A soft nose pushed into her palm. A moist tongue licked at it, a puppy voice whined.
‘They’re going to kill me,’ she said, hopelessly. That’s what this has all been about. They’re going to kill me. And I don’t even know why.’
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
In Alphenlicht, Makr Avehl lay silently on the narrow cot, eyes closed, his breathing so shallow he appeared hardly to breathe at all. Around him extended a gray vacancy that was brushed intermittently with hints of color, echoing occasionally with a distant sound, a melody, perhaps a voice. It smelled of mossy woods, then of cinnamon, then of something namelessly disgusting. He had the sensation of walking, or swimming, or perhaps flying through this nameless void, reaching out with his senses toward a potent symbol. It was a familiar quest. He had floated here before, very recently. It was only a few weeks ago that he had followed the other Marianne into the false worlds that opened upon this nothingness, the dream worlds, the fantasy worlds that clustered within and beside and through the worlds of reality.
What would it be this time? One of Madame’s worlds, certainly, and yet not wholly hers. Each time she drew a victim into one of her worlds, whether purposely or unwittingly, that victim would change the world, little or much. Marianne’s presence would have modified the world in which she found herself, would have changed it and put a mark upon it that the follower might seek as a trailfinder seeks a cairn.
A woman washing clothes. The slap of sodden fabric. The slosh of water. The soggy enervation of steam. The fatty stink of soap. He turned his head on the pillow, evoking and following that fragrance. The smell of soap. He seemed to scent it, far off, coming closer. And a sound, as of some great tumble of waters. Thrashing. Gushing. A whirling sound.
He drifted. Drifted uncomfortably. Wet. Very wet. His whole body was soaked. He choked, drowning, forgetting, screaming at the dark thundering waters around him.
Someone opened the door of the indigo washer and he spilled onto the floor, wet as a flounder, his princely garb reeking of bleach.
‘Gracious,’ said the old man across the crook of his cane. ’It’s Prince Charming! I thought you might be my trunk, coming back.’
‘I’ve come to rescue the fair damsel,’ The Prince gargled, gasping for air. ‘Where is she?’
‘If you’re talking about Marianne,’ the old man answered, ’She’s imprisoned.’ He nodded, his head tilting to and fro like a rocking chair sent into motion by some constant breeze, moving of itself, unable to stop. ‘Sentenced to trial by combat. The whole town is talking of nothing else.’
The Prince rose with what dignity he could muster. His satin trousers leaked dye even as they shrank into sausage-skin tightness. Rust bloomed on the hilt of his sword all at once, like a flower. His velvet cape was a rag, ripped into fragments by the waters. He cursed.
‘You must be her champion,’ the old man commented, gesturing as he did so at the great machine across the aisle. The indigo dryer,’ he murmured, staring at Prince Charming’s trousers. ‘I’d recommend it.’
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
In the middle of the night, the voice returned, hissing once more between the impenetrable stones. ‘Marianne. Marianne.’ Insinuating as a serpent. ‘Marianne? Your champion has arrived.’
It was impossible to ignore the voice, even though she told herself it was a ploy, a feint, an attempt to give her hope that would then be dashed. She tried to keep silent and could not. ‘Who?’ she begged. ‘Who is it?’
‘Prince Charming,’ said the voice with a lewd giggle. ‘All got up for the part.’
She turned away from the wall and put her arm across her eyes, willing herself not to cry, not to speak. The little grating opened and someone peered in. She kept her eyes shut, breathed slowly, pretended to be asleep.
‘You’ll meet him next holiday!’ the voice exulted. ‘At the colosseum. In the catacombs where the victims are prepared!’
Marianne didn’t answer. She could not have answered. In this nightmare world, she could only endure for a time, then die. What was the point in argument or expostulation? What was the point of anything?
Slow tears crept down her face, hidden behind her arm. After a time, the grating slammed shut, as though in pique.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Prince Charming was hiding in an alley near the palace, hoping very strongly that the gang of mapless ones he had recently evaded would not find him again. He had had to fight off two such gangs already, and his rusty sword was proving to be of little help. He carried it in his hand, unsheathed, since if it was sheathed when he needed it, there was a strong likelihood it could not be pulled free at all. Once dry, he had assumed he would be able to obtain clothing, directions, perhaps a hot meal or a warm bed, all those things that civilized men take more or less for granted. His first disillusionment had come when he approached a store which purported, by the terms of its window displays and name, to sell clothing.
