The Way of Muri

by Ilya Boyashov

  The house spirit continued to wail inaudibly. ‘Herbert is abandoning the portraits of his ancestors! He’s abandoning his library! What would his father and his grandfather say? Heaven help him!’ The house spirit was rocking from side to side and jumping up and down, frightened and trembling, about to burst from the stress. ‘My master will fall from that terrible cliff again!’

  The house spirit began rushing about the library ceiling in despair – bumping into the bookshelves, flying over Aristotle, Plato and Nietzsche, colliding with Descartes, Hegel and Xenophon. The books mutely endured this emotional outburst, but Muri did not.

  ‘Why are you jumping about like that and behaving so hysterically? At least your master is doing something. Most humans that I’ve met on my travels haven’t a clue what they should be doing with their lives. They stick their heads in the sand, become slaves to their routines and put their faith in superstitious nonsense like “lucky” cats, doing their best to ruin my life in the process… I admire your master, you know, even if he is prepared to make the same mistake three times. That housekeeper, on the other hand, is just a silly old fool!’

  ‘Wash your mouth out!’ cried the house spirit, incensed by such slander. ‘How dare you scorn the woman who got you out of that noose? The same woman who brought you into the house, fed you and warmed you up!’

  ‘Of course she’s a fool,’ repeated the shameless cat. ‘She spends her whole life bustling about in that kitchen like a brainless chicken, quaking at the sight of every red-blooded male. The extent of her path in life is to the market and back!’

  ‘You ungrateful wretch!’ exclaimed the house spirit, trembling with anger.

  ‘You are too accustomed to your little world,’ Muri said condescendingly. ‘What if your house and your precious library were smashed to smithereens, and all your books were thrown in different directions? Houses do explode! I’ve seen it happen. It will happen to this house too, sooner or later – take my word for it. What will you do then? Will you end your days ignominiously on a heap of scattered junk?’

  At that moment the housekeeper woke up, and her reproachful cry echoed throughout the house. She continued to sit there for a while, beating her hands against her unattractive thighs. Muri walked up to her and started purring and rubbing against her legs, which rose from her slippers like a couple of spindly twigs. Less than a minute later he was polishing off a plate of liver, ignoring the admonishments of the house spirit who was pacing about nearby, choking with indignation.

  Meanwhile Frau Hosspield threw on her coat and went outside to investigate. She saw that the ropes had disappeared. She also noticed the wheelchair tracks leading away from the house, the footprints and the imprint of car tyres on the snow. The housekeeper finally realized what had happened. Without a thought for the wide-open doors, she ran into the night.

  After eating his fill, the cat screwed up his eyes and stretched with indescribable elegance. Satisfaction was written all over his face. The house spirit continued to scold him, accusing him of base ingratitude.

  ‘I’m afraid that’s the way things are and always will be!’ answered Muri. ‘I never turn down food and a blanket, but when the time is right I’m on my way.’

  When the cat left this time he made his way to the town of Sadelen, then on to Jonenraug, before eventually reaching the border town of Salzburg.

  Sheikh Abdullah Nadari Ak-Saïd ibn Khalim, owner of thirty wives and fifteen oil fields, climbed into the pilot’s seat again. This time his aircraft bore the name Success (wingspan 111 feet) and featured four engines custom built by the firm Pratt & Whitney (each worth a million dollars). On 10 February 1994 at 10 a.m. local time, to the accompaniment of the cheers of journalists and the weeping of his inconsolable wives, the sheikh’s aeroplane faded to a dot against the background of an otherwise unblemished Arabian sky.

  Abdullah Nadari Ak-Saïd ibn Khalim had successfully flown 25,000 miles when he was inadvertently and unavoidably caught up in a hurricane of unprecedented force over the Atlantic. After seven hours of turbulence, Abdullah Nadari Ak-Saïd ibn Khalim managed to reach the coast of Africa and flew a further 100 miles searching for a suitable landing site in the jungle. His tattered pterodactyl eventually came to rest on a tiny strip of land in the Congo. The pygmies who poured out of the forest stared in horror at the heap of valuable scrap metal.

