If You're Reading This, I'm Already Dead

by Andrew Nicoll

  It was a wonderful time. And then I noticed, at the side of the street, a tiny figure watching us, standing by the roadside to watch us pass, then running ahead to the front of the procession to watch again. There was nothing unusual about that. Lots of people were doing it, especially the children, and the strange watcher was hardly bigger than a child, but there was something about him, a bitter shadow that hung about him as he went. He did not cheer as the children cheered. He never waved a flag on a stick, never applauded. They jostled to get to the front of the pavement while he hung about at the back, peering out from behind the trees, darting his head away if I tried to catch his eye. But strangest of all, while the children were dressed in their Sunday best, sent out by their mothers to enjoy the sunshine, he was completely hidden under a long gray salt-stained sea-cloak and, just once, from under the hood, I was sure I caught a flash of magnificent tiger-red whiskers.

  I pissed myself. There you are. I said you’d never believe the heroic parts unless I told you the cowardly parts too, and it doesn’t get much more cowardly and pathetic than that.

  It was the bombing that did it. It’s started again. One of them landed right outside. That’s a damned lie too. It wasn’t right outside, it was the other side of the park, but I heard it coming, the damned thing screaming and howling all the way down. You never hear the one that gets you. Everybody knows that. It’s something to do with the physics, the angle of flight or the speed of sound or something, I don’t know, but everybody knows you don’t hear the last one. Not that that was any comfort to me. I heard that whistling and I knew it was headed for me, straight down my throat, and I sat there, gripping on to the table, listening to it coming for half an hour, down and down and down until it burst, way over the other side of the park, and I pissed myself. It’s very shaming, but there we are. Remember those trees I told you about before—the ones that were standing out in silhouette against the fires? They’ve gone now. The bomb took them and they are burning too, fizzing and popping in the dark. Nothing left but broken stumps with lumps of burning wood exploding out across the grass. I find it strangely reassuring. A stray bomb like that, it must mean I’m not the only one who’s terrified. One of those pilots up there decided to get out quick, hit and run, never mind looking for the docks down there in the fires. He came just as close as he had to and no closer than honor demanded. Close enough would do. Dropped his bombs and turned round as fast as he could, that’s what he did, and I don’t blame him. One less tree to assist the war effort of the Reich and a planeful of young men who live another night—what’s wrong with that?

  Anyway, I am blessed that I have another pair of trousers. I’ve got no tea but I have got another pair of trousers. The others are in the sink now and I do not intend to do anything with them. I can’t be bothered. I suppose they call this “resignation.” A man who expected to be alive in the morning would wash his underwear, but I’m not resigned. I’m not. As old as I am, as feeble as I am, I’m not ready to die yet. I’ve proved that. A man who sees Death as a welcome friend does not piss his pants when the knock comes at the door.

  We should talk of happier days, when I was rather more heroic and when Death was far enough away for me to face him with a smile on my lips and an iron bladder, secure in the knowledge that he had not yet put my name in his address book.

  We were on our way to my coronation, remember, and the throng grew thicker as we went because those who had waited to see us close to the palazzo ran forward to join those who had waited a little further ahead. It would have been a wonderful day to be a burglar since the whole of the townspeople had left their houses empty and come to see me, but I suppose it was safe enough since almost all of Albania’s crop of brigands was busy in my procession.

  Still, Zogolli’s careful organization had certainly paid off. When we arrived at the great square in front of the church and the bandmaster, with his strange rocking gait, waddled right into the center, his musicians found there was barely room to breathe. The crowd closed around them the moment they arrived, the way into the square was blocked and our little procession came to a halt. But Zogolli had put the lancers in second place and behind them the soldiers and the bashi-bazouks. Up ahead I could see the horses plunging through the crowd, opening a way, forcing them back, and the soldiers came behind, clearing a path, holding the line until, before too long, the crowd was pushed back to the edges of the square.

  They took it well, like good citizens keen to help, but the noise was indescribable and the military band might as well have stood there miming for all they added to it.

  Then the Rolls arrived in the square and pulled up beside the broad steps of the church. The chauffeur got out to hold open the door and the yelling got a little louder. This was something to see.

  Something was happening.

  Somebody was getting out.

  “It’s him! It’s the king! I’m telling you, it’s the king! The king!”

  “No, not him.”

  “Not him either.”

  “This one, it must be this one. The king!”

  “No, not him. I don’t know who that is. He must be something in the government but I bet he’s important because, look, he’s waiting for the king.”

  He was. They all were, Zogolli and his friends in their glum top hats, lined up on the steps to await my arrival; the lancers and the bashi-bazouks around the square, the flag party standing at attention, the fathers-in-law handing their ponies to waiting boys and taking their places on the steps, all of them standing there amidst a cacophony of bells, they were all waiting for the king, but still I did not come.

