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

by Viereck, George Sylvester

  I felt warm flesh pressing against mine. Herma lay between Salome and me. “Salome,” I whispered, my words coming into my mouth from an immense distance, “Salome!”

  “Cartaphilus!”

  “Must always a dream or another human form, however lovely, interfere between Salome and Cartaphilus?”

  “When Salome conquers the moon—Cartaphilus shall conquer Salome.”

  Something beat against my ear like a bass drum—bang, bang, bang! I could not open my eyes. Bang-bang-bang! I must see—I must! Bang-bang-bang! I must! Bang, bang! I opened my eyes wide, wide, for fear they would close again.

  It was morning. The sun pierced vainly through the curtained windows. All about me, men and women snored and groaned or lay still, like dead. Herma slept, her face bloated, her lips frozen into an ironic grin. Salome was gone!

  Bang, bang, bang! Some one was knocking furiously at the door. No one moved. The servants had disappeared. I rose, tottered to the door, and opened it.

  Kotikokura, wild-eyed, his sword drawn, was ready to strike.

  “Kotikokura!” I exclaimed.

  “Ca-ta-pha!” His sword dropped. “Ca-ta-pha!” He embraced me.

  “This is the enchanted palace of Persia, Kotikokura,” I grumbled.

  He took me in his arms like a child and placed me in a carriage. I fell asleep. When I awoke again, Kotikokura administered cognac and iced oranges.

  “What has happened, Kotikokura? Where have I been?”

  He explained that he suddenly became aware that I had disappeared from the salon of the Marquise. Nobody had seen me go. He shouted: Where is Ca-ta-pha, god Ca-ta-pha? Everybody laughed. He rushed out, upsetting several men and women. He looked for me at the hotel and at the cafe’s,—everywhere indeed where I was accustomed to go. He feared foul play. He had heard of spies and kidnappers. He rushed about the streets, calling out: “Ca-ta-pha! Ca-ta-pha!” He stopped carriages, peered into windows, and finally returned to the hotel. I had disappeared! Meanwhile, day was breaking. He was desperate and commenced to search once more.

  Finally, a lady, heavily veiled, stopped him, and pointed out the house where I was.

  “It was Salome!” I exclaimed.

  His jaw dropped.

  “Dear old Kotikokura, best of friends and companions! What would I do without you?”

  Kotikokura began to dance.

  A lackey brought in a letter.

  “From Salome, Kotikokura”

  “Mon cher Lucifer,

  Kotikokura, the most faithful of creatures”—Do you hear that Kotikokura?

  Kotikokura grinned, his eyes luminous like a cat’s. “…must have taken care of you. Do you remember anything as grotesque as last night? Mon ancien, mon ami! Do not remain very long in Paris. The storm is rising. It is not safe.

  “Before leaving, however, see Dr. Benjamin Franklin, inventor, publicist, statesman, and possessor of twenty-seven mistresses and several illegitimate children, which is not a mean record for a representative of a new country.

  “Help him carry on the revolution. It may be that the New World will be a more habitable place than the old one. I doubt it. But let us try. Besides, you will lose nothing. Your banking system is splendidly organized. Rothschild is very clever. You have chosen well.

  “Poor Herma! When she wakes up, she will find neither you nor me. A god-goddess for one night. But what a god—what a goddess, Cartaphilus!

  “I am leaving for the Pampas, where I hope to create a more perfect being than Herma. I shall communicate with you as soon as I wish you to visit me. Meanwhile, take care of yourself and of your charming monster.

  “Lilith, Regina.”

  I remained pensive. I could not remember the embraces of Herma. Had I been enchanted by the ludicrous circus? Had I foregone godly pleasure? I tried to recollect. I remembered I protested against her—I called out: “This is not what I yearn for! You are neither Mary nor John! Go away!” I ran. Herma pursued me. “Help! Help! Monsieur le Chef de Police!” Suddenly, I noticed a tall pole with a yellow top. I climbed quickly. Herma fell and wept. I laughed.

  “Kotikokura, oh that we may never find what we seek!”

  He helped me descend from the bed.

  “I am sick, Kotikokura.”

