The Scarlet Fig: Or, Slowly Through a Land of Stone, Book Three of the Vergil Magus Series

by Avram Davidson

  Often.

  If, now, as the boulder trembled and the boulder moved and Vergil, illaday, could not move; if all the dogs alleged to roam what western island and if all the dogs of all the Guaramanties and if all the hounds of all Molossia (where sang all the singing cauldrons of high Dodona’s oakenshaws with all their vatic voices) and if every dog of every dead had been summoned by the power of every Gunta: there could not have risen such a hellish clamor as rose then amidst the crags. All color fled the face of half-maddened Alcinoüs, his dirty-fleecy legs trembled and he be-pissed himself: then he turned and fled. All the satyrs fled, save only old Teter, who was too old to flee: he crawled up to Vergil, his half-human face torn with terror, and Vergil, recalling the old tale of a sudden gained power to move and moved the old creature tween his own legs, to assure him that he be safe. Shapes of darkness lurched and shambled swiftly through the meads and marshes and up among the crags. No single satyr, not the biggest bull-buck, even, made that noise in his chest; but quite another sort of noises they were making: dost ever hear the hare scream out when the weasel pounce upon him? suppose the hare the size of buck or bull, then conjecture hearing how that sounds … and by how many made.

  “I now remember who am I,” the man cried out. “I am Vergil Marius Mago! Let this doing now be done!”

  And he sank and set himself upon his knees and he clasped old uncomprehending Teter round the old thing’s neck and he held him and he wept.

  In a lagoon near where the islanders some times took their rest (ha!, were they not always at rest?), or tended to their single fire (although how they remembered always to feed it, he could not imagine), odd birds waded and, seemingly, fed: for they quite often bent down their heads with the peculiar beaks and dipped them in the waters, surely not to drink, for the waters were not fresh. Their heads were not alone of them peculiar; their legs so long and thin the birds gave the impression of walking on stilts. And their plumage was entirely pink, much resembling a certain confection of marchipane, the specialty of a certain shop which sold sweetmeats, half-way upon the hill back there in Naples. Somehow he thought that the name of these birds was Flemingo, though why such a bird, very clearly a creature of the warm south, should be called after the natives of Flaunders, in the cool north, indeed he could not say. Now and then the island-folk, Guaramanties or Guaramanchies or however they called themselves, would sing all of them together, and beat time with sticks upon some naturally-hollowed logs: then all the wild, gaunt, pink birds would dance in time to the music: twas a rare fine sight, indeed. Flemingoes.

  After some while, turning from the crags towards the sea, he saw the waves coming in, like students to a school. His mind, seeing them, was in an instant back a measure of years: when he, he himself a student, too: a single portmantle containing all his garb and gear, lived with others such — they shared one floor, one mess, one servant, and one set of books (they were very worn books, and for that matter, it was a very worn servant, too lacking one eye and one ear about his large and tufty head) — and all took turn and turn about. He could not imagine why a copse of exotic palm-trees was growing in the middle of their commons room now, he did not remember them, but there they were; and there were many things which he could neither imagine nor remember. It was said of such a group of student thriftbudgets that even a load of grass or hay served them at least three, even four, times: once to stuff their pallet-ticks; once, the stuffing having worn so flat or thin that they could feel the grain of the boards beneath, once to strew upon the floor in lieu of reeds or carpet; a third once, the strewing being grown thinner yet … and, for that matter, grosser, too! … to fuel the fire; and the fourth and last once the ashes served to polish knives and spoons.

