‘I believe you,’ I said. I did.
‘Good for the youth of America!’ He saluted me mock-cheerfully. ‘Because of your untarnished innocence and candor you deserve the prize! Which is … Ta-da!’ he explained the flourish. ‘Another manuscript fragment for your thesis. This one came out of nowhere, a year before he died.’
Our tab arrived and De Petrie paid over my protests. We finished our brandies, then sped home in the Z-5 through a moonless, star-studded, honeysuckle-drenched night. I changed into my sweat pants and T-shirt. De Petrie dropped the MS on my bed-table and went upstairs for the night.
‘I don’t really know where this came from,’ the preface to the pages I held in my hand read. ‘For a long time, I thought it was something I’d seen. You know, one of those full-length cartoons that used to be aired on television year after year around the Christmas holidays. I recall several such films set in Arctic locations, with beautiful magic white horses and dark long-bearded villains. I think they were made in Finland or Denmark. Not America or Japan. But whenever I mentioned this particular tale to my siblings, they said they didn’t recognize it at all, although they did remember the others. So maybe I made it up myself. The way, I guess, writers make up stories and novels all the time: some image or idea sits in your mind for a long time, and then one day, there it is: a story. At any rate, this little tale seems to stand for something about my life. I’ve titled it, “A Fable”.’
A FABLE
There once was a little boy who lived in a northern land. He was happy, and well loved. And in turn he loved everyone: his family and friends, the countryside and the farm animals and the wild birds and animals. But most of all he loved the wintry snows and ice. From the time he could toddle, even before he could talk, he loved to play in snow and ice. Nothing pleased him more when he’d grown a little older than to sled, or ski or, best of all, to skate the ice that formed over lakes and ponds and rivers and streams more than half the year. He would go out skating with his family and friends. But long after they were weary, the little boy would continue skating, gliding along the ice, skidding, sliding, racing, flying. He’d skate by himself, with nothing but the wind, with the snow, for companions.
One afternoon, long after all the others had grown weary and skated away to rest and warm themselves at an outdoor fire, the little boy continued to skate on and on. The snow began to fall again, not thickly but melting at the ice’s surface. The little boy was so lonely and yet so fascinated with the patterns it made falling in the strong shaping wind, he pretended he could see another person. He began to skate with, dance with, this person. Together, they swung round and round, pirouetted, allowed each other under and over, swerved and spun, twisted into figure eights.
Without the little boy noticing, as he skated, the wind and the snow grew stronger, until he found himself blinded from seeing anything but snow. Faintly he heard his friends and family calling him. He thought he heard them telling him to hurry and come indoors with them. Cry babies, he thought. Cowards, he scoffed. Why be afraid of the snow? The wind? The ice? He wasn’t afraid. As the snow came down around him thicker and harder, he skated on, gliding along the ice, skidding, sliding, racing, flying with the elements, enjoying his solitude, his peace and quiet.
He was very surprised when, coming out of a revolution he’d made with his eyes closed, he saw a stranger skating nearby. An extraordinary, tall, beautiful stranger, clothed in a gleaming silver jacket and shimmering trousers, both of them adorned with innumerable diamonds. The little boy wasn’t certain whether the stranger was a man or woman. Its gloveless long hands and beautiful long hair were snow white. Its face wasn’t pink like the little boy’s but instead of a pallor like the finest ivory, and its eye the deepest, darkest blue the little boy had ever seen, like that pool of water at the very bottom of ice when farmers cut holes into it for winter-fishing. In its shimmering beautiful voice, the stranger asked the little boy if they could skate together.
Although none of his friends or family could ever skate as well as the little boy and so he’d always danced alone on the ice, he was afraid to be rude. So he said yes, and instantly felt the gloveless ivory hands take his fingers. Even through his own warm rabbit-fur-lined mittens he could feel the chill of the stranger’s hands. Still, the stranger’s voice was silvery and sweet, the stranger’s face was lovely and calm, and the way the two of them went on to skate together, to dance on the ice as though gliding through mid-air, was wondrous, ecstatic, beyond anything the little boy had ever experienced.