  “Sick of the wine?”

  “Sick of the earth…”

  “No, no!”

  “Pan—you love the earth too much.”

  He gave me another cool drink into which he mixed cognac and orange juice.

  “Bacchus!”

  He began to dance.

  I laughed heartily.

  LXXXI: TWO PARALLEL LINES MEET—THE GARDEN OF SALOME—HOMUNCULA—A CENTURY IN RETROSPECT—ADVENTURES IN THE NEW WORLD—THE WOMB OF CREATION—A SIMIAN ABELARD—I PLAY CHESS—THE BLACK KING AND THE RED KING—THE LAST INGREDIENT—ULTIMATE MEANINGS—KOTIKOKURA SNORES

  SALOME was standing at the tall bronze gate, waving her hand. In the reflection of the setting sun, she dazzled like a luminous body—a lake on fire or a full moon surrounded by a magnificent aureole. She was the snowy peak of a mountain, surmounted by a golden crown, a cataract of white roses, the foam of a gigantic wave congealed, a dream carved in stone.

  “Gallop faster, Kotikokura, or she will disappear. She is Fata Morgana.”

  We whipped and urged our horses and in our haste, we drove past her. Salome laughed, and ran a little to meet us. She embraced me, pressing me tightly to her breast.

  Kotikokura stood a little aside.

  “Come here, you little monster!” Salome ordered.

  He approached her like a boy who is guilty of a misdemeanor. She embraced him.

  “You are old enough, Kotikokura, to behave better.”

  Kotikokura kissed her hand.

  She took our arms and led us back to the gate of her inaccessible dominion. Meanwhile, a host of men and women whose faces were hidden by their enormous sombreros, ran from all sides, took care of our horses, and rushed to meet the long caravan which was approaching slowly.

  “What is that, Cartaphilus?” Salome asked.

  “My belongings and my gifts to the incomparable queen.”

  She looked at me a little perplexed.

  “I have come to stay, Salome. The Wandering Jew must have a spot to call his own. This is the twentieth century. He has exhausted all countries. The Zeppelin and the airplane make a jest of distance. I shall stay here for a century, perhaps forever…”

  “Don’t be too sanguine,” she said, pressing my arm.

  “Even in the most romantic novels or among the Anglo-Saxons, no hero waits more than two thousand years for his wedding night.”

  “Incorrigible as ever and as ever, arrogant.”

  “And more than ever in love with you.”

  “Kotikokura, you should have taught your master patience and modesty.”

  “Ca-ta-pha god.”

  “In a godless world, there is still one believer,” she smiled.

  “And in an unromantic world, there is still one lover,” I added.

  “You are Don Quijote and not the Wandering Jew.”

  “No, not Don Quijote,” I protested. “I saw him wandering about with Sancho Panza and their donkeys. He was a charlatan, a reformer of the kind one meets in America. He derived much profit from his grotesque notions, and the blows he received were much exaggerated by Cervantes who desired to arouse pity in the hearts of his readers. Sancho Panza, poor fellow, lived in the world of illusions attributed to his master. He believed in chivalry and in his master and received as recompense, rebukes and sarcasm from the latter, and the ridicule of every succeeding generation that reads the book.”

  “Sancho Panza reminds me of Kotikokura. He too believes in his master and his master’s illusions and as reward, he obtains– —”

  “His master’s love,” I interrupted.

  “Ca-ta-pha god,” Kotikokura insisted.

  Salome laughed and looked at me. Her eyes were like green stars.

  “Salome
is more beautiful than all illusions, more gorgeous than drug-begotten dreams.” I kissed her throat.

  “Cartaphilus does not wait for his reward,” she said.

  The gate opened wide at our approach. A burly individual bowed to the ground.

  In the center of the garden, a tall fountain rose and fell softly like a long whip that strikes caressingly the back of a cherished animal. In the basin, black swans glided shadow-like. Peacocks spread wide their tails and followed their mistress, reflections of her magnificence. Upon the tall palm trees, small monkeys rushed up and down, screaming. A gigantic tortoise whose back glittered as a strangely polished jewel, moved imperceptibly, its head shaking like a silent bell.