  ‘Oh, Great and Merciful Allah, finally I understand the sign You have given me!’ whispered Abdullah Nadari Ak-Saïd ibn Khalim, after he had regained consciousness thanks to the ministrations of the local witch-doctor (and a drug extracted from the leaves of the yagomba plant). ‘Oh, Creator of all that exists, I have been guilty of vanity and hubris! I was an arrogant egotist, naming my worthless creations Victoria and Success and daring to put my faith in mechanical engineering instead of relying in everything only on You, Father of all that exists in the world! Indeed, my reason was clouded with pride, but twice now this pride has come before a fall! I humbly pledge to name my next invention Hope. Though I am the most abject of slaves, unworthy of brushing the dust from the feet of the lowliest servant, I vow to dedicate my only dream to You, my All-Powerful and Munificent Lord and Master, and I swear on my beloved children that I shall begin to prepare for the realization of this dream at once.’

  Thus, his pride humbled, Sheikh Abdullah Nadari Ak-Saïd ibn Khalim returned to his palace and entered the mosque, where he stayed for three days and three nights, spending his time in vigilant prayer. When he eventually appeared, to a barrage of photo and video cameras, he shocked his family and loyal aircraft designers once more by informing them of his steadfast decision.

  The goose from Uryupinsk continued to astound experts in a different field. Just six months after Timosha had been placed in a specially prepared room – featuring oxygen-enriched air, natural sunlight and a ready supply of top-quality modified wheat supplemented with vitamins A, B and C – he was able to carry out sums involving ten-digit figures without any particular difficulty. Further progress was hampered by the simple fact that it took officials days to verify each answer. Despite the abundant supply of food, the talented goose himself became so exhausted that he lost his voice.

  ‘There exists another, no less significant path, known to all yogis and gurus since time immemorial. It has been exalted by, amongst others, Buddha and Krishna, Goethe and Tolstoy. This Path is a spiritual ascent, which must also lead to a specific goal,’ proclaimed Pete Stout, at a conference of ufologists and parapsychologists held in Oslo in February 1993. ‘And what is the goal at the end of the longest road? The merging of man with God! We might also ask ourselves, is any species other than Homo sapiens capable of following this ‘internal path of knowledge’? The answer is yes. Timosha the goose, Toni the dolphin – they are our answer, and very soon it will be scientifically proven. To tell you the truth, it would have been proven some time ago if those damned Russians weren’t so stubborn and suspicious… Gentlemen, my hands were tied by politics! But I am confident that the Chicago dolphinarium will not let us down. Meliora spero!9’

  A blizzard was raging on a mountain road in Bavaria. An old VW had stalled in the middle of it, and its occupant – a young student – was growing increasingly anxious. Her handbag contained an assortment of random items accumulated over time – fluffy toy squirrels and mice, a tube of energy tablets, some make-up and a spare condom that she’d been carrying round with her for two years, just in case. But the thing she needed most in the given circumstances, the thing she was looking for, was missing. She must have left it back at the hostel. The girl emptied her bag out onto the front passenger seat, but her mobile phone would not materialize out of thin air. Her only consolation was the unexpected discovery of a piece of chewing gum.

  The inside of the car was getting colder. The girl’s feet were already frozen in her light shoes, and she soon regretted the hastily chosen dress that barely reached the top of her thighs. ‘Oh God!’ The girl gave a short, high-pitched shriek as a gust of snow cove
red the windscreen. ‘Oh God!’ Wiping away her tears, the student stared at the hopelessly blank wall of snow. The windscreen wipers didn’t stand a chance. ‘Oh God!’ she wailed once more.

