A muscular rock, still inexorable, still unyielding—a thousand tongues of flame surrounding it, seeking to melt it—beating against it like hammers, scorching, tearing, lapping…
A sea stiffened by the furious caress of the tempest. Then a sea without motion. The rock crumbled into the billows. Hot ashes smothered the flames, but left still unextinguished, the volcano beneath.
Where was the King of Love? My hand sought, but captured only shadows… My eyes glared, but discovered nothing… My ears heard, in the distance…laughter…like the laughter of Salome…
“Do you believe that a thousand women equal one Salome, Kotikokura?”
He walked off, suddenly remembering something which needed his immediate attention.
“My excellent friends,” I said to Ali and Mamduh, “is it possible to achieve unity through diversity?”
Ali shrugged his shoulders and replied with a long string of incomprehensible equations.
Mamduh, more practical, however, replied. “There is always some virgin, harboring some unsuspected delight.”
“No, no, Mamduh, my harem is already more numerous than King Solomon’s, who also sought—and in vain—the one perfect queen. The multiplication table cannot help me solve the problem of love. No, Mamduh, seek no more. Your exquisite taste has already accomplished miracles. But, alas, however many zeroes we add to a number, infinity remains distant and unapproachable…
“Beauty, my friends, is a magnificent vase, broken into a thousand parts. However expert we may be at piecing them together again, some chip is missing, or is wrongly united, and if, by some supreme good fortune, we restore the vessel to its original form, we cannot hide from the touch, the cicatrice, the scar where we have joined them together.”
My friends tried to console me.
“Perhaps man should not seek to remember, but rather to forget…” I suggested.
I ordered festivities, such as Nero and Heliogabalus had never dreamt of. I invited the Rajahs and the Princes of many cities. The most famous cooks of Arabia prepared dishes of so many varieties that names could no longer be invented for them. Wines of fifty nations flowed incessantly into golden goblets. My harem danced before us to the music of all races, and at night procured us tortures that delighted, and pleasures that agonized.
Some guests, unable to endure the torments of delight, left. Many, persisting, succumbed. Among these were my two dear masters, Ali and Mamduh. At last, only Kotikokura and myself remained,—perennial survivors of the cataclysm of joy.
“Are we owls, Kotikokura, perching forever upon ruins?”
He grinned.
My women, woefully decimated, wandered in the garden, like strange peacocks, endeavoring to entice me. I saw merely the ugly feet. I heard only disagreeable voices.
“What shall I do with these creatures, Kotikokura? I can neither take them with me, should I desire to continue my wanderings, nor can I leave them here, to starve. After all, there was something of beauty in them, something that reminded me of the unforgettable past. Should Ca-ta-pha imitate other gods, who send floods and earthquakes when they can no longer endure the sight of their creatures?”
He shook his head.
“Should not Ca-ta-pha be more reasonable and more kindly?”
He nodded.
“Very well, then, Kotikokura, since we have so much time at our disposal, we shall be merciful and just. We shall wait patiently until these creatures die, one by one, and when the last is gone, we can continue our journey… Meanwhile, there are many problems that my late master, Ali—may he be happy in Paradise—has left unfinished; problems that merit solution.”
XXVII: THE MASTER OF THE HAREM—TIME DISAPPEARS—I DISCOVER RELATIVITY—FUNERALS—KOTIKOKURA ACCELERATES FATE—THE MOSQUE OF A THOUSAND GRAVES
ALI had found in me an apt pupil. My theories made the heart of the mathematician leap. I unfolded to him the knowledge I had gathered in the monasteries of Thibet. I recounted bold astronomical formulæ which I had worked out, assisted by the secret lore of the Hindus, while Asi-ma, the Rajah’s sister, purred at my feet like a magnificent lioness.
“Heaven descended into the eyes of my beloved, Ali, and it was both easy and delectable to learn the secrets of the stars.”
He sighed.
“Where is Heaven, in truth, Ali?”
“It all depends.”
“Upon what?”
“Upon where a man happens to be.”