  The first of the landaus reached the square, the horses nervous and jittery as the cheering grew wilder and more frantic. Each new arrival made the excitement of the crowd more intense—and it was now, definitely, a crowd. There were no men and women left in the square, no children, no families, there was just a crowd, one single, breathing, heaving beast with a single pulse, a single, hammering heartbeat and one throat to howl through. There was howling when the harem girls got down from their coach. There was howling when Aferdita, the last to leave, turned and waved at them, and they went absolutely crazy when Sarah’s carriage arrived.

  Imagine what it must have been like for those people, living then, in that place, waking up from years of war and misery and finding yourself in the same town square as those three gorgeous creatures.

  “Who are they?”

  “Countesses.”

  “From Austria.”

  “Grand duchesses.”

  “Princesses.”

  “From Russia.”

  “Actresses.”

  “The mistresses of the king.”

  “From Paris.”

  They got down from their carriage, each one more lovely than the last, hidden from the crowd until they too mounted the steps. Mrs. MacLeod in a stunning gown of black and white and a hat with half an aviary perched on it. Tifty in red velvet that lapped at her curves like flames round a heretic. She paused and bent to hook up the hem of her dress before climbing the stairs and the crowd howled—just as she knew they would.

  And there was Sarah, who mounted the steps arm in arm with her blind father. Can you imagine how they roared? Uniforms, pageantry, music, flags, beauty, glamour, charm and sex and then, on top of all that, a touching, girlish devotion for a poor old cripple. We knew how to give them a show to remember and, by God, they got their money’s worth.

  From Bonn to Budapest, Spindelleger’s Spectacular Equestrian Circus and Menagerie had never produced a show like this, and then, because we always saved the best for last, because we always gave them the very biggest of big finishes, it was my turn.

  There was no surprise. They knew I was coming. They could see me coming. They were baying for me, “Mbret! Mbret! The king! The king!” Pointing and shouting, waving madly, tossing their hats up into the blue, blue sky and screaming, but if I could not surprise them, I could at least give them what they wanted and more—far more.


  They expected me to walk my horse up to the steps, dismount and there to shake hands with Kemali, who had appeared from I know not where and who stood, small and gray and imperturbable, waiting to welcome me. I did that. Of course I did that, but before I did that I put my heels to my horse’s flanks and I rode. By God, that was a fiery beast. It was as if, all through that long, tedious walk around the city, with the flags flying and the drums beating, he had simply been waiting for a sign from me and then, when it came, he set back his ears, flared his nostrils, rolled his eyes and took off as if all the devils of hell were on his tail.

  Of course there were no devils behind us, but Max and Arbuthnot were there, and behind them half a squadron of lancers, all a-glitter. How could they abandon me? When I rode they rode, and I galloped round the town square like a comet trailing a great fiery tail of horsemen, hardly slowing for the corners as the mothers in front screamed in terror and snatched up their children and the fathers behind yelled for the joy of it. Once around the square, one hand raised in salute to my people, hailing them, reaching out to them as they were reaching out to me, to touch as a father touches his children, back to where Kemali stood on the steps, slowly shaking his head as he would over a wild, reckless son who made him very, very proud, back to where Sarah was standing, hands clapped across her mouth with excitement, eyes sparkling with delight, back to where the soldiers of the flag party were standing at attention, facing the front, eyes swiveling to catch a glimpse of their king.

  I pulled back on the reins. My horse slowed, just by a fraction. I leaned out of my saddle. I leaned out and forward and to the right, my arm extended, my hand open, and there was the color sergeant of the flag party, a great silver-headed bear of a man, a man sworn to defend that flag against each and any and all, though it be with his life. He turned. He saw me riding right at him. We looked into one another’s eyes. He knew at once what I meant to do and he knew that flag would be safe with me. He held it up. He held it up to me in two hands and I snatched it from him as I rode past. I swear to God my stirrup must have brushed the tip of his nose but he never flinched. He stood there like a rock, proudly at attention as I cantered round the square for a second time, my arm held out straight and level, the flag streaming out behind me as I rode, passing over the people like a blessing.

  I had done enough. Leave them wanting more, that’s what we always say.

  The color sergeant was waiting where I left him. I leaned down, handed him back his flag and clapped him on the shoulder by way of thanks and then, finally, I dismounted.

  Kemali came down the steps to greet me, doffing his hat as he approached. He shook me by the hand and said, “Very good, Your Majesty, very good. Will there be any further theatrics, or can we get on with the coronation now?”

  Naturally I was as eager as the next man to be crowned, but I wasn’t quite ready to stop showing off.

  “Indulge me just a little further, Prime Minister,” I said. I took down my saddlebags and, with Kemali at my side, I walked out into the square and found a boy, a handsome little dark-haired chap he was, about ten years old, and I gave him my bag. I remember how he watched me coming toward him, wonderment growing in his face and, when at last the Magnificence was directly before him, he reached for his mother’s hand but still found the courage to meet my eye.

  “Hello, son,” I said.

  “Hello, son,” said Kemali.

  “I need somebody to carry this bag for me. Do you think you can help?”

  Kemali said the boy was sure he could help.

