Life Everlasting and Other Tales of Science, Fantasy, and Horror

by David Henry Keller

  "I let him have his recreation. Once a year, I insisted on his attending a meeting of his lodge of Lofty Pine Trees, even though he would smell of cigar smoke when he came back; but I was patient with him and never threw it up to him how hard I had to work to get the smell out of his best suit. At last, I used lavender and heliotrope alternately; and finally, when he wore his suit to church, you could not smell anything but the perfume. It seems that the lodge appreciated what kind of a loving wife John Harker had, because the floral piece they sent to the funeral was perfectly lovely. Perhaps you ladies noticed it? I placed it in a conspicuous place at the head of the coffin. It was a large pillow made of little daisies with the words At Peace worked out in violets.

  "But of course you want to know just how it happened. You realize that in my delicate health we always had separate bedrooms. But as the dear doctor said, every husband has his rights; and so I never once shut the door between the rooms at night. I will say this: that John was a gentleman and never once took advantage of my kindness. You see, I told him right after we were married just what the doctor had said, about any sudden shock being likely to kill me; and, of course, realizing how delicate I was, he did not want my death on his conscience. I had his room decorated in pink; and on the wall facing the bed, just where he could see it the last thing at night and the first thing in the morning, I had an enlarged picture of us on our first trip to Atlantic City, me on a chair and he in back, standing, holding an umbrella over me to protect my complexion from the sun. You know how sacred such experiences are during the first weeks of matrimony. He had a nice, single bed, and I kept it and the room scrupulously clean. There was a piece of linoleum by the side of the bed, and on it I had a china spittoon handpainted with tearoses. I gave it to him before we were married. Of course, he was not vulgar enough to chew or smoke, though goodness knows he might have formed such habits had he been married to any other kind of woman; but he was fond of chewing gum, so every night I let him have one stick, and the instructions were for him to put the wad into the spittoon just before he went to sleep. When I was well, I used to turn the light out for him; but the nights of my martyrdom from headaches, I made him put himself to bed.

  "The dear doctor says that just as soon as I change the headaches will stop—and I hope they do. No man knows just what a terrible thing it is to be a woman, especially if he is not married.

  "This night, I went over his weekly allowance with him, and explained how, by drinking 'chicko' instead of coffee, I had saved three dollars and had spent all of it for a new piece of art linoleum for his bed. It had the loveliest design on it—a Cupid shooting an arrow at a trembling deer, symbolic of married life, I told him; and explained that it was a female deer, and that was why it was trembling. He did not say much, but later on, his light went out and he said 'Good-night.' I knew right away there was something wrong, because I had always taught him to say 'Good-night, Dear,' with the loving emphasis on the last word. Later on, I heard a drip, drip, drip, and I knew right away that either a faucet was leaking or that it was raining a little. I called, 'John, did you turn off the spigot tight in the bathroom?' and he just laughed, and told me everything was all right and to go to sleep and not worry.

  "The drip, drip, drip, kept on, but fainter; so I went to sleep. When I went to his room to wake him, so he could go down and get breakfast—for that was the way we divided the work, and it gave me a half hour more of necessary rest every day—I found the poor man had cut his wrist with a safety razor blade and was dead. What I had heard dripping during the night was his life's blood.

  The dear doctor explained it all to me. He said that he was psychotic; that no man, who had a loving, tender, wife like John Harker had, would do a thing like that if he was not insane. That must be the explanation. One thing I am sure of: During all the twenty years of our sweet married life, he never learned to appreciate my efforts to give him a nice clean home. Even at the end, he was careless. If he had only moved down in bed eight inches, he could have bled on the linoleum, instead of on the lovely ingrain carpet."

  THE THIRTY AND ONE

  CECIL, OverLord of Walling, in the Dark Forest, mused by the fire. The blind Singer of Songs had sung the sagas of ancient times, had waited long for praise and then, disquieted, had left the banquet hall guided by his dog. The Juggler had merrily tossed his golden balls into the air till they seemed a glistening cascade, but still the OverLord had mused, unseeing. The wise Homunculus had crouched at his feet uttering words of wisdom and telling tales of Gobi and the buried city of Ankor. But nothing could rouse the OverLord from his meditations.