  I looked about, bewildered.

  “Child,” Salome said, stroking gently my cheek, “you fear it is illusion again.”

  “You always guess my thoughts.”

  “No, this is not Persia—and what you see is reality.”

  “So it seemed to me then.”

  “This time you need not fear,” she assured me.

  We entered the palace, a building massive and yet graceful, practical, solid. Here and there, however, were touches of daintiness that bespoke the nature of the owner. A strange mixture of freshness and antiquity pervaded the place which, instead of giving the impression of incongruity, suggested a beautiful harmony, as if time had merely removed the glare and blatancy characteristic of newness, but left all the freshness. I thought of an aged tree whose leaves had the tender greenness of saplings.

  Salome guessed my thought and smiled, pleased.

  “Just like yourself, queen of queens.”

  “And like you too, Cartaphilus. And like this wild creature Kotikokura.”

  “Life is not an evil, Salome.”

  “Perhaps we are dead and that is why we are incorruptible. We live not in time but in eternity.”

  “Are you quoting Spinoza?”

  “You were more fortunate than I. I came some months after his death. The old woman was dying also. She spoke to me of you.”

  “She never knew my name even.”

  “Your name? What name? If I were to discover your whereabouts by your name– —”

  We laughed.

  Salome ordered two servants to undress us and help us with our bath.

  In a corner of the garden, shaded by willow trees and rose bushes, the cool soft waters of a lake splashed noiselessly their artificial banks.

  After our ablution in the lake, we were anointed with oils and perfumes as in the time of the kings of Israel, and were offered silken robes and satin slippers, studded with jewels.

  I thought of the glory of Salome rising out of the waters, more fragrant than the roses that hid her from view. Dinner had meanwhile been prepared and the table spread in a ten column portico.

  Kotikokura preferred to eat with the majordomo, the colossus who had opened the gate for us. I was not displeased for I wished to be alone with Salome.

  A youth and a young girl whose skin was as smooth and as black as ebony, dressed in silken garments emphasizing the suppleness of their limbs, waited upon us.

  We reclined on opposite sides of the table on couches, Roman fashion, eating delicate but simple foods, and drinking out of exquisitely chiseled goblets, wines and liqueurs that sparkled like molten jewels.

  At a distance, some one played the lute. The music mingled with the perfume of many flowers and the singing of birds.

  “Salome, this is Paradise and only a god as cruel and as jealous as Yahweh shall drive me out of it.”

  Salome smiled. “Or a goddess as merciless as Princess Salome, daughter of King Herod.”

  “Fortunately, Yahweh is dead and Salome is no longer Princess of Judea.”

  “Who is she?”

  “She is the Goddess of Reason, and Reason knows no cruelty.”

  She laughed. “Strange that Cartaphilus should accept a Goddess of Reason.”

  “Salome is the mother of Beauty.”

  “And Cartaphilus the father of flattery and chivalry.”

  We remained silent, eating the fruits which, like manna, tasted of all delicious things.

  Salome smiled. “My servants believe that you are my bride-groom, come to wed me.”

  “Your servants are attentive and knowing.”

  “Only a month ago, their mistress died and her great granddaughter has inherited her wealth…”

  I knit my brow.

  “Cartaphilus, will you never be able to jump at a conclusion except by a slow and masculine process of ratiocination? I have lived here with few interruptions for a hundred and fifty years nearly, since our strange night at Herma’s. How could that be accomplished save by calling myself my own descendant? To your right, there is a crypt in which are buried my great-grandmother, my grandmother, and my mother. I have raised statues to all of them.”

  “And the corpses?”

  “Wax figures, of course, and a little magic. The black art is not dead…”

  “Oh lovely great-granddaughter of Salome, more beautiful and more radiant, be indeed my bride!”

  “Salome does not break her promise. The time is nearly ripe.”

  “Then Cartaphilus shall remain here forever.”

  “Shall the Wandering Jew forswear his wanderings?”

  “He is not a Jew any more and he will no longer wander save in the company of the great-granddaughter of the incomparable queen.”

  “It will be the death of Cartaphilus.”