‘Y’got a coupon?’ the clerk had asked him curiously when Makr Avehl had asked to see something in a cloak and tights, size forty-two long.
‘Coupon?’
‘A coupon entitlin’ you to go around in fancy dress like that there. I mean, I’m not goin’ to say nothin’ to the Map Police, they’ll find you soon enough in that getup, Mack, but it’d be my job if I sold you somethin’ like that without a coupon.’
Prince Charming sighed. He felt it would be unbecoming to succumb to local pressure in the matter of dress, but one could not go about the streets looking like a derelict. ‘How about a regular sports coat and slacks, then. Shirt size sixteen-and-a-half, thirty-two.’
‘Fine. Y’got the money?’
Prince Charming laid gems and gold upon the counter.
‘I didn’t ask did you have no joolry. I asked did you have money. Like coin of the realm, like moolah, like voskies, double-voskies or maybe a ten vosky bill. I can’t do nothing with those.’
Prince Charming asked the way to a pawn shop or exchange bank and encountered the realities of the city.
‘Listen, Mack. You can’t find nothin’ without you got a map. First thing you got to do is lay your hands on tomorrow’s map, got that? Then you can find yourself some pawn shop or whatever.’
A few incisive questions asked of passersby elicited the information that maps were available at kiosks or twenty-four-hour restaurants for one vosky the map.
Prince Charming repaired to the nearest restaurant he could find and asked for a job as dishwasher.
‘It’d have to be that, wouldn’t it,’ said the manager, staring at him with obvious distaste. ‘You sure couldn’t wait tables in that getup. Yeah, I suppose you can wash dishes. One vosky an hour and your supper. Y’got your work permit?’
‘Work permit?’ asked Prince Charming.
A few incisive questions asked of the restaurant manager gave the Prince the information that work permits were issued at the palace, between the hours of eight a.m. and noon each day.
‘Where will I find the palace?’ the Prince asked, exiting the restaurant a few moments later to the sound of raucous laughter.
‘It seems to me,’ mused the Prince to himself, ‘that there is something wickedly illogical at work here.’
He found a television store and watched the broadcast of the palace viewing. During the broadcast, the announcer used the phrase, ‘Here at the center of the city.’ Sighing, Prince Charming set out to find the center of the city, by trial and error.
By nightfall, he had worked his way within three blocks of the palace. Not wishing to draw himself to the attention of the guards, he took refuge in an alley, intending to apply for a work permit in the morning. When he awoke, he found himself in a different alley, with the palace nowhere in sight. He had not eaten in two days.
The Prince decided to beg a meal. He was promptly set upon by the Map Police and thrashed before being given a stern warning. Begging was not permitted in Bimbleton. The Prince decided to scavenge a meal. This brought him to the attention of
the first of the mapless gangs.
‘That trash can, in case you’re interested, joker, is in our territory.’ The speaker had green hair and his name tattooed on his forehead. Bonecracker.
‘I’m sorry,’ said the Prince. ‘I didn’t know trash cans were anybody’s territory.’
‘He didn’t know,’ Bonecracker advised his friends, Dangerous and Lethal. ‘Ain’t that a pity. He didn’t know.’
The Prince tried his sword and found it locked in the sheath. He therefore leapt straight upward and caught the bottom rung of a fire escape which lowered itself under his weight into the waiting arms of the trio. The Prince gave an excellent accounting of himself with the sheathed sword, emerging with one black eye, a split lip, and assorted bruises around the ribs and belly. Dangerous had, as he recommended to Lethal and Bonecracker, split. The other two were stretched beside the disputed trash can, which, on examination, proved to be empty. Another can, further down the block, yielded half a sack of potato chips and an unopened flip-top can of Ruby Garcia’s Bean Dip with extra jalapenos.
Later that day he found a public drinking fountain and stayed near it for some time, attempting to put out the fire in his stomach. By evening he had worked his way to the palace once more. Moving as casually as his strange garb, now further battle-worn, would allow, he found a place near the fence that was partially hidden by the overhanging limbs of a large tree. When the tremor of change came, he grasped the iron fence and held tight, emerging from the changeover still on the sidewalk adjacent to the palace.