  At last, he stood up and struck the silver bell with a hammer of gold. Serving men answered the call.

  "Send me the Lady Angelica and the Lord Gustro," he commanded, and then once again sat down with chin in hand, waiting.

  At last, the two came in answer to his summons. The Lady was his only daughter, as fair and as wise a Lady as there was in all Walling. Lord Gustro, some day, would be her husband, and help her rule in the Dark Forest. Meantime, he perfected himself in the use of the broadsword, lute, the hunting with the falcon, and the study of books. He was six feet tall, twenty years old, and had in him the makings of a man.

  The three sat around the fire, two waiting to hear the one talk, the one waiting till he knew just how to say what had to he said. At last, Cecil began to talk:

  "You no doubt know what is on my mind. For years I have tried to give happiness and peace and prosperity, to the simple folk of our land of Walling. We were well situated in a valley surrounded by lofty, impassable forests. Only one mountain pass connected us with the great, cruel, and almost unknown world around us. Into that world, we sent in springtime, summer, and fall, our caravans of mules laden with grain, olives, wine, and uncut stones. From that world, we brought salt, weapons, bales of woolen and silken goods, for our needs. No one tried to molest us, for we had nothing much that they coveted. Perhaps safety made us grow soft, sleepy, and unprepared for danger.

  "But it has come. We might have known there were things in that outer world we knew not of and therefore could not even dream of. But this spring, our first caravan winding over the mountains found, at the boundaries of the Dark Forest, a Castle blocking their way. Their mules were not birds and could not fly over; they were not moles and could not burrow under. And the lads with the mules were not warriors and could not break their way through. So they came back, unmolested, 'tis true, but with their goods unsold and unbartered.

  "Now, I do not think that Castle was built by magic. I have personally looked at it, and it seems nothing but stone and mortar. And it is not held by an army of fighting men, for all we can hear is that one man holds it. But what a man! Half again as tall as our finest lad, and skilled in the use of weapons. I tried him out. One at a time, I sent to him John of the flying ax, and Herman who had no equal with the double-edged sword, and Rubin who could split a willow wand at two hundred paces with his steel-tipped arrow. These three men lie, worm food, in the ravine below the castle. And meantime, our country is strangulated as far as trade is concerned. We have cattle in the meadow, and wood in the forest, and grain in the bin, but we have no salt, no clothes to cover us from the cold, no finery for our women, or weapons for our men. And we never will have these as long as this castle and this man block our caravans."

  "We can capture the Castle and kill the giant!" cried Lord Gustro, with the impetuosity of youth.

  "How?" asked the OverLord. "Did I not tell you that the path is narrow? You know that. On one side, the mountains tower lofty as the flight of the bird and smooth as a woman's skin. On the other side, is the Valley of the Daemons, and no one has ever fallen into it and come back alive. The only path is just wide enough for one man or one man-led mule, and that path now leads through the castle. If we could send an army, 'twould be different. But only one man at a time can we send, and there is no man equal to successful combat with this giant."

  The Lady Alngelica smiled as she
whispered, "We may conquer him through chicanery. For example, I have seen this hall filled with fighting men and fair ladies almost put into an endless sleep by gazing at the golden balls flying through the air and back into the clever hands of the Juggler. And the Blind Singer of Songs can make anyone forget all except the music of his tales. And our Homunculus is very wise."

  The OverLord shook his head. "Not thus will the question be answered. This madman wants one thing, and that one thing means everything in the lastward, as far as our land and people are concerned. Perhaps you have guessed. I will give you the demand ere you ask the question. Our Lady's hand in marriage, and thus, when I die, he becomes the OverLord of Walling."

  Lady Angelica looked over at Lord Gustro. He looked at the OverLord's daughter. At last, he said:

  "Better to eat our grain and eat our olives and drink our wine. Better that our men wear bearskins and our women cover themselves with the skins of deer. It would be best for them to wear shoes of wood than pantufles of unicorn skin brought from Araby. It were a sweeter fate for them to perfume their bodies with crushed violets and may-flowers from our forest than to smell sweet with perfumes from the trees of the unknown Island of the East. This price is too heavy. Let us live as our fathers and fathers' fathers lived, even climb trees like the monkey folk, than trust to such an OverLord. Besides, I love the Lady Angelica."