  Such a group of students was called a res, which was cant for a word not generally thought safe to use in public use: the thing, then, let it be called. At stated times they elected two consuls for themselves. Anselmo was Emperor then: arms, a shield of silver with five red roses. Rose, said to be in his honor (they relished even the touch of servility, that they might safely sneer upon it when in secret: Here’s two cheeks for you-know-who, one of them was sure enough to say when setting his naked buttocks on the cloak while dressing in the morn). Rose was the lining of their ragged cloaks, and they considered it themselves a brave sight and gesture with one motion to throw back the cloaks over the right shoulder as they walked along the lane: whereat passers-by or shop- or stall-keepers were expected to say, “The roses bloom …” Their particular res occupied the third floor and rooftop room of a tenement which clung like a wasp-nest to the surviving section of the curtain-wall of the Castello of Orland the Proud; the Castello of course itself was long gone, only here and there a stone of that famed honey-color was pointed out as being of such provenance. It was considered rather brave of them, the students, not to mind The Crone Below (so they called her when the door was at bolt); this was the old woman Iadwicka who lived in one room on the street floor and had a better beard than any of they students. Iadwicka in pits in part of the yard kept vipers and fed them with rats bought off the outcaste boys at five-a-stiver: one copperkin for five. Of which vipers she day by day killed such-and-such a number and them she stewed with honey and with dill till all the meat left all the bones: flesh and flour, vetch-meal and verjuice and broth she moiled in a mull and divided the mass into trochees of the lesser theriac**; this did she of the forenoons, and all the afternoons the hooded pothecaries in their hooded cloaks (none ragged) and their prentice-boys came upon their rounds and bought them up by weight in the scales the boys did tote, to be used as ingredient for many receipts and prescriptives.

  It was considered rather brave of them to dwell there unmindful of the vipers (questioned, Were they a-feared? answered, that the vipers kept down the mice; sometimes, added, the fleas, or the lice, as well), but it was considered far from good taste to hiss. Once only someone did this, an ill-favored lumpkin whom none much liked; but so unskillfully that his imposture was soon discovered; instead of rueful laughter and rough good cheer which clearly and stupidly he had expected, they rated him at some long length, nor yielding to point out his bumpy skin and stinking feet and how ill he got his lessons; then they fined him. He was sullen after that a good long time and they by and by had reason to believe that he was mad, but they tried nothing to cure him. Merely they passed him by for mess-duty, fearing lest he introduce who knew what into the food, the while they wondered what to do with him. But soon he did it to himself, donned his cloak and went by ladder to the roof-peak and cast himself off.

  “What a rare rose bloomed that day!” a pothecary’s prentice said, though his master growled and cuffed him for it.

  They the students of that res dyed all of them their cloaks black from the linings out, and said it was for mourning, but in truth they knew it was for shame.

  But why grew the grove of exotic palm-trees from the middle of their commons-rooms? Palms of such a sort, nor giant stalks of fennel, did not use to grow in Naples, nor samphire in the crannies of their raddled house-walls.

  Fortunatus, the laughter of the Neopolitan court of its heavy Doge still ringing in his ears (only a certain sage, by name Vergil, had not laughed scornfully with the others: but did he not, behind his civil mask smile a bittle? — perhaps he did, a bittle, smile), Fortunatus scuttled through the door which the majordomo’s fingersnap had caused to be opened for him, half he turned for one further bow, but perceiving that the majordomo was already hastening off, Fortunatus gave half a shrug, then went his way. The courtly kindness had not ended with the gift of the purse which held fast on its thong against his belly (to be sure it was not a very heavy purse, but twas heavier than Fortunatus’s own purse ever was), for a torch parted from the cluster by the gate and a torchbearer said, trotting over before Fortunatus could vanish into the black, “If the Master Philosopher will just give me the directions — The house of Messer Magus, of course I so often —” Fortunatus, after a somewhat startled look to see that the
sage, Vergil, had indeed come away from the levée and was standing right behind him, declared, “The Alley of the Hornscrapers, which lies yet other side of Oxen Shambles, past Fodder Lane. Yes, yes, yes, yes.”