Satisfied, he evaded a mapless gang set upon stealing his sword and found the nearby alley previously referred to in which to spend the rest of the night.
‘Work permit, sure,’ said the palace functionary the next morning, polishing the brass buttons on his cuff. ‘Y’got entry papers?’
‘Entry papers?’ said the Prince in a dignified voice with overtones of distress. ‘Entry papers?’
‘Apply for those at the Bureau of Maps. Be sure to have your vaccination documents, three letters of reference from local residents, and the quota number under which you entered the country.’
‘Quota number,’ said the Prince vaguely, beginning to get the idea.
When next violently approached by members of a mapless gang, Prince Charming asserted with a bare though rusty blade his intention of joining them. Brasstits believed it was because of her well displayed charms. Ironballs thought it was because of his obvious leadership capabilities. In reality, Prince Charming would have joined anyone he thought able to provide him with a decent meal and some idea of what was going on.
‘Why don’t we… ah… rip off a map vendor?’ he asked. ‘Then we’d know where we wanted to go tomorrow.’
Brasstits shook her head pityingly. She was drawn to this peculiar stranger, partly because he obviously needed mothering and partly because he was so – oh, polite. Most men – well, no need to go into that, but they didn’t act like this one did. ‘You poor jerk,’ she said. ‘That’s not the way it works.’
Prince Charming smiled up at her from under his lashes. He was not above flirtation for a good purpose, though he had not used this particular technique since age ten. ‘How does it work, Brassy? Tell me.’
‘If you don’t buy a map for one vosky, the map just falls apart. You can’t steal one. You can’t peek over anybody’s shoulder, either, or the Map Police’ll put your eyes out. You could find somebody’s got a map and offer to cohabit, if you want to, but the people who’re willing to do that are pretty repulsive, let me tell you.’
‘So, if you can’t buy a map, you don’t know where you are. If you can’t get a job, you can’t buy a map. If you can’t get a work permit, you can’t get a job. If you don’t have entry papers, you can’t get a work permit. If you don’t have local references, you can’t get entry papers, and you can’t get local references without having a map. Is that more or less it?’
‘More or less,’ she said admiringly. ‘You catch on fast.’
‘Which is why there are mapless ones, I guess. You’ve learned to do without.’
‘Well, it’s either that or the arena. I mean, you can volunteer to be a victim for the arena, to fight the Duke of Eyes, and they’ll feed you and take care of you until the next game comes up.’
‘Duke of Eyes?’ asked the Prince with a shiver of foreboding. ’Duke of Eyes?’
Brasstits described the Duke with loving attention to the more formidable details. ‘Like, he gets to fight the victims, you know. And he gets to fight the champions, too. Like there’s this girl, Marianne, and she has a champion going to fight for her. I’d like to see that. He won’t get anywhere with the Duke of Eyes, let me tell you.’
The Prince sighed, his worst fears fulfilled. ‘Where will this take place, Brassy? And when?’
Once the Prince had the day-to-day details of survival under control – though he was unable to do anything about improving his clothing – he worked his way to the palace once more and announced himself as Marianne’s champion. He asked to see the Fair Maiden and was greeted with a chorus of jeering laughter.
‘Whadaya think this is, the Love Boat?’ a functionary asked him. ‘You get to fight for her, chum, not canoodle with her.’
‘I didn’t have canoodling in mind,’ said the Prince in a very dignified voice. ‘I simply thought I should meet her and assure her of my best efforts. She may not even know I’ve arrived.’
‘Oh, she knows!’ There was laughter again. ‘You can see her at the arena, buddy. If you can find it.’ There was more hooting laughter, and the Prince left the palace feeling quite downhearted.
‘How would you find the arena, if you had to?’ he asked Ironballs.
‘Gosh, I dunno,’ said Ironballs. ‘It moves around, the arena does, just like everyplace else. Brasstits, how’d you find the arena if you had to?’
‘Find somebody that was goin’ there, I guess,’ she said. ’Maybe you could do that.’
Two days later, Prince Charming awoke in front of a pawn shop.
He took the gems and gold he had hidden in his left boot heel and spread them upon the dirty counter.
