The Laughter of Carthage: Pyat Quartet

by Michael Moorcock

  I had not sought any of this. I had been ill-prepared for it. They are the wretched servants of despair, the enemies of optimism, the willing slaves of Bolshevism. Carthage rose again, not merely in Arkansas, or Missouri, or Louisiana, but in every part of the United States, like the warning signs of cancer. In Europe, too. In the East it already conquered the entire organism. Everywhere was ignorance, hunger, fatalism, corrupted blood, blind hunger. It had been dormant in the shtetls until the great drums began to beat and the brazen trumpets rang, when Carthage shook herself from sleep and reached with a red grin for her spear and shield. She licked her thick lips and looked with confident envy upon the fruits of our labours: our harvest of civilisation. Her hot black eyes glared and there was a deep growl in her throat as she stretched and tested her limbs, her heart filling with anger against those who had sought to destroy her, who had, through their superior morality and courage, meanwhile enriched themselves. And her swarthy hands curled in anticipation. Her hungry, stinking breath is heard in the alleys of the city, the shadows and shacks and shelters, the tents and camps of the countryside, until the sound threatens to drown all others. It drowns the hymns and prayers of true Christians. Our beautiful songs and our poetry, our pure-voiced little girls, our sacrament is extinguished by the roar. Carthage stands laughing on the ruins of our just dreams; our blood runs down her chin; our monuments are ashes beneath her sandalled feet. The beast has conquered! The mindless mob rules on Earth. Chaos becomes the sole condition of Man. This I predicted. And we who were given signs (like the sign God sent when He brought the airship to rest) took heed. It became our duty to warn anyone who will listen. The fight is not completely over, though we have lost so many battles. They never made me a Mussulman. I do not stumble. I keep my back straight. I will not be seduced by the comforts of the trance. I will survive even the most terrible mistakes. Gehorsam nicht folgn. Ich bin baamter! Bafeln! A mol, ich bin andersh. Can’t they see? I do not know their language. Podol is nothing. One must work where one can.

  They were laughing their mockery as they finally let go of the rope and our ship flew free. They had been playing with us, showing off their power. Arms, white and black, waved like sickly reeds. I fought to recover my self-control. Major Sinclair had still not realised how close I had been to losing consciousness. We were still climbing into a silvery sky. I was so glad to leave Carthage behind. Little Rock lay clear ahead. I could imagine no experience before us as terrifying as that which we had already escaped.

  They put me in Springfield when the roses were in bloom. Oh, Esmé, my sister, you never came to see me. They removed me from your memory. I know now how they work. They told you I did not exist. They desired you for themselves. Carthage descended upon us and carried you away. They destroyed my mother. Mother, did they turn you into ash? Did your bones smoke in their hideous pits where starving soldiers floundered through smouldering human flesh, while machine guns chattered night and day and the voices of the damned echoed in the gorge where I and Esmé used to play? Were you with her, Esmé, or were you already dead, churned to fertiliser by the Steel Tsar’s implacable machines? Or had you sought the consolation of the Mussulman in a Carthaginian prison camp? I did not see you in Springfield, but Springfield is a dozen different places. The maps change and the locations move. My flying cities will know where to go. They tell me at the police station there is nothing they can do about the blacks. They sympathise, but their hands are tied. We are all afraid to speak our minds. The great movements have been suppressed; our heroes are dying in chains or already murdered. Only grey people are allowed to survive. They are the shadows left by Carthage to deceive us into believing our world still exists. But I am not deceived. I have not been dragged down. They shall not confine me in their camps, nor to their ghettoes, their nigger towns and stateless barbed wire pens. I shall not wear their pe’os. I am not the same as them. I deserve better. What right have they to call me mishling? Halbjuden? I was betrayed before I was born. Das Blutt gerinnt. Das Blutt gerinnt.

  As Major Sinclair had promised, we were in Little Rock by noon. Our printed handbills fell into the neat furrows of her streets like seeds at springtime. A small crowd cheered us when we moored in a small park on the outskirts, took aboard the money we had come for, refuelled our tank and were quickly on our way again to Tuscaloosa. The illness which had seized me in Carthage seemed to disappear not long after we left Little Rock. As we sailed above the unremarkable rooftops of Tuscaloosa I was completely free of it. I began to think I had suffered food poisoning, for pork has never much agreed with me. With the wind behind us and clear skies ahead we set course for Atlanta, Emperor City of the South, core of a world once thought crushed and defeated but now growing into a golden, avenging phoenix. Atlanta, burned to the ground by ruthless enemies, raped and robbed and left for dead, rapidly gathered back her strength. Her great silver towers were rising from the wasteland. White, curving roads would sweep through her skies. I saw her in the distance and she was impressive. At her heart was a massive crown of gold. Major Sinclair was in excellent form now that the weather was clearer. Below the countryside steadily became more varied and pleasant. The city, seen above a line of dark green pines, had a clean, modern appearance which I had not expected. Before we reached the golden dome we turned north of Stone Mountain, heading for the extensive grounds of Klankrest mansion, seat of the Imperial Wizard, hub of the Invisible Empire.

