they are, whispering to each other. I am quite certain they are conspiring to keep you with us beyond tomorrow.”

  Antonio and Antonia advanced toward us.

  “How delicate is youth!” I said.

  “Nothing,” the Baron added, “surpasses the loveliness of spring. I wish I could keep them from growing older! Before long I shall lose them. Each will go and lose himself in the labyrinth of love and life…”

  “Worse still, perhaps…they will lose each other!”

  Antonia and Antonio raced toward us. Each offered me a rose.

  The boy’s rose was white, hers red. My face flushed. I was a little embarrassed, a pleasurable sensation. ‘How many centuries have passed Cartaphilus,’ I thought, ‘since you have last blushed! You are still young… It is well.’

  “You are too kind,” I said, at loss for words.

  “Without you, Count, we might be dead…”Antonia remarked archly.

  “You exaggerate your peril.”

  “No, no, Count,” the Baron interposed. “You do not know the Florentines. Art and crime both flourish within our walls.”

  “Count,” said the girl, “you must know many stories…”

  “Tell us one,” said the boy.

  “A story!” the girl repeated.

  “They still are children,” the Baron remarked, “even if they pretend to be grown up.”

  Kotikokura ran, the dogs after him, barking lustily.

  “It is strange, Count—those two dogs, ordinarily ferocious toward strangers, have become from the first moment inseparable companions of your man.” “He is a lover of animals, Baron, and animals, no doubt, scent his affection at once.”

  Antonio and Antonia, on either side of me, we walked slowly through the garden. The delicate pressure of their arms—one barely heavier than the other—delighted me. It was like the warm pulsation of the heart of a bird.

  The Baron, summoned by the Prince on business of state, apologized for his absence and asked the scatterbrains—as he was pleased to call the children whenever he was most affectionate—to entertain me.

  We were sitting in a corner of the enormous reception hall, whose walls had been frescoed by the old masters of Florence, Antonio on my right, Antonia on my left. Kotikokura sat opposite us, a dog on either side of him.

  I raised the chin of Antonio with my forefinger, then that of Antonia, and looked into their eyes.

  “Who are you?” I asked.

  They smiled.

  “Who are you?” I repeated.

  “We are Toni,” Antonia answered.

  “Both Toni?”

  They nodded.

  “Are you one or two?”

  “We are one and two.”

  “Where did I meet you before?”

  “You met me…far, far away,” said Antonia, speaking like a child that is telling a fairy tale.

  “And me still
farther,” added Antonio with boyish eagerness.

  “He always tries to outdo me, Count. It is the vanity of the male…”

  “Silence, woman!” the boy commanded. “Man is the master.”

  “No!” she exclaimed.

  “Woman must remain the inferior of man—always,” the boy insisted.

  “Toni!” she exclaimed. “How can you say that?”

  “Except you, my dear. But you are not a woman.”

  “Well, I shall be one.”

  “Never!”

  “Yes…and I shall be the queen of a great nation where women rule over men.”

  “Do you not think that woman is the equal of man, Count?” Antonia asked.

  “Some women are the equal of goddesses.”

  “See?”

  “Then some men are the equal of gods, Count.”

  “They are.”

  “And is not a god greater than a goddess?”

  “Sex distinctions are not important among the gods…”

  “See, Toni? But Count, tell us the story you promised!”

  They pulled their chairs nearer to me.

  “Ready!” they both exclaimed.

  “Once upon a time, there were two children—a boy and a girl– —”

  “No, no, Count.”

  “We are no longer children.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Of course.”

  “Some of the things I shall tell, you may not understand.”

  They laughed.

  “Count,” Antonio whispered, “we have read Aretino and Boccaccio.”

  Antonia blushed a little and nodded.

  “What!” I exclaimed in mock reproof.

  For a moment, they were nonplussed but, catching a faint smile about my lips, they burst into laughter. Each placed an arm upon my shoulders, and their voices mingling into one, said: “You cannot deceive us, Count. You too believe that the beautiful is the good. Uncle sometimes tries to appear severe on moral questions. Dear uncle—he considers himself responsible for our welfare. But you are like an older brother. You can afford to be candid with us…”

  “You are right, little sister and brother.”

  “Don’t call us little,” Antonia reprimanded me. “Call us sister and brother.”

  I placed my arms about their waists. “Brother and sister, you are supremely good, because you are supremely beautiful…and as long as you will be beautiful, you will be good. Ugliness is the only sin…”

  “Tediousness is the only evil,” Antonia added sagely.

  I related divers experiences. By merely calling the centuries years and the years months, I discovered that, after all, one could squeeze upon a tiny canvas what had been spread leisurely upon an enormous wall. Although I used various names to hide my identity, they knew perfectly well that I was telling my own experiences.

  Salome and Ulrica intrigued Antonia, Flower-of-the-Evening and Damis fascinated Antonio. They asked questions, apparently very innocently and merely for the sake of elucidation, but in reality they showed that uncanny prescience of sex which sometimes startles us in the very young.

  I thought of the white rose, symbol of purity, whose perfume and pollen are but sexual allurement to entice the bee and the butterfly. Under the petal of their youth, the children’s senses were stirred, and the perfume of their desire was wafted to me.

  They snuggled against me. Suddenly, Antonia stood up. “Why, my dear, the Count must be thirsty and hungry too.”

  Antonio clapped his hands. “Why, of course! You will never be a woman, sister. You will never think of important trifles.”

  She smiled. Was her smile irony? Was it wisdom? Was it pity? Was she a daughter of the Sphinx?

  A servant entered. Antonia ordered wine and cakes and fruits in such abundance that I burst out laughing.

  “You overestimate my capacity.”

  Antonia filled our cups. We drank to beauty, which is truth, and to truth which is beauty.