They skated, hand in hand, for hours. The way the little boy had skated with the snow and the wind, that’s how he skated with the stranger. Together, they swung round and round, pirouetted, allowed each other under and over, swerved and spun and twisted into figure eights. Hour after hour. Until at last the little boy began to tire. He’d never tired of skating before. But now he could see through the falling snow that the sun was setting, had set, it was midnight black around them.
‘Enough!’ the little boy cried at last. He tried to pull out of the frozen grip of the stranger, who begged him for one more dance, one more reel, one more spin, one more pas de deux. On and on they skated, dancing, until finally the little boy called out, ‘Enough, or I fear I’ll die!’
Reluctantly the stranger stopped dancing. Then the stranger bowed deep to the little boy. ‘Never before,’ it said in its voice of silver bells, ‘have I met a skater who could keep up with me! Not a half, not a quarter of the time you have honored me with, little sir. Never before have I met your equal.’
No longer afraid, now he had been released and now that he felt warmth crawling back into his hands and arms and feet, the little boy politely said, ‘Will you skate with me another day?’
‘Alas, I cannot. I must go away,’ the stranger said. ‘But if you were pleased by our skating, grant me a boon – a single kiss.’
The little boy didn’t even think but impulsively reached forward and placed a kiss upon the sterling lips. As he did, the little boy felt encompassed as though by frigid chains: tightly bound within the silver and diamond clothing and the freezing limbs of the stranger, with all warmth being drawn out of his body. He tried to pull away and succeeded enough to withdraw his lips and plead, ‘Let me go, please!’
‘Know then, impetuous child,’ the stranger said frostily, ‘with whom you have danced, with whom you have dared carouse all day! I am the Ice Queen, Sovereign of Winter, and after dancing with me, and knowing me, and being loved by me, a human may never know another! Death by freezing cold is your reward for consorting with me – and my heart’s delight. But do not be afraid, it will be gentle, like sleep.’
‘I beg you, great Queen, let me live, not freeze to death. My friends and family love me. They are good people and will take my passing hard. Let me go. I’ll honor you hereafter. I’ll skate with you, and you alone. I’ll never care for any other the rest of my life.’
‘Do you swear it?’ the Ice Queen demanded. The little boy solemnly swore the vow. Then the Ice Queen put up an index finger and its silver nail grew into an icicle, sharp as a stiletto, and the Ice Queen said, ‘I know the ways of men and how they lie and how they forget. With this bond we seal our vow.’ The Ice Queen plunged it into the little boy’s breast. To his surprise the boy felt no pain, no hurt.
‘The ice now lodges deep in your heart. There shall it remain the rest of your life. You shall grow tall, fairest of all men in the land, adored by all. Princesses, the cream of the land, shall desire you for escort and companion. You may give them your body. You may give them your word. You may give them the sweetest dreams of hope. Never give them your heart. Should you ever warm to another but me, this arrow of ice shall melt away. Your heart shall break and bleed to shreds. You will instantly die!’
With those words, the Ice Queen drew off and spun itself into a silver tornado of sleet and rose to the sky and was gone. Shaken and stunned, not realizing all he had agreed to, nor exactly what he had vowed to make good hi
s escape, the little boy skated away through the snow. When he reached home, his family and friends were barely awake, but amazed and joyful to see him. He’d been gone all night, believed lost in the blizzard, already mourned. They warmed him at their stove and cherished him.
From that day on the little boy went skating on the ice, but though he danced daily with the snow, and pirouetted with the wind, he never again re-encountered the Ice Queen. He grew strong and tall, fairer far than anyone else, just as he’d been promised. In time, his aloof beauty attracted friends from afar, some from great houses. At last he left his beloved home and wintry lake and moved to the capital, and there by his looks and cool grace, he gained favor with the royal household and rose high at the King’s court. As he’d been promised, all desired him, high and low, rich and poor.
Nobles wanted him as chum and escort, Princesses demanded him as consort. He wed one and became a great peer.