  The Lady smiled her thanks. "I still am thinking of the use of intelligence overcoming brawn. Have we no wisdom left in Walling, besides the fair, faint, dreams of weak woman?"

  "I will send for the Homunculus," her father answered. "He may know the answer to that question."

  The little man came in. He was a man not born of woman, but grown for seven years in a glass bottle, during all of which time he read books held before him by wise men, and was nourished with drops of wine and tiny balls of Asphodel paste. He listened to the problem gravely, though at times he seemed asleep. At last, he said one word.

  "Synthesis."

  Cecil reached over and, picking him up, placed him on one knee.

  "Have pity on us, Wise Man. We are but simple folk and know but simple words. What is the meaning of this sage word?"

  "I know not," was the peculiar answer. "'Tis but a word that came to me out of the past. It has a sweet sound and methinks may have a meaning. Let me think. I recall now! It was when I was in the glass bottle that a wise man came and held before my eyes an illuminated parchment. On it was written in words of gold, this word and its meaning.

  "Synthesis. All things are one and one thing is all."

  "Which makes it all the harder for me," sighed the OverLord of Walling.

  The Lady Angelica left her seat and came over to her father. She sank upon the bearskin at his feet and took the little hand of the dwarf in hers.

  "Tell me, my dear Homunculus, what wise man 'twas who thus gave you the message on the illuminated parchment?"

  "It was a very wise man and a very old man who lives by himself in a cave by the babbling brook, and yearly the simple folk take him bread and meat and wine, but for years no one has seen him. And perhaps he lives and perhaps he is dead, for all I know is that the food disappears. But perhaps the birds think that it is for them now that he lies sightless and thoughtless on his stone bed these many years."

  "This is something we will find out for ourselves. Lord Gustro, order some horses, and the four of us will go to this man's cave. Three horses for us, my Lord, and an ambling pad for our little friend so naught of harm will befall him."

  The four came to the cave, and the four entered it. A light burned at the far end, and there was the wise man, very old and with nought but his eyes telling of the intelligence that never ages. On the table before him in a tangled confusion, were glasses and earthenware, and crucibles, and one each of astrolabe, alembic, and hourglass through which silver sands ran, and this was fixed with cunning machinery so that every day it tilted around and once more let the sand tell the passing of the twenty-and-four hours. There were books covered with mildewed leather and locked with iron padlocks and spider webs. Hung from the wet ceiling was a representation of the sun with the planets revolving eternally around that fair orb, but the pitted moon alternated with light and shadows.

  And the wise man read from a book written in letters made by those long dead, and now and then he ate a crust of bread or sipped wine from a ram's horn, but never did he stop reading. When they touched him on the shoulder to attract his attention, he shook them off, murmuring, "By the Seven Sacred Caterpillars! Let me finish this page, for what a pity were I to die without knowing what this man wrote some thousand years ago in Ankor."

  But at last he finished the page and sat blinking at them with his wise eyes sunk deep into a mummy face while his body shook with the decrepitude of age. And Cecil asked him:

  "What is the meaning of the word, 'synthesis'?"

  "'Tis a dream of mine which only now I find the waking meaning of."

  "Tell the dream," the OverLord commanded.

  "'Tis but a dream. Suppose there were thirty wise men learned in all wisdom obtained from the reading of ancient books on alchemy and magic and histories and philosophy. These men knew of animals and jewels such as margarites and chrysoberyls, and of all plants such as dittany which cures wounds, and mandragora which compelleth sleep (though why men should want to sleep, when there is so much to read and profit by the reading, I do not know). But these men are old and some day will die. So, I would take these thirty old men and one young man and have them drink a wine that I have distilled these many years, and by synthesis there would be only one body—that of the young man—but in that man's brain would be all the subtle and ancient wisdom of the thirty savants, and thus we would do century after century so no wisdom would be lost to the world."

  The Lady Angelica leaned over his shoulder. "And have you made this wine?" she asked.