  We sailed in towards evening, flying over the brow of a hill towards a wide lawn surrounding an ornamental lake in which a fountain gushed. Orderly paths ran through the lawns. Above them was a great house so beautiful it would have been the envy of the Tsar himself. It was the epitome of fine Southern taste, with marble columns and lintels, a neo-Graecian mansion, solid and serene in the warmth of the late February sun. One could imagine some Georgian cavalier strolling in these grounds in the golden days before the Civil War. As Major Sinclair brought The Knight Hawk to a gentle halt over the lake, negro servants impeccable in red, white and blue uniforms of the Colonial style came running from the house to catch hold of our lines, securing us to a pair of special posts erected near the house, evidently for this very purpose. Next we were gradually winched to the ground and the ship was firmly anchored, enabling us to step easily from our cockpits to the grass. Major Sinclair, with his usual pleasant good manners, thanked the negroes and instructed them to take our luggage into the house. Looking up at the blue-veined marble and polished stone, the tall windows of Klankrest, I decided the Imperial Wizard’s chief residence already rivalled the White House which I had seen in Washington and found disappointing.

  We began to walk round the extensive marble veranda towards the front of the building. Just before we turned Mr Clarke himself appeared. For me, it was more thrilling seeing this unassuming, intelligent looking man, than if I had actually come face to face with Mr Harding himself. In his lightweight grey suit he approached us with easy grace. He and his family might always have inhabited the mansion. Retaining the mild, academic manner I had noted before, he confirmed my opinion: he was a natural gentleman, bearing himself with quiet dignity as he warmly shook hands with us, enquiring how the journey had been, saying how pleased he was I had decided to join the service of the Klan.

  With some amusement, Major Sinclair told of our enforced stay in Carthage. ‘I’m not sure Colonel Peterson was too happy about the accommodations.’ He chuckled. ‘All niggers and poor white trash. Wasn’t that so, colonel?’

  ‘It’s a side of the South nobody’s greatly proud of, sir,’ said Mr Clarke soberly. ‘Not so bad, I suppose, as New York slums, but a living reminder of carpetbagging days. It will change in time, especially when the alien exploiters are finally driven out.’ He began to lead us towards the front entrance. ‘In those days, sir, as you may know, the Klan dealt harshly with thugs who took advantage of Reconstruction. More harshly than they do today.’

  Birth of a Nation had shown me this graphically. I nodded in enthusiastic agreement.<
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  ‘It was an economic war, whatever Yankees pretended to the contrary. They were no more interested in the lot of the slaves than Simon Legree. The welfare of the negro was treated as a duty and an enduring responsibility in the South. When we were mined, those poor wretches were amongst the first to suffer. If we had been left in peace to found our Confederacy, this part of the world would be a paradise now, a model to the rest of America, to the whole world.’

  We paused outside the glass and rococo-iron doors. Major Sinclair seemed singularly happy as he surveyed the tall hedges, the neatly raked gravel drive. ‘We’re too big and varied a country to be administered as a single nation. Each State knows where her best interests lie. It’s the Federal Government which always causes the trouble.’

  We entered a spacious hall, also predominantly of marble, hung with old canvases, its alcoves containing alabaster urns trimmed in gold. ‘You’ll reduce the influence of government locally as well as nationally, I understand?’ I wished to impress him with my sophisticated grasp of U.S. politics. I rested my hand lightly on the polished wood of a full-size grand piano and raised my eyes to the sweeping staircase with its huge Klan banner, the Grand Klensign.

  ‘The rights of the individual are of paramount concern to the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan.’ Mr Clarke was about to expand on this when a tall, handsome raven-haired woman appeared on the stairs and began slowly to descend. ‘My dear! Colonel Peterson, this is my colleague, Mrs Mawgan. She has done as much as I to make this organisation the force it is today.’ Mrs Mawgan wore a formal black frock. Her jewellery was jet and silver. With her broad forehead and heavy jaw she had a manner more immediately striking than Mr Clarke’s own. I guessed at once she must be his mistress, even, to some degree, the power behind the throne. They were a splendidly well-matched couple. As she reached the bottom of the steps she extended her gloved hand, smiling pleasantly. ‘You’re the foreign gentleman who’ll help us drive our aliens back to where they came from.’

  ‘Now, Bessy, that’s not exactly right,’ began Mr Clarke chidingly, but I laughed heartily. She was a woman of considerable irony and I appreciated her wit.

  ‘Mrs Mawgan,’ I said with a bow, kissing her hand, ‘if I can stop America making the mistakes of Europe before I, myself, am driven out, I shall be more than satisfied.’