He lived long and prospered beyond his goals. But though he was widely adored, he could never return a jot of their love. One by one they turned from him, friend and courtier, spouse and concubine, companion and child. Old and alone, surrounded by nurses and hired help, he lay dying. And only now did he come to see that his adult life had been a show, a mime. For the price of more years had been direly high: a frigid heart, a core of ice.
At last, he died, forgotten, unmourned. When they closed his casket, the few who stood by, all remarked on the corpse’s great chill, on the snowy and overcast, ill-chosen morn, on the hardness of the frozen earth. Also how fast, once the box was shrouded in earthen dirt, frosty rime surrounded it, encasing it in a silver shell – a carapace of rock-hard snow and polar ice.
After I’d read Len’s fable, I lay in bed a long time, thinking. I’d never felt so close to him as then, lying in what, for some months, had been his bed, sleeping in what for six years had been his house, reading his story, his fable: a story – if I were willing to admit it – not terribly different than my own.
I’m not certain when it was that I became aware of the cricket. I’d almost fallen asleep when I was startled awake by its chirping. It sounded so close, I turned to look. The window was open. I got up and closed it and went back to bed. Closed my eyes. Ahhh! Sweet sleep! I heard the cricket chirp again. This time louder. It must be inside the house! Inside this room. Maybe if I ignored it? I was, after all, very tired. That’s what I tried to do, ignore it. It didn’t work. As though intuiting my intent, the cricket chirped on and on. Damn! I got up and lit the table lamp and put a shirt over my bare torso and went searching for it.
Not under the bed. Not under the furniture that I could see. I stopped and listened. There it was! Low down. My head down near the floorboards, I listened again, followed the sound. Yes, very close to the floorboards. Maybe it was in the floorboards. No. Couldn’t be. I wouldn’t hear it so clearly then. I needed more light. Put them all on! Was that it, scuttling along just under the poorly fitting lower molding and floor?
I followed the scuttling sound into the dressing room. It stopped. I kicked at the wall near where I thought the cricket might be. Then listened. The next time I heard the cricket chirp it had moved yet again. I kicked again, afraid I’d hurt myself or, worse, wake my host. Was his bedroom directly above this? I didn’t recall. I’d not toured upstairs. Didn’t know the layout of the rooms up there.
Wait, there it was! Headed toward the bathroom! I followed it again. Hoping that by kicking at the molding and annoying it, or better yet frightening it, I’d be able to move it out of my part of the house. This took effort. It went the wrong way for a few minutes once it had reached the floor and molding in the bathroom, and I thought that if anyone saw me, they’d conclude I was acting like a madman, kicking the floorboards, talking to someone or something no one, not even I, could see. Maybe I should just take a sleeping pill? They must have one in the cabinet here, no?
I rummaged through the bathroom shelves, all the while listening to the poor stupid, scared cricket chirping its brains out. At last I found a Sominex. Getting it out of its child-proof package was a chore. I realized how sleepy I was, decided to only take one. Took it with water. Then got angry and started kicking at the floorboards all around myself, immediately silencing the cricket. I stood listening. Nothing. Was it gone? At last. Or had it run back into the dressing area and from there would go back to where I’d first heard it, in the bedroom?
I was standing there, listening intently. Nothing! I opened the bathroom door into the dining room. Nothing. Wait! Was that it? A cricket. Maybe not mine but, yes, clearly a cricket. I went back to the dressing area and listened. No cricket. Went back into the bedroom. No cricket. Good! It worked! I knew that closing doors meant nothing to a cricket, which could sidle under them. Even so, I would go back and shut all the doors between me and the dining room, between me and the cricket chirping. I pulled the string chain of the overhead bathroom bulb to put out the light, with the dining room door ajar, still listening to make sure the cricket was outside, not in. I didn’t hear it. Fine. I shut the bathroom light.
What was that glow? From the other end of the first floor? Did it come from the kitchen? Hard to tell with the door between the dining room and the pantry ajar like that. Maybe it was my imagination? The Sominex? Sure!