  Suddenly she thought she heard a strange scratching noise. The girl was so frightened that she opened the door, and a snowball with grey whiskers jumped straight onto her lap. ‘A cat!’ she cried. The smell of make-up and tears inside the car told Muri all he needed to know about its occupant. The student was too stunned to protest when Muri started turning in circles on her lap. Eventually he stopped and lay down. The snowstorm, on the other hand, was growing stronger. After further unsuccessful attempts to locate her phone and start the engine, the girl succumbed to genuine panic. Fear had already enhanced her sense of hearing; now the student detected a strange howling noise in the wind. Without even thinking about what she was doing, she pushed the disgruntled cat from her lap, grabbed her bag and scrambled out of the car into the pitch darkness. She had picked just the right moment. A battered old lorry lumbered noisily into view. Its four wheels screeched as the driver braked, mercifully stopping right in front of the girl.

  Under normal circumstances, the sight of this old wreck and the sound of its brakes would have been reason enough to refuse the services of its driver, but the girl’s fear overruled the remnants of her common sense. She reached up and grasped the door firmly as it opened, fully prepared to climb into the front seat with the devil himself.

  ‘Traitor!’ miaowed Muri, abandoned in the frozen car along with the scattered contents of the girl’s handbag. ‘How dare she leave me behind?’

  He catapulted out of the doomed VW, slipped past the girl and leapt up into the lorry, straight onto the worn front seat. The driver was invisible in the darkness.

  ‘Is this little devil with you?’ he asked.

  ‘No,’ answered the girl, climbing in and pushing Muri out of the way. ‘He just appeared out of nowhere.’

  ‘Well, the more the merrier,’ declared the driver, to her surprise. ‘Where are you heading?’

  ‘My town’s about nine miles from here,’ she answered, fidgeting on the seat as she tried to make herself comfortable.

  ‘No problem!’ her saviour swiftly reassured her.

  Once she’d settled down in the warmth, the girl sniffed and looked around. Her face took on a worried expression, because there was an unpleasant smell inside the lorry and the driver – a large, powerfully built man with black hair, speaking with an obvious accent –made her feel distinctly ill at ease. It was too late to change her mind, though, as the lorry had already set off.

  ‘Don’t worry, Fräulein, I’ll take you straight there!’ promised the driver, stroking his moustache. This declaration and the accompanying gesture further stoked the girl’s panic. Gripping the wheel with his large hands, the driver began singing a strange song:

  I’ve spent long enough in Austria!

  It’s time for me to head North,

  Through Munich and Berlin –

  I just need to save up some cash!

  Curled up on the floor near the pedals, the cat immediately recognized the collector of corpses from Sarajevo. Despite her fear, the girl suddenly began talking.

  ‘You shouldn’t let that cat sit down there, you know. I’ve heard loads of stories about animals in cars suddenly getting under the driver’s feet, or throwing themselves at the windscreen… They cause accidents.’ Her teeth were chattering. ‘I’ve honestly got no idea where he came from!’ she added, categorically disowning her fellow traveller.

  ‘Calm down, Fräulein!’ answered the driver. ‘He’s not taking up much space, and he wouldn’t dare get under my feet. If he does, he’ll know about it!’

  The lorry skidded on the icy road, but the driver’s boot remained in control of the brake. His passenger gave a belated squeal of despair as they passed yet another ravine.

  ‘My town’s not far now,’ said the girl. ‘Please, just slow down!’

  ‘Seriously, stop worrying!’ The driver burst out laughing. ‘You’ll be at your front door in no time.’

  Nevertheless he obediently slowed down, and the girl surprised herself by telling him about herself – that she was studying at college, which was fifty miles from her home, and that she was on her way to visit her parents for the weekend.

  ‘The journey’s been an absolute nightmare!’ she grumbled.

  ‘I wouldn’t call that a journey!’ the driver pacified her. ‘Fifty miles door to door, from your student hostel to the comfort of your own bedroom and the warm milk your mother brings you in the morning? It’s barely an excursion!’

  His serious tone and the way he’d spoken with such conviction about the warm milk her mother always brought her in the morning had the same effect on the girl as a handful of tranquilisers. The blizzard had died down, and things were calmer outside too. The road was less icy and seemed to be behaving itself.

  ‘How did you know about the milk?’ asked the girl.

  ‘Just a lucky guess,’ answered the driver. ‘There, look, isn’t that your town?’

  It was. After continuing downhill for a little while, the road levelled out. Leaving the blizzard behind them, they headed towards the neon lights that had awoken in the distance.

  ‘When you find your true home, there will always be a fire in the grate and warm slippers waiting for you,’ declared the driver. ‘And the central heating will never break down. A nightmare journey, indeed!’ he continued pensively. ‘Listen Fräulein, my life has been ruined, almost beyond repair, and I’m trying to get it back – that’s the way real journeys begin.’

  Noticing that he had the girl’s attention, the driver continued.

  ‘My name is Bolislav Zonžič. I’m from Serbia. My mother, my father, my brothers and my uncles are all dead, my home has been defiled, my fellow countrymen have fled… I had to do something!’

  ‘You speak so calmly about it,’ said the girl, chastened. ‘As though it were all in the natural order of things.’

  ‘Not at all,’ the driver replied sadly. ‘My point is that this was the reason I began my journey. Journeys begin for a variety of reasons, and I’m sorry to say that most of them tend to be rather unpleasant!’

  ‘Unpleasant?’ exclaimed the girl. ‘I can’t even begin to imagine what I would do if something like that ever happened to my mother and father.’

  ‘I’ve mourned my loss,’ said the driver. ‘Unfortunately the Lord gives many their staff to carry after they have suffered misfortunes such as this. I have also met holy men, who set off on journeys without the stimulus of grief. Personally, I have always known that my true home exists somewhere – the war just gave me the impetus to begin searching for it. As I said, some set off on their travels without any obvious motivation; others are compelled by need and misfortune… But enough about that! The important thing, Fräulein, is that every journey should have a goal, and it has to be something important enough to keep you going until the very end. I believe that what lies at the end of every journey is a person’s true home. Without it they are worth nothing and their life has no meaning, but once they’ve found it the wandering can stop. What’s the point of travelling if you don’t have a goal?’

  ‘But where will your journey end?’ the girl asked timidly.

  ‘I don’t know yet,’ confessed the driver. ‘I just feel that my road is not that long. I mean it will end here, on Earth. Some look to the sky and travel from star to star, certain that what they are searching for is situated somewhere in the region of Alpha Centauri. I’m serious!’ he continued. ‘I’ve met so many travellers who no longer delight in anything this world has to offer – nothing less than the Milky Way will do for them! These cosmic nomads are ten a penny, but even they have to stop some time! It’s all a question of timing. They’re also yearning for a place to take off their shoes and put their feet up, albeit on some distant planet. Don’t laugh! Their home there may well turn out to be a ramshackle wooden hut with one tiny window and a garde
n overgrown with weeds, but it’ll be worth all the worn-out sandals! It’ll be worth jumping from star to star.’

  With the autobahn stretching straight ahead of them, Zonžič the Serb tried once more to coax a meteoric performance out of his dilapidated old lorry. This time the girl didn’t even flinch.

  ‘On the other hand,’ continued her strange companion, ‘I’ve also met people who are convinced that we never find our true home, and that one road always leads to another. They see themselves as part of a universal whole, spanning millions of years and billions of miles, and spend their lives preparing to roam the rim of this Brahma wheel for all eternity. These wanderers must be lost, unhappy souls… Surely we’re all looking for a place to call home, a well in the garden, a window… and happiness! I mean, the feeling that all your journeys are finally over and you can spend the rest of your life sitting on the porch of your house, smoking your pipe and admiring the sunset.’

  ‘Well, my house, my own bedroom and my fireplace are already waiting for me,’ reasoned the girl. ‘As long as you keep your word and this old banger of yours manages to get us there without disintegrating, I’ll be outside my front door in five minutes, so I don’t really know what you’re talking about!’

  ‘No, my dear Fräulein! A thousand times no! I’m talking about a home, not a house. Tell me honestly, hand on your heart, do you feel happy when you walk in through that front door? Do you never feel tempted to leave your little nest, once you’ve had your fill of sitting by the fire and sleeping in your bed?’