‘My, my, look at that,’ the pawnshop owner gazed at the glittering hoard. ‘Where’d you get all this, man?’
‘It’s mine,’ said the Prince. ‘Not stolen.’
‘I didn’t suppose it was. Just interested is all. What you want for ’em?’
‘Clothing,’ said the Prince. ‘Voskies.’
The pawnshop owner shook his head. ‘Sorry. Can’t give you anything but coupons. Look through the coupon book if you like. If you see anything there you can use, let me know.’
The coupon book was dusty. Most of the coupons were handwritten. One offered a home-cooked meal, another to repair a saddle. One offered two nights’ lodging with Mrs McAlister. One offered to tell his fortune.
‘I’d like the meal and the lodging,’ said the Prince. ‘If that includes a bath.’
‘Not unless it says so,’ the pawnshop owner shook his head. ’I doubt Mrs McAlister would let you in, the way you look and smell. Tell you what. Why’n’t you take the meal and the fortune. I’ll sell you those two for this littlest jewel, right here.’
‘I don’t need my fortune told,’ said the Prince. ‘I already know how things are going.’
‘Yeah, but I’m throwing it in. Won’t cost you anything.’
The Prince took the coupon, was directed to the house where the meal was offered – corned beef and cabbage and pecan pie for dessert – and then to Madame Fiff’s Emporium of Truth.
Trouble with you is,’ said Fifi, ‘you got body odor.’
‘So would you,’ snarled Prince Charming, ‘if you’d been sleeping in alleys and eating out of trash cans for the past week.’
‘You know, that’s a very good observation,’ she remarked, rubbing her hands gently over the crystal ball. ‘I probably would smell pretty bad. Of course this is your fortune we’re doing here, so how I might smell under any c
ircumstances at all is what you might tend to call kind of irrelevant.’
That’s so,’ admitted the Prince.
‘Let’s see here. You gotta dangerous trial comin’ up in the near future. You gotta rescue a Fair Maiden. Lord love a duck, it’s been twenty years since I seen a rescue of a Fair Maiden in the crystal ball and that was a fireman. Well, what else. If you’ll spend the night in the alley just across from this place, here, right after midnight the restaurant will throw out two T-bone steaks, medium-rare, not even touched. Man and his wife have an anniversary fight and storm outa the place without eatin’. What else. You expectin’ a horse, maybe?’
Prince Charming said he was not expecting a horse.
‘‘Fiuzyou, I’d expect a horse. Also, there’s somethin’ in here about a Holiday comin’ up in about two days. Oh, boy, that means the Duke of Eyes’ll be at it again. That machine goes through Fair Maidens like they was panty hose. That’s it.’
‘What’s it?’
‘That’s yer fortune. Coupon please. Thank you very much.’
Prince Charming found himself back on the street. It was late enough to seek shelter for the night, and by paying strict attention to what the fortune-teller had told him, he was able to obtain two medium-rare steaks, two baked potatoes, one with butter one with sour cream, and a side of fried zucchini. As he sprawled in the rear doorway of the restaurant, licking his fingers, he thought how true it was that one’s pleasures are measured by one’s expectations. He could not remember having had a better or more satisfying meal.
Were it not for the plight of the Fair Maiden, he would have been almost content. He still had no idea how to find the colosseum when the terrible day came.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
On the days that followed, Marianne would wake each morning to look out the high, barred window at a featureless sky, rather more gray than blue, without clouds, perhaps evenly painted with a high mist through which the sun let down a neutral, colorless light. She would rise wearily, use the toilet, splash tepid water on her face and chest at the stained basin, then retreat to the cot to await breakfast. It would always be the same: bread and tea, both tasteless. During the morning, the voice at the grating would offer intelligence of a kind. Lunch would follow: broth and bread, distinguishable from the previous meal only in that the liquid was served in a bowl rather than a cup. During the afternoon, the voice through the wall would hiss its messages of cheer, and in the evening there would be bread and a kind of mush that seemed to have a good deal of sawdust in it in addition to whatever nutrient it might have contained. Shortly after the evening meal, the light would go out as the shrieks began, and in the scream-wracked darkness she would lie awake, shaking and weeping silently while the puppies huddled around her, offering what comfort they could.
Marianne, the Madame, and the Momentary Gods Page 11