  “But what does your mother think?” I turned my kingly gaze on her. “Madam, would you be willing to allow your son to come and help his king?”

  Madam was more than willing. Madam was beside herself with tearful delight. Madam called down all the blessings of heaven on my head, wailed into a handkerchief flung across her face, scrubbed that same handkerchief over the boy’s chin and shooed him away with a lot of sniffles and ‘Be good’s and ‘Do as you’re told’s, which I did not need Kemali to translate.

  We walked back across the square, Kemali and me, the boy marching poker-straight beside us as the people screamed with delight.

  Kemali said, “It seems to me you have one more surprise in store, Majesty.”

  “Oh, at least one, my friend. In fact, I hope to surprise you regularly from now on.”

  “Try not to be too surprising, Majesty. Stability is a good thing in governments. Respect for tradition. My advice is to avoid novelty, eschew anything that smacks of innovation, despise the daring.”

  “But, Kemali, if you had followed your own advice, my proud little kingdom would still be under the heel of the monstrous Turk. I am all for tradition—in fact, I think we should make it traditional for all the kings that come after me to parade the flag around the square. What do you think? On the other hand, ‘daring’ is my middle name. For example, I was considering whether I might not insist on having my entire government dress in pink. I have some very interesting ideas for uniforms. Very novel. Very innovative.”

  The old fox refused to take the bait. “Majesty,” he said, “it is a narrow tightrope to walk, but there is a clear difference between the daring and the downright eccentric.”

  We reached the top of the stairs and the doorway of the church.

  “Turn and wave to your people,” said Kemali. “The next time they see you, you will be crowned.”

  I turned. I waved. Max and Arbuthnot stood aside so as not to block the view. The people cheered. It was almost embarrassingly easy to make them do it, as if we were dancers, following practiced steps, as if we were performers going through a routine. I waved, they yelled. We went into the church.

  “Come this way,” said Kemali. “Those waiting on the stairs will make their own arrangements.”

  I obeyed as meekly as a king can and he led me into a dirty little room with a table and some chairs and a lot of discarded boxes.

  “Why are we here?” I said.

  “To prepare. To make ready. Mostly to wait while everyone else finds a place to sit. Have you ever been in a church before, Majesty?”

  “Yes. Once or twice. A few times. When I was in Germany.” Which was true. There was the time I got christened and a few times afterward, weddings and funerals, stuff like that.

  “No doubt Your Majesty’s quick mind is asking the vital question: why is this ceremony taking place in a Christian church?”

  “I was about to raise that very matter.”

  “There are very few churches left. The Christians were all but destroyed and driven out of Albania. They survived wars and invasions, the fall of the Byzantine Empire, persecutions of one kind and another, but the firman of your ancestor, demanding compulsory military service of all their young men, proved to be a convincing argument for conversion to the faith of the Prophet. History has not been kind to the Albanians but, to those Albanians, most unkind of all.

  “Yet it is the most fervent wish of your government, Majesty, that there should be no Christians in Albania tomorrow and no Mussulmans either. Only Albanians. Christians too are your subjects. They too are Albanians. And Skanderbeg is theirs. The crown itself is theirs. The very act of crowning is a Christian one, and rather than take it from them, we have chosen to give it back to them—with a few little additions. Yes, they are infidels, but endure this little humiliation, Majesty, for the sake of all the greater humiliations they have suffered. Bear this and help to make one nation.”

  There was a kind of grandeur in what that fine old man was saying. He wanted Albania to be the best country it could be, just the way that I wanted to be the best of kings. Imagine living in a country where nobody cared what religion you were, where patriotism and brotherhood were enough, where you had no need to prove how much you could hate your neighbors in order to prove how much you loved your country. It was a good and high ambition.

  “More than happy to help,” I said. “Do you think we could get started?”

  My voice seem
ed suddenly very loud because, just at that instant, the clamor of the bells ceased as if their music had been pouring out of a tap that somebody simply turned off, leaving in its place that same empty, expectant echo I heard when the Companions stopped singing.

  Kemali raised a finger as if to emphasize the quiet. There was nothing to hear now but the sighing roar of the crowd, like the sound you hear as you walk toward a faraway beach, before you reach the crest of the dunes. “I think that means we are ready to begin,” he said.

  There was a knock at the door. Arbuthnot opened it and revealed a bearded priest dressed in fabulous golden robes, a boy acolyte at his side. The man rushed into the room and knelt to kiss my hand, tears in his eyes. I almost had to drag him to his feet again as he raved and babbled at me.

  Kemali said, “He wishes me to convey the joy he feels that he is in the presence of the King, the Heaven-Blessed, the Protector of Nations, Defender of the Poor and of the Oppressed. There is a good deal more, and he has obviously rehearsed for some time.”

  I took the priest by the shoulders and I looked him full in the face. “Tell him,” I said, “that the king is a man, like him and, like him, the servant of God and the slave of death.”

  He seemed to like that and he dried his tears and smoothed down his enormous black beard with thick fingers.

  “Now can we go?” I said.