  Rapted in talk about the Latitudes and Zones (seldom he gat a chance for such talk … with Vergil or with anyone else), almost he forgot to make his single stop, by Poultry Court. Vergil observed with light surprise that the flemincoe or Flemengoe birds were wading in the puddle where live ducks were sometimes set to paddle and freshen before becoming dead ducks. The tall pink birds seemed quite at home, though Vergil had no thought that ever he had seen them in Naples before at all. Strange sights, well, some said these were strange times: likely they were right.

  “Who in the bloody little hell knocks at such an hour?”

  “Poulterer, the Doge’s Torchbearer; open, open, ope!”

  “May his Grace’s torch be set to my house and out-sheds if me taxes be not already fully paid and tallies isshied — What, Messer Fortunatu? What?” The man startled at the sight of Vergil, but gave him a deep nod as good as any bow; it was difficult to bow at a tiny window which showed little but one’s face and neck.

  “My man, at once, at once, one quarter of a hen-chicken, at once! Yes, yes, yes, yes.” Fortunatus at once resumed talk of the Zone in which lay Great Zeugma, known as the richest toll-bridge in the world, as it crosseth River Eupherate; but soon the thunk! thunk! of the cleaver on the block distracted him.

  “Fo! the thick chickeny stenk o’ the place,” the torchman said, staring down the family, and the neighbors, and perhaps a score or so of onlookers who seemed to have appeared from nowhere to speculate and point … until eyed down, for the torchman wore a livery which all knew, and by the proud stance and glance of him he might have been the Master of the Doge’s guard. (Did he pose, thus, there, of course, they would have cuffed him).

  At his house in the Alley of the Hornscrapers — the Alley was full of the strong, rich olor of neats’-horn, which none who ever smelled of it ever forget; to which added sundry stenks from the Ox Shambles: let the Fisc term cattle-butchering one of the Infamous Trades and tax it as such, that made it smell no sweeter. Not that Fortunatus showed any sign of noticing. He fumbled now in his own ratty purse, so different from the one which held the ducal bounty; gave the torchbearer sundry copper coins, received his thanks. Somewhat hesitantly he said, “I do not usually invite people to my chamber, but if the Messer Vergil would care to climb aloft —?”

  The sage Messer Vergil would feel honored. There was merely a slight problem. The torchbearer, saying, “If Messer Magus would care to go aloft a bit, I shall be pleased to wait below, and I haves a spare torch to enlight him home,” Vergil nodded his assent. The Master Philosopher suddenly pointed into the shadows, “Did you drop a coin?” asked he; and whilst the torchbearer peered and gaped, Fortunatus swiftly, deftly, furtively, found the end of a rope concealed somewhere, and hauled upon it, then as swiftly hid it away again. Down slid a ladder. Up went Fortunatus, Vergil following after. Below they heard the torchman mutter, as he clinked his coins and counted them, that he saw nowt missing, but thanked Messer Fortunatu none the less.

  “Please to step carefully as you enters,” said Messer Fortunatus. He let the ladder stay where it was, and tied the rope fast. “Down there in the street be dangers,” he muttered. “Did you see the way some of yon rabble looked upon me? They would have rabbled me and stole away my quartern hen-chicken, if they could. — but here be safety.”

  By dim light (and no doubt even without it) as easily as if it were level daylight, Fortunatus moved about. He unsmoored the fire, blew the sleeping coals a-bright, added a few more, lit a spill, by it lit his lamp, swiftly, carefully, blew out the spill. He took the quarter a hen-chicken in its wrapping of clean cabbage-leaf, dropped it, cabbage-leaf and all, along with an onion, a parsnip, a cluft of garlic, a juniper berry, a single peppercorn, and the two small pippins whose selection from the sideboard of the Doge had made so much merriment (Did he know it was customary to take both hands full of the gilded sweetmeats — including the rosy marchipanes — when the Doge gestured, saying, Have what you will, and …? No, he did not.); dropped all into his sole black chauldron, covered all with a fiasco of rain water deftly drained from the cistern-on-the roof, and put his meal (supper? it would be supper, dawn-dish, noon-mess and all to him, with his scanty and disciplined diet) to cook upon the embers. From the one lamp lit, he lit others, all the others … that is, all both of the others …