Our discussion, purely sentimental, suggested an idea which I could not formulate clearly at the moment it took place, but which now, since the death of Ali and my futile orgies, had taken complete possession of me. If heaven depended upon one’s position, did not the earth depend upon one’s position also? Did everything depend upon one’s position? What, then, was Truth? An entity—eternal and unchangeable—or a variable thing, fluctuating with one’s position? And Time—was that not purely an illusion, nonexistent, perhaps? Had not some years appeared to me shorter than hours, and could I not remember some hours longer than years?
“Kotikokura, henceforth you are the lord of the harem, and master supreme of my earthly goods. Ca-ta-pha retires to his tower, to meditate upon time and space and the final meaning of truth.”
Kotikokura took my hands in his, and looked into my eyes, his own filled with tears.
“No, no, my friend, do not mistake my intention. Kotikokura will not disturb me. He may visit me whenever he pleases.”
His face beamed. His eyes dashed so rapidly from one corner to the other that I could not look at them.
“Kotikokura, be a kindly master. Remember that justice is mainly pity. You are dealing with creatures whose years at best are few. Should they not endeavor to derive as much pleasure as possible from a world which is generous only in pain and in disillusion? Their life will be an attempt to avoid suffering. That indeed is the meaning of happiness. They will commit theft, adultery, and murder occasionally. They will tell lies, use flattery, and gossip. They will wallow in dirt like hogs, and pretend death, like foxes. And always will they be vain and obstinate.
“But all this is in the very nature of things, and should rather amuse than irritate. Be just. Justice, Kotikokura, is three-quarters convenience and one-quarter pity. All other definitions are the rhetoric of politicians and prophets and the vain words of poets. You and I are the masters of time. We can afford to pardon and to laugh. And when absolutely necessary, we may be cruel—or what may seem to be cruel—and laugh, nevertheless. Do not attempt to reform mankind or womankind. It is vainer than sweeping the refuse from one corner of the room to the other, and only raises dust and stench, which irritate the nose and throat. However, don’t hesitate to grant favors, deserved or undeserved.”
Kotikokura murmured, “Ca-ta-pha.”
“Ca-ta-pha, meanwhile, must find out—how things should be judged, Kotikokura. No archangel whispers into his ear. He has no Father in Heaven, no Holy Spirit alighting upon his palm, in the shape of a dove. He must rely upon reason and logic—both precious jewels, hidden within a mountain of stone. Ca-ta-pha must become a hewer and breaker of rock. Hard labor harmonizes with the law of his being. He is not a fragile receptacle, but a huge hammer, hammering God.”
The conclusions I reached astounded me. Infinity, eternity, dwindled into mere circles. Time disappeared. Space changed shape and size like clouds blown about by the wind. The earth lost its solidity, and spun under my feet like a toy. The stars were underneath and above me. Everything whirled about everything else, and nothing seemed constant, save a fantastic and passionate dance. Could this be the ultimate meaning of Life and of the Universe? I rebelled against it. I yearned for something less amorphous, more tangible, more comforting. I worked over my charts and my problems again and again. Always the result was the same. The equations, like an apothecary’s scale, balanced perfectly.
I looked out of the window. A moon as clear and as dazzling as the one I had watched with Apollonius long ago from the threshold of his home, a
dorned as a perfect jewel, heaven’s forehead. Some clouds crept over it for a while, and vanished.
Kotikokura entered, informing me that one of my concubines had died during the day and would, according to Mohammedan law, be buried that evening.
“I shall come to the funeral, Kotikokura.”
Kotikokura looked at me, startled. It was the first time, since my seclusion, that I had spoken of my return.
“Are you glad, Kotikokura, that I shall be once again with you?”
His eyes filled with tears.
“You must not be too sentimental, my friend.”
He kissed my hand.
“Or, perhaps, it is just as well. Sentiment is a more pleasant companion than reason.”
A large part of the orchard had been cleared and turned into a cemetery. Already ninety stone slabs glared in the wide reflection of the moon, throwing their own shadows, like wraiths of the dead. Upon each tomb was engraved the name of some dead concubine, and a prayer to Allah.