  ‘Oh, Colonel Peterson, you’re far too well-bred to overstay your welcome I’m sure. I appreciate your ideals. And it’s a good salary, too, I gather.’ With this she treated me to a ladylike wink to put me at my ease. In some ways she reminded me of my baroness. ‘You two boys must be tired out. What d’you want first? A drink? Or would you rather clean up?’

  We chose the latter.

  ‘Wilson will show you to your rooms. We’ll meet down here before dinner.’ Mrs Mawgan acknowledged my subtle bow with a smile of equal delicacy and we parted.

  Wilson, the butler, took us up to the second floor, along a carpeted marble tunnel, to our suites. Mine was more luxurious than any hotel’s. I had never been in anything of this size or richness. The sensation of genuine opulence which swept through me reminded me exactly of the feeling I received at my Uncle Semya’s house in Odessa when I realised I was actually to have a whole room to myself, that many people thought it quite natural not to sleep in the same room as the one in which they ate! It was all I could do to stop from running from place to place opening cupboards and inspecting the elaborate toilet fittings. The whole was tastefully designed in the same patriotic colours, with the addition of gold and silver where appropriate. The wallpaper at first seemed fairly plain until inspected closely. Its chief motif was of lozenge shapes containing the initials KKK. The main feature of the suite, however, was my huge four-poster bed in the Napoleonic style, its headboards painted with scenes recalling the great triumphs of America’s struggle for freedom and honour. Inset over the tallest point of the headboard was a stylised Klan hood on which, in beautiful Gothic script, had been imposed the motto Suppressio veri suggestio falsi. This reference to the methods of our enemies could not be too frequently reiterated. The french windows of my sitting-room opened onto a balcony directly overlooking the lawns and the lake. How I wish those fools who even now insist to me that the Klan was a gang of ill-bred ruffians could have visited Klankrest in the days of its glory. They, who would not even know which fork to use for fish, would have been speechless with amazement. It was the epitome of civilised and gracious living. Nobody there questioned my yichuss.

  * * * *

  ONE

  I AM ONE of the great inventors of my age. Rejected by its birthplace, my genius would otherwise be universally acknowledged; even by Turks. The Rio Cruz, loaded with snow and refugees, steamed from Odessa, heading for Sebastopol and the Caucusus. I was toasted by the British as a Russian Prometheus. How could I have guessed the irony? I was sublimely ignorant of my personal future. In those last days of 1919, having escaped an humiliating death, I became freshly inspired with my mission: I would bring scientific enlightenment to the world at large. (Now, chained, I still await my Hercules. Es war nicht meine Schuld.)

  Within a day of my boarding, Mr Thompson, Chief Engineer of the Rio Cruz and by nature of his calling a cosmopolitan, a reader of learned journals, was my unqualified admirer. ‘You must get to England as soon as you can,’ he begged. ‘So many have been killed. They need trained people more than ever.’ Several other officers were equally encouraging. They were good-hearted fellows, spontaneous and sincere. The best type of Englishman; now extinct.

  Until such time as, we were fond of saying, Russia came to her senses, England was the obvious country in which to further my career. Mr Green, my Uncle Semyon’s business partner, had returned to London at the outbreak of the Revolution. He would have money for me. Moreover, the support I discovered aboard the Rio Cruz suggested I should rapidly secure an important government position once ashore in ‘Blighty’.

  By dint of these prospects, together with a little cocaine and wine, I was at least partially able to forget my earlier disappointments. Russia was harder to put behind me than I had anticipated and it would be three weeks before we actually reached Constantinople. Immediately we were out of sight of land, high winds and seas attacked us. A good sailor, I nonetheless felt a moderate amount of nausea and periodically was infected with a terrible, debilitating gloom. At these times I would be forced to rush from whatever company I was in to return to my bunk where for half-an-hour or so my whole body would shake, as if in time to the vibrations of the ship. These bouts were quite as much a physical as a psychological reaction to events of the previous two years, but whenever they seized me I would be overwhelmed by an agonising longing for a more innocent past, for my golden Odessa summer of 1914 when the whole world had appeared to open herself for me. In my quasi-delirium it seemed the noble city of Odysseus was lost forever to the Tartar, the Mussulman, the Jew. In conquering Odessa they had captured something of my being and still held it. Trotski and Lenin leered gigantically and grinned: with bloody fingers they brandished that small, pulsing fragment of my soul. The elements wailed around the ship in massive chorus as I wept for Esmé, my little angel, whose blonde Slavic beauty represented everything true and honest in Russia. Dishonoured by anarchists, by Mongol riff-raff, my lost sweetheart could never be redeemed. She had mocked me for my horror at her stories of rape and abasement. Esmé, my greatest support after my mother, had been my muse, my hope. If she still lived she was nothing but a Bolshevik’s whore. Esmé, as my body shuddered on its narrow bunk, I yearned to flee backwards in Time to rescue you. How different both our lives would have been if we had escaped together. I should have been loyal to you. Kàbus göruyorum. I am still, even in this decrepit body, loyal to you. For all that you betrayed me I bear you no ill will.