  “Oh,” she exclaimed suddenly, “we have forgotten him.” She pointed to Kotikokura who was smiling, his eyes half-closed. “He is such a queer and dear fellow,” she whispered.

  She filled a cup for him and brought him some cakes and fruit.

  I told them anecdotes about Africa and India. Cheered by the wine, they laughed uproariously.

  “What a strange ring you have, Count. Is it from India?”

  “No, Toni—this ring belonged to one of Mohammed’s nephews…it brings good luck to its wearer.”

  “Has it brought good luck to you?”

  “I have had the good fortune of meeting you.”

  “It is rather the other way, then, Count. He who wears it brings good luck to those with whom he comes in contact.”

  “Do you really think it beautiful?”

  “Very.”

  “Well, then, I shall have it cut and made into two rings, and if you will allow me, I shall present each of you with one, so that you may always have good luck or bring good luck to others.”

  “Oh, Count, you are too good to us, really!” they exclaimed, their fingers pecking at my sleeves like small birds.

  “We shall remember you—always,” Antonio said.

  “Whenever we are unaccountably happy, we shall think of you.” Antonia added.

  “Will you think of us, too?” the boy asked.

  “I shall think of you—long after you have forgotten me.”

  “Count, would you like to see the rings our mother gave us before she died?”

  “Oh, yes, Toni, bring the little box.”

  Antonio went out. Antonia placed her small hand in mine and leaned her head against my shoulder.

  “Count…who are you?”

  I was startled.

  “Who are you?”

  I kissed her dark tresses gently, and equally gently removed my hand from hers. This bud was too tender, too beautiful, to be plucked.

  Antonio returned. He opened a small gold box, with two rings livid with exquisite rubies. Centuries of mystery and of passion seemed to slumber in the depths of the stones.

  “How beautiful!” I exclaimed.

  “Mother told us to wear them when we are happy. Shall we not wear them tonight, brother?” And the two rings blazed on the hands of the children, flaming like rose leaves, scarlet like drops of blood.

  Kotikokura snored, his head resting upon one of the dogs, their shadow mingling and forming a bulky elephant whose trunk made a semicircle.

  We talked, intoxicated by something that was not wine. At last nature demanded her toll. The sandman strewed his ware into the golden eyes of the two children. Antonio yawned. Antonia blinked.

  “It is time to retire,” I said.

  They were reluctant, but finally yielded.

  At the door, Antonia threw me a kiss. Antonio raised his hand half-way, checked himself, and blushed.

  I was about to draw the curtains of my bed, when I heard footsteps, hardly heavier than those of a cat, approach. I strained my eyes, but I could see nothing. The hall was very long, and I had time to conjecture.

  A soft-tipped finger pressed against my lips. “Sh…” I moved slowly toward the wall. The bed hardly felt the weight of her.—She pressed her lips on mine.—My hands were many mouths, drinking nectar.—A long kiss.—A pressure of breast against breast, a mingling of lips, a moan…

  Like some white weightless feather which a zephyr wafts about a garden, she rose and disappeared in the blackness of the room.—Thoughts like many-colored confetti fell softly upon my brain, making beautiful patterns which bore no names.– —

  Suddenly, I heard the soft footsteps again. Was she returning? Did her lips ache for another kiss…? Again the pressure of a finger against my lips. “Sh…” Again a kiss, tender and impetuous. Did my hands deceive me? Was not beauty a flame? Was not joy a slow swooning?

  I awoke. I rubbed my eyes and forehead trying to remember something—something incredibly beautiful and delicious. What was it? When did I…? Was it a d
ream? I felt a pressure against my thigh. The ruby—a frozen drop of flame—on the head of the serpent.

  “Antonia,” I whispered.

  I placed the ring upon my small finger. It fitted perfectly. I rose. Something fell to the floor.

  “The other ring! Antonio?” I placed the ring on top of the other. They melted into one.

  ‘Who are you?’

  ‘We are Toni.’

  ‘Both Toni?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Are you one or two?’

  ‘We are one and two.’

  ‘Both one?’

  ‘Yes.’

  How incredibly beautiful!

  The Double Blossom of Passim—the almost impossible loveliness of John and Mary in one!

  A courier arrived with a letter from Baron di Martini. Affairs of state compelled him to prolong his absence for a few weeks. Unfortunately, the presence of the “scatterbrains” was also essential. Meanwhile, he would consider it a special favor if I remained his guest.

  “Are the children gone?” I asked.

  “Yes, Count. Early this morning, a messenger from the Duke came to fetch them.”

  “Kotikokura, we must go.”

  He sighed. His eye caught my hand. He grinned. I felt a little uneasy.

  “It is the gift of the children.”

  Then, discreetly as ever, Kotikokura made preparations for our departure.

  “Before I go I must see a goldsmith who will make two rings of this one—one for Antonio and one for Antonia. Alas, Kotikokura, we shall never see the children again—at least, never as they were…last night…never. Ah, the perfect hour of youth is more frail than the outer rim of the moon when the dawn kisses her lips!”

  LXIV: MAN A RHEUMATIC TORTOISE—I TAKE STOCK OF MYSELF—I BRING THE HOLY GRAIL TO ALEXANDER VI—I DISCUSS THEOLOGY WITH THE POPE—THE HOLY FATHER AND HIS UNHOLY FAMILY—I AM TALKATIVE—ALEXANDER ASKS A QUESTION—TRAPPED

  KOTIKOKURA and I walked along the shore of the Tiber which, heavy with recent rain, moved ponderously like a man newly enriched. Lonesomeness made me shiver with a sudden chill. I took Kotikokura’s arm and felt comforted a little. Strange that this queer being—captured almost like a wild animal in the African jungle—was my only companion.