  “Then death shall be more welcome than life.”

  “Salome belongs to an old generation. She may not believe in divorce.”

  “Have not nearly two thousand years proved the constancy of Cartaphilus? Why, there are stars that are less– —”

  “Persistent,” she interrupted.

  “The ancient order of geometry is overthrown by the new mathematics. Two parallel lines may meet long before infinity,” I said, and raising my glass, I continued: “Here is to Einstein—greatest of mathematicians!”

  We descended several steps. A gate opened and closed behind us automatically. We were surrounded at once by high stone walls, surmounted by an immense glass dome.

  “Where are we, Salome?”

  “The new Garden of Eden in which I fashion a different world.”

  I touched a rose. It curled its petals until it assumed the shape of a red-furred cat. Out of its pistil or muzzle—I could not tell which—jutted a thin stream of perfume. I retreated before what seemed a leopard, glaring at me. The leopard unfolded into a vast dahlia. Peacocks’ tails were the leaves of a palm tree. A butterfly, waving its wings, was a carnation of the loveliest hue. A bud that Salome offered me assumed the shape of a bee, the tips of its leaves buzzing. Out of chalices of flowers, birds sang exquisite music. Out of birds’ beaks hung branches, laden with fruit. Lizards, many-colored, grew like microscopic trees. The animal world merged with the plant; perfumes mingled with color; leaves were incipient wings; songs approached human voice.

  Salome offered me an apple. I bit into it. A sensation of nakedness overcame me. I looked at myself.

  She smiled. “This is my Tree of Knowledge.”

  “Does knowledge mean nakedness?” I asked.

  “Life is overdressed. Knowledge is the tearing of veils.”

  “Salome! I am as a man who has been swung about many times and is set upon the ground suddenly. Everything turns. The earth is no longer solid. The sun whirls about my eyes. The universe rocks under my feet.”

  “Thus creation must have impressed Adam.”

  “Be good enough to explain things to me, O marvelous Queen!”

  “It is very simple. I am weary of the earth. The earth is magnificent and interesting only to those whose lives are numbered by a few years. I have seen her too often. She is the most monotonous of mothers. Always she bears the same children. Her patterns are unvarying, like the knitting of a senile woman. I am the new mother! I shall create newer and more beautiful things! I shall change th
e dull face of life…”

  I knelt before her. “Goddess of Reason and Beauty! Creatrice Supreme!”

  She bade me rise. “But greater and more resplendent than all things created shall be my new humanity.”

  “New humanity?”

  “My Homuncula is nearly completed.”

  My thoughts reverted to Bluebeard.

  “No, not the Homunculus of that strange man whom I inspired, but whose masculine lack of creativeness shaped a ridiculous monster.”

  “Did you know Gilles de Retz?”

  “Of course. I met him before you came to Paris. His genius was too great for him. It overflowed him as a stormy river overflows its banks.”

  “Salome, whom have you not seen and understood?”

  “Are you surprised, Cartaphilus, that I experimented with life?”

  “Tell me your experiences, Salome.”

  “Some day, I shall turn writer.”

  “What a poetess you will make!”

  “It is so easy to write poetry,—an art for the very young. I shall write prose, lucid and clear,—ideas that will illuminate the mind of the reader. When I am too weary of life, I shall write about it, Cartaphilus, and you will see whether woman is inferior to man.”

  “And yet, Salome, how seldom did I discover a great mind in woman! What feminine Spinoza, what Bacon, what Apollonius have you encountered?”

  “Woman considered herself the inspirer of man. She has preferred to remain behind the throne and whisper into his ear. She is forgotten. His name is carved in gold.”

  “Is it merely that, O beautiful Princess?”

  “That and her biological tragedy. That and the tyranny of the moon and the greater tyranny of childbirth.”

  We walked silently between the rows of strange flowers and animals.

  “Homuncula, however, overcomes both the moon and the horror of birth.”

  I looked at her, expecting to see the crazy glint of Bluebeard’s eyes. But the eyes of Salome were as cool as the shadows of the roses.

  “Is anyone interested in a new humanity in Europe or in America, Cartaphilus?”