  Vergil looked round the room, the his, Fortunatus’s room, crazy and cranky (but his!), at the top of the house, with no way thither into it now from inside or outside the building. He saw the books, scrolls, the massive folios (oliphaunt folios, some called them, either because elephant was part of the bindings or because they were the size, so to speak, of oliphaunts), instruments, plans, charts whereby one could instantly tell the hour and half-the-hour (even on rainy or cloudy days), pictures (of the Great Gnomon at Syene, for ensample), the tiny plants which he maintained, in his cranky way, purified the air (Mercules! it did need such, in this neighborhood!); globes celestial and terrestrial and crowded cabinets; and that odd, odd bird of unknown provenance, silent bird, sitting silent on its perch (the whisper in the lane had it that Fortunatus had frequent converse with it in a foreign tongue). It would munch the remnants of his meal, whatever his meal might be; no meal at all? then the bird, too, would make do with no meal at all; at such times the neighbors said that they could tell it was Hunger Day, for all day long the bird plucked the strings of an ancient lute a-hanging by its perch: every note from umma to summa, one after the other, all day long, all the long, long, day.

  If any one was untactly enough to sound such series of notes on his own lute: “Leave off!” (at once), “Leave off! Tis Fortunatus’s bird, gone gant!”

  But little cared Fortunatus for any of this. Here he might be (even if, by his own choice, he was not now) alone. Here no one could (unless he himself chose) disturb him. Here he, and not others, put his own value on things. The whisper, indeed, the loud and raucous rumble in the lane, said nothing about Fortunatus’s life concerning women, … or, for that matter, boys or girls or men … But a statue of a beautiful she, half life-size, stood int the corner. Many a Patrician of the Kingdom of Naples (the Kingdom was extinct: not the title) would have given many a golden solid or golden pæleólogus for to have it: Haro the sculptor had groaned it up himself by ropes and pullies, and selected a choice-most nook for it in the best light, purely out of respect for a fellow-artificer; Fortunatus used it to dry his breeches on in the hot weather, the while he went bare … though in the cold he set the brazier of heated ashes by it, (the while himself he shivered), lest it freeze and crack.

  Having attended to the matter of food (it would remind him by savory smell when it was ready, he was not one of your hour-glass or water-clock cooks), he prepared to sit him down — and suddenly bethought himself that he had a guest; “Is the sage, Vergil, interested in the mathematics?” he asked.

  “It would be a further favor,” the sage Vergil began, but one word attended the ear of the Master Philosopher.

  “ ‘A favor’ yes. A favor. One may ask a favor? ah?. By the boon and bounty of the learned Doge …” (many had called Tauro many things, referring to his habits, his parents, his coarseness, and his size: no one before, under the Consulate of Heaven, had, surely, ever called him learned!)

  “… Doge, I now have enough for parchment, pens, ink, pounce … one thing Doge’s boon and bounty cannot bring me … If I might come to the house of the sage Vergil and copy but one passage out of the great book Almagest …?”

  “Come whenso you will and copy what you please. I shall advise them at the door and inform them in the library. Might the hour of noon be to the Master Philosopher’s convenience? The light —”

  It would not. “At the hour of — at the hour mentioned, according to my own calculation mathmatical, the most-favorable spirits
would not be in the ascendant …”

  So, thought Vergil; even Fortunatus feared the hour of noon, when, since men cast no shadows, one could not tell real men from false: the Demon, the Dukos, the Simulacre and the Sand-Jack shed no shade. Well, so be it. The sage Vergil, with a murmur and a gesture, made the Master Fortunatus free of whatso hour ever he might desire. The sage Vergil wore a civil face, yet, beneath the civil face, did he not smile a bittle? Beneath the civil face, he did smile … a bittle.