I read aloud each name, trying to evoke the faces of my dead mistresses. Their names were empty sounds, like strokes of a stick upon a tin pan. I could not remember whether they had afforded me pleasure, or had merely skimmed the surface of my senses.
Kotikokura walked behind me, grumbling something from time to time.
“Kotikokura, the man who possesses but one woman may, after all, possess more than he who possesses a thousand. His memory does not waver, as the light of a torch in the wind.”
We walked in silence for some time.
Two slaves were running, a wooden coffin upon their shoulders. The surviving women followed them, more leisurely, wailing and beating their breasts, and invoking Allah and the Prophet. Some chanted, repeating at intervals the name of the deceased. The coffin was lowered into the grave, a slave refilled it, and leveled the ground, beating it with a spade. The cortège, chatting and calling to one another, returned. The eunuchs walking among them admonished them to be less noisy.
The youngest of the women had already acquired the rotundity of maturity, while all about me I saw faces seared by wrinkles. I walked among my concubines, caressing them, or complimenting them, and telling them amusing stories. They laughed, and touching me furtively, whispered promises, lascivious or sentimental. They all remembered the Bath of Beauty.
“Were you very lonesome without me?” I asked.
They sighed. “Very lonesome. Fatima and Chadija wept and wept, until they died. The rest of us gradually became accustomed, knowing that the will of Allah is supreme.”
“Who were Fatima and Chadija?”
“Fatima had brown hair, tied in a knot, and eyes out of which all the sadness of the world seemed to peer. She was your favorite for an entire night…”
“Lydia,” I muttered. “And Chadija?”
“Chadija’s hair was like the new flax, and she rolled it into braids that reached to her knees. Our lord praised her beauty and called her by a heathen name.”
“What name?”
They remained silent.
“Does no one remember?”
“It sounded like Rica…or Urica,” one answered, her tongue slipping over her toothless gums. “She stabbed herself, master,” she whispered.
“And where is she who was so ticklish that I could not touch her, without making her laugh uproariously?”
“It is I, master. Don’t you recognize me?” She began to laugh, but stopped suddenly, and conscious of her bare gums, covered her mouth with her hands. “I am no longer ticklish, master,” she whispered significantly.
I looked at her, and wondered how every trace of John and Mary had vanished so utterly from her face. Would they, whom I loved so much, have looked like her, had they lived long enough? Did they look like her when they died…?
“Was Kotikokura a lenient master?”
They nodded. One looked around and whispered. “He was too indulgent, my lord. He allowed the eunuchs to fondle us.”
Kotikokura had evidently obeyed my instructions.
“Are you satisfied with your table?” I asked, realizing that as youth disappears, culinary raptures take the place of amatory delights.
“Our master has always been very generous,” one of them remarked. “But the new cook,” she whispered, “does not stew lamb with fresh almonds. His almonds are hard…”
“Our women are aging, Kotikokura. It is a pity.”
He nodded.
“But what is even more pathetic is that they still desire: their passions still smoulder. Alas, there is no harmony in the world! Passions are awakened long before we may express them, and continue long after we can. But why speak of harmony in a whirlwind?”
Kotikokura scratched his face.
The cemetery, having become too crowded, I ordered the remainder of the orchard to be cleared. Only four of the eunuchs were still alive, stout and hairless individuals, grumbling and scolding incessantly. At my approach, they still ordered the women to kneel. “Our Master! Our Master!” Most of them would no longer obey, finding it too difficult a matter to bend or rise. They preferred to lie outstretched upon the couches or carpets, and relate to one another their ailments, begging me to give them ointments and drugs to relieve their pain. Several had become deaf, three blind, some had succumbed to a second childhood. They sang ceaselessly or wept bitterly.
Kotikokura sighed.
“By the way, we too, my friend, must at least appear affected by the passing of time, or else, who knows what the jealousy of man is capable of? We must paint our faces yellow, walk with difficulty upon our canes, and make wry faces.”