I closed the dining-room door, the bathroom door, the dressing area door and went back to bed. But although I could only hear the cricket at a distance now, I still couldn’t sleep, thinking of that glow. Maybe De Petrie had left on the outside light, near the garage. I got up and went to the window on that side of the house. No, the porch light used for the driveway was out. But I saw the same glow. It seemed to come from inside that part of the house. Could it be a flashlight? A burglar?
I couldn’t very well awaken De Petrie, could I? I grabbed one of the window sticks used to keep the heavy windows from falling closed and, wielding it before me as a weapon, I went out through the three doors, quietly padding into the dining room. From there I used the stick to nudge open the ajar door into the pantry. The pantry to kitchen door was also ajar, and the glow was beyond. I trod down the steps and once more braced myself for trouble and once more nudged open the ajar door. The kitchen was dark. Through one window I could see the glow was a light and the light was on inside the double-doored garage. I couldn’t believe De Petrie kept it on intentionally all night. Had he forgotten it was on?
The door from the kitchen to the garage was locked and bolted. I undid the locks, trod cautiously, and carefully edged open the door. Before me were five steep little wooden steps down to the concrete floor of the garage. I couldn’t see very deeply into the garage. But it was lighted. I slowly dropped down the stairs. No one was in the garage. On the left, just under the turned-on light-bulb, were the built-in cabinets, shelves, desk top, work bench, all of what De Petrie had called Len Spurgeon’s workshop. It looked untouched. Tools put away. Nothing obviously out of place. Neither the Sport Utility nor the Beemer was kept indoors, except, I supposed, during winter months, so the garage was empty but for the workshop and, on the other side, three tall plastic garbage and leaf pails and a few slotted wooden boxes for deposit bottles and beercans. Remembering every B suspense movie, where the enemy is always hiding above ready to leap down, I looked up. Crossed slats – thinner than two by fours, maybe one by twos – barely holding up the weight of aluminum lawn chairs, paper lamp shades, a few lightlooking boxes. It wouldn’t support anything heavy as a man. I stepped forward. I felt funny. As though someone was here, present, with me. Where? I found a flashlight and switched it on. Its tight beam explored every shadowy corner of the place until I had ascertained I was alone. I put it back where I’d found it, noticing two other flashlights, and a lantern. I found the wall switch and turned it off. I walked up the few steps. As I turned and closed the door I said, ‘Good night.’
To whom? I couldn’t say. The presiding spirit of the house? The lares or penates that I felt lived exactly there? I didn’t know. Maybe it was the Sominex working
. Because by the time I’d gotten back to my bed through the darkened lower floor of the house, I was exhausted. My head hit the pillow and I was out!
Albinoni awakened me: two oboes intimately exchanging motifs in courtly larghetto, while violins sighed from the sidelines. After a few seconds, I realized the sound was, almost angelically, coming from above. I moved the curtains. Stark, strong sun. The clock read almost ten. That Sominex had really worked!
In the dining room, a place was laid out for breakfast next to the window bird feeder. A thermos of hot coffee, fresh croissants, confiture. I was starved. I ate for ten minutes before I wondered where my host was. After I’d cleared and washed my breakfast plates in the kitchen, I showered and changed. The Beemer and the Sports Ute were still in the driveway, the Z-5 parked slightly differently than he’d left it last night. I guessed he might be upstairs, and called from the bottom of the step in the entry foyer.
The Baroque concerto ceased. De Petrie called something in response and I took it to mean I ought to go up. I was greeted by a peaked-roof stairway landing the size of the downstairs parlor. Light slanted in from two dormered windows on one side, a small reading area made by placing an overstuffed armchair next to a Queen Anne tea table. Exactly opposite the stairway, flanked by an ancient highboy and antedeluvian painted pine chest, ajar doors disclosed windows in two small bedrooms. A modern-looking bathroom occupied the short side of the wide-planked landing, a corridor the long side. I glanced into a large, bright white and pale green bedroom I guessed to be his on my way to the end.
The Book of Lies Page 44