  "Yes, and now I am working on its opposite, for why place thirty bodies into one unless you know the art of once again separating this one body into the original thirty. But that is hard. For any fool can pour the wine from thirty bottles into a single jar, but who is wise enough to separate them and restore them to their original bottles?"

  "Have you tried this wine of synthetic magic?" asked the OverLord.

  "Partly. I took a crow and a canary-bird and had them drink of it, and now, in yonder wicker cage, a yellow crow sits and nightly fills my cave with song as though it came from the lutes and citherns of faerie-land."

  "Now, that is my thought," cried the Lady Angelica. "We will take the best and bravest fighters of our land, and the sweetest singer of songs, and the best juggler of golden balls, thirty of them, and I, myself, will drink of this wine of synthesis. Thus the thirty will pass into my body, and I will go and visit the Giant. In his hall, I will drink of the other wine, and there will be thirty to fight against the one. They will overcome him and slay him. Then I will drink again of the vital wine, and in my body I will carry the thirty conquerors back to Walling. Once there, I will again drink, and the thirty men will leave my body, being liberated by the wonder-wine. Some may be dead and others wounded, but I will be safe and our enemy killed. Have you enough of it—of both kinds?

  The old man looked puzzled.

  "I have a flagon of the wine of synthesis. Of the other, to change the synthesized back into their original bodies, only enough for one experiment, and mayhap a few drops more."

  "Try those drops on that yellow bird," commanded Cecil.

  The old man poured from a bottle of pure gold, graven with a worm that eternally renewed his youth by swallowing his tail, a few drops of a colorless liquid, and offered it to the yellow bird in the wicker cage. This the bird drank greedily, and of a sudden there were two birds, a black crow and a yellow canary, and ere the canary could pipe a song the crow pounced on it and killed it.

  "It works," croaked the old man. "It works."

  "Can you make more of the second elixir?" asked Lord Gustro.

&nb
sp; "What I do once I can do twice," proudly said the ancient.

  "Then start and make more, and while you are doing it, we will take the golden bottle and the flagon and see what can be done to save the simple folk of our dark forests, though this is an adventure that I think little of, for 'tis fraught with danger for a woman I love." Thus spake the OverLord.

  And with the elixirs in a safe place, they rode away from the cave of the old man. But Lord Gustro took the OverLord aside and said:

  "I ask a favor. Allow me to be one of these thirty men."

  Cecil shook his head. "No. And once again and forever, NO! In the doing of this, I stand to lose the apple of my eye, and if she comes not back to me, I shall die of grief, and then you, and you alone, will be left to care for my simple folk. If a man has but two arrows and shoots one into the air, then he were wise to keep the other in his quiver against the day of need."

  The Lady Angelica laughed as she suspected the reason of their whispering.

  "I will come back," she said laughingly, "for the old man was very wise. Did you not see how the yellow bird divided into two, and the crow killed the canary?"

  But the Homunculus, held in Lord Cecil's arms, started to cry.

  "What wouldst thou?" asked the kindly Over-Lord.

  "I would be back in my bottle again," sobbed the little one. And he sobbed till he went to sleep, soothed by the rocking canter of the war horse.

  Two evenings later, a concourse of brave men met in the banquet hall. There were great, silent, men, skilled in the use of mace, byrnies, and baldricks, who could slay with sword, spear, and double-bitted battle-ax. The Juggler was there, and a Singer of Songs, and a Reader of Books, very young but very wise. And a man was there with sparkling eyes who could by his glance put men to death-sleep and waken them with a snap of the thumb and finger. And to these were added the OverLord and Lord Gustro and the trembling Homunculus, and on her throne sat the Lady Angelica, very beautiful and very happy because of the great adventure she had a part to play in. In her hand was a golden goblet, and in the hands of the thirty men, crystal glasses, and the thirty and one drinking vessels were filled with the wine of synthesis, for half of the flagon was poured out. But the flagon, half-filled, and the golden drug viand, the Lady Angelica hid beneath her shimmering robe. Outside, a lady's horse, decked with diamond-studded harness, neighed uneasy in the moonlight.