Kotikokura dropped his jaw. His face seemed a thousand wrinkles. Senility crept into his joints. I applauded.
Every few days another woman died,—peacefully, save for a slight cramp. Kotikokura smiled secretively. His visits to the laboratory where I had stored my favorite poisons were mysterious and frequent. The eunuchs, too, passed away, and were buried during the night near the rest, as if they were still to guard their honor and virtue.
The swans, like boats with broken masts, continued to sail on their sides, their long stiff necks half drowned in the water. The dogs, each in a tiny coffin, were buried in one grave, and Kotikokura ordered a tombstone, upon which the names were inscribed, and their souls entrusted to Allah and His Prophet Mohammed.
I freed and rewarded my slaves according to their ability and my caprice.
“Kotikokura, once more we are ready to go. The banquet is over, life has turned to death, and noise to silence. Such is the fate of things and of men.”
Kotikokura nodded, fixing his turban.
I paid a visit to the Vizier. I told him that I felt death approaching, and that I preferred to breathe my last in Mecca, where the soil, trodden by the feet of the Prophet, was holy.
I signed a document, bequeathing all my possessions to the city of Bagdad, for the purpose of building a great mosque to the glory of Allah and His Prophet. Since the thousand faithful ones were buried there, I suggested that the place be known as The Mosque of the Thousand Graves.
The Vizier considered it a most appropriate and propitious name, He embraced me, and wished me a fine couch near the Prophet.
XXXVIII: I MEET A JEW—EVIL OMENS—THE DISAPPEARANCE OF ABRAHAM—SHIPWRECKED
THE Caliph’s armies captured Alexandria and the northern part of Africa, as far as the Atlantic Ocean. Europe’s feet began to scorch under the conflagration. Before long, the flames would rise and consume the entire body. Why was I so delighted? Was Mohammedanism more desirable than Christianity? Was it less an amalgamation of superstitions? Neither Christ nor Mohammed tolerated reason, and I would be an outcast whether the golden cross or the silver crescent glittered. And yet I exulted in the idea that the Nazarene must succumb to Mohammed.
I decided to investigate the progress of Christianity. Once more I was a wanderer. Once more the sea carried me away in her arms to a new destiny. The waves beat against the sides of our boat drearily, as a dog asleep war
ds off with his tired paw a pestiferous fly.
In an angle of the boat, some one played a Hebrew melody upon a reed. In my childhood, I had heard it played in just that manner by an old shepherd, owner of a dozen sheep, whose ribs nearly pierced through the skin. I used to follow him to the top of a hill, where the animals could graze unmolested. Unlike most Jews, he was not disputatious, and utterly unconcerned about the perennial quarrels of the clergy and the prophets.
“Who knows who is in the right, my child? Maybe they are all in the right, or all in the wrong. And what difference does it make, anyhow? If a man lived a thousand years,—then he would have time to find out the truth,—but since he doesn’t live much longer than his sheep, it is better to keep quiet or play a tune upon a reed.”
He was wrong. A thousand years sufficed no more to discover the truth than sixty. At sixty or at a thousand the best thing was to play a tune on a reed! I approached the player. I was struck by his resemblance to the shepherd I had known in my childhood. Or, did I perhaps imagine a resemblance? Would my memory really have retained the image so clearly?
I praised his music. He thanked me. I asked him where he came from, and his destination. He smiled sadly. “You may never have heard of my country, sir, and as for my destination,—who knows? Wherever the boat stops, I must land, must I not?”
I understood perfectly what he meant, and something gripped my heart like a fist. After seven centuries, was I still a Jew?
“I have traveled through many lands, my friend. It is very likely that I have been in yours.”
He laughed. His voice sounded like several dice shaken together. “My country? I have none. Hundreds of years ago, my ancestors were driven out of it. My country? Any place where I can earn my bread; where I am not beaten and spat upon too often; where I can pray to God in peace.”
My First Two Thousand Years; the Autobiography of the Wandering Jew Page 18