Last Stories and Other Stories (9780698135482)

by Vollmann, William T.

  Just for her he once brought a wooden chest all the way from Egypt; within stood tiny blue mummiform servants with their arms folded across their breasts and their kohled eyes staring ahead. She used to march them all around. He said that they must have belonged to some Pharaoh’s sister-wife, who had been entombed with them so that they could do her work for her in the afterlife. Even a queen, so it seemed, was not exempt from agricultural labor.

  Well, father, since we have taken away her slaves, will she have to work now?

  He laughed and chucked her under the chin. Just then he was unriddling the mystery of the three triangles contained in the Pentangle of Solomon, and her still innocent as he supposed (for he never learned about the episode of the ebony coffer); to him it seemed that this first knowledge she was gathering must merely be as sweetly ancient to her as ears of wheat engraved on a buried Roman pillar; she was not yet armed with the Sword of the Word; the Divine Purpose had not murmured in her ear; but soon, perhaps even this winter, when the ships were in, he would show her the Cabbalistic Secrets of the Master Aptolcater.

  Father, where is Captain Vasojevic?

  Him? Oh, I’ve sent him back to Egypt.

  (The task, he did not tell his daughter, was to expose from beneath the sands of Egypt a certain pyramid whose vertex touched the center of the earth, and copy whatever writing might be engraved therein.)

  On another day she asked why Prince Lazar had fallen, and her father, rising, with tears in his eyes, explained that Christ had offered two choices: victory at Kosovo, and then eternal insignificance, or the tragic glory of a defeat which his descendants would unceasingly mourn and seek to avenge.

  Trusting her above all others in the household, even his dear wife Marija, he ordered whichever books she wished, even when her mother thought them unsuitable, and while her younger brothers were telling off Dalmatia’s coastal islands to their father’s strictest sea-pilots (for mistakes they now got beaten—she never did), she began to study the ancient Greeks, because next spring he hoped for her help in collating seven fragmentary parchments concerning astral navigation. She chose certain dramas as her primers; he sent away to Rome, paying gold ducats.— He said to her: I’ve prayed to Saint Sava that you’ll find something I’ve overlooked.— At this the girl felt proud, guilty and uncertain.— He used to sit by the hour at his high easel-desk, calculating wages and profits, while she rested with her legs in his lap, reading Euripides. Not until she had children of her own did she realize how much trouble he must have put himself to, conveying the ledgers back and forth in order to be home with her longer. When she got to “Alcestis,” that play about the selfish man who falls out with his old father for declining to die for him, then finally persuades his wearily, tolerantly loving wife, Tanyotchka forgot to reach out and gently stroke her father’s wrist; and he, coming up out of absorption in his ledgers, presently noticed the lack, and saw her lovely face illuminated with tears. Saying nothing, he continued his sums, waiting for her to speak. He had almost come to the time when he must be off to his ships when she said: Now I understand.

  Oh, is that so? And what do you understand?

  It’s better to die for others than to—

  Yes.

  But why couldn’t he have won the battle also, and saved our land?

  So then you don’t entirely understand. Well, darling, give me a kiss! The Beograd is coming in . . .

  From Montenegro?

  Good girl! And your uncle needs me.

  Father, why must you do business with the Sultan?

  For our advantage, and his disadvantage, silly girl! Now I’m going—

  The girl smiled at him.

  Father, about Prince Lazar—

  Yes, darling, what is it? Be quick.

  Would it be better to have hope of heaven, and live in the world trying to improve oneself, or just be born in heaven and never feel the need of anything?

  That’s one crucial question, for a fact, said he, caressing her hair, and then as he turned away from her she saw the mysterious affliction settle back upon him, so that all the sudden he was as gnawed down to narrowness as the jackal-haunted Sabbioncello peninsula. Rising dutifully, she went to weave linen before her mother scolded her. Once her father had called for Petar, her mother stood for a long time in the garden, stretching out her hands to the doves.

  5

  Mother, mother, please tell me more about Saint Lazar.

  What else do you need to know? He’s our holy saint, who gave his life for our glory.

  But why couldn’t he—

  Her mother sharply said: Whoever weeps for the world loses his eyes.

  6

  If they live and thrive, children must grow, just as surely as fig-roots will split the old stone walls of Trieste; thus Tanya bloomed up out of what she had imagined that she understood. Of course one only grows up so far; Tanya would never comprehend, as we can for her, that her entire life remained confined within those sad days before Serbia finally cast off the Turks—which were also the good days when the Ponterosso could still swivel open for the ships; yes, they were the young days of Trieste before Our Lady of the Flowers had blood on her forehead; those were the days of Tanya, who could still remember her mother carrying her inside the cathedral and along that awful glistening space where God could see her, then entering beneath the canopy, crossing herself, kissing the center icon, crossing herself and kissing the rightmost one, then repeating with the leftmost; now that she was grown, she understood that God could see her wherever she hid. Her perception of other matters grew meanwhile. She realized that her parents were not happy together. At least they were not poor. She took joy and comfort in the good sound of ducats pouring out onto the table whenever her father came home.

  When an old Florentine lady with snow-white braids and a sea-tanned face knocked on their gate in hope of alms, her father, peering through the tiny window, told Srdjana not to admit her.— But, master, we have some slops . . .— Foolish woman, can’t you smell the plague on her?— A week later some neighbors were dead from the pest.— This too gave her comfort of a sort; her father could protect her.

  Like her brothers, she learned to communicate in the runic bone-scratching of the old Lingua Venetica, but she had no one to trade messages with; her sisters being ignorant, and her mother, even admitting the inconsiderable possibility of her literacy in that language, lacking the time for nonsense. So Tanya began to memorize swatches of the Gospels, in order to recite them in church. Just before her First Communion she proved her knowledge, and the priest said, not entirely approvingly (not that her father cared what he thought), that he had never heard of so learned a girl.

  Smiling sadly, her mother presented her with a necklace of silver coins on a golden chain; every coin bore the same profiled portrait of an unknown king. Tanyotchka’s hopes became as rich as the ivy on the walls.

  7

  Whenever her father and Captain Vasojevic went out, murmuring together, Tanyotchka, peeping out between the curtains of the highest window, saw other men grow as open-eyed as the painted saints of the Trecento period. This made her all the more inclined to remain indoors like her mother and sisters, especially since she had learned how to help her father balance his accounts. Occasionally now that she was older she was permitted to accompany Srdjana to the market by the Ponterosso; her mother rarely went. There Tanya discovered how poor most people are. She dreaded becoming a beggar. This she never dared to confess to her father, for what if this would insult him who was undefeatable? So, like all of us, she continued to bind and conceal her thoughts, sharpening her deductions the more. The way that her mother turned her back now when she found Tanya studying astronomy, the way her sisters so often wove and spun her share without complaint, and that steady sad alertness with which her father gazed at her, all proved again that some task would be laid on her. Whatever it was, she prayed it would relieve her fathe
r. Since he stood so superior to all fears, she now commenced to wonder whether that look of misery might derive from the body; for of course even he was mortal. But this thought she uprooted wherever it sprouted. Was it reassuring or the reverse that her father’s friend now seemed likewise weighed down? She could remember when Captain Vasojevic had been cheerfuller, which is to say not merely younger but more like unto other men. When she was much smaller, he scarcely came around. But once he had achieved her father’s confidence, with which their common nationality had much to do, he began to stay for supper, or at times overnight; and as the household warmed to him, he might occasionally chuck the nearest daughter under the chin, and with gruff shyness present her with some small and peculiar thing of appropriately moderate commercial value: a copper coin engraved with a pretty mermaid, a medallion of Prince Lazar, or a set of tiny animal-headed trade-weights picked out of some shipwreck or marketplace. By the time that Tanyotchka was twelve or thirteen, of course, such physical familiarities were out of the question, and he contented himself with bowing to her, or at most kissing her hand, before he gave her any pretty trifle.

  Her mother used to wonder why he never married. Here she exposed an almost comical blindness, for it was into his hands that that Cincar wax trader had conveyed her so many years ago. Leading her into a private cabin, in company with her maidservant, Vasojevic promised the two women that they would be secure, and offered them whichever refreshments or conveniences they might wish. Reassured by the portrait of Prince Lazar, the maidservant removed her veil first. Her beauty was such that it superseded one of Vasojevic’s most beloved memories, which derived from a window-glimpse he had once obtained in Sarajevo of a woman, evidently Turkish, of immense elegance, who, it being winter, was wrapped in a sable coat whose soft hues were a rainbow of coffee, honey and milk, with sweet black shadows which matched her own black hair. Although he had as yet taken in no more of her than her outline, Vasojevic was already stricken. A ring lived on every one of her pale fingers, which ceaselessly stroked one another for warmth. The rest of her, however, remained perfectly still. She leaned forward, resting her fur-sleeved arms on her fur-sheltered knees, staring far away in boredom or sadness. After half an hour she lit a long pipe, which she then allowed to suffocate between her fingers. Then after another long pause she turned her head in his direction. Perhaps she had not realized that he was watching her. He saw a pale face, with dark, generous yet cruel lips. The longer he looked, the more she fascinated him. Her eyelashes upcurled, almost supplicatingly. She held a tiny black leather pouch which gleamed scratchlessly. Her hair was parted across her face, transforming her white forehead into a pagoda roof. She had a triangular chin. He thought her the most irresistible lady he had ever seen. Her long hair accompanied her throat down into the hot darkness of her fur collar. Her expression never changed. A slave rushed to shutter the window.

  As she was to all other women he had seen before, so was the maidservant of his master’s bride to her, and thus the mistress to the maidservant. Bowing, Vasojevic asked them to send to him for anything they needed. Then he left them there, with a sailor outside the door to protect them, and that was how it went, all the way to Trieste.

  Had her father seen fit to wed him to one of the many Cirtovich belles, no one in the family would have minded, in spite of the disparity in age; perhaps her mother had even once suspected some interest on his part, Tanyotchka being most definitely his favorite, for although she had not entirely achieved her mother’s former beauty, her heart was kinder, her intellect was as great as her father’s, and her eyes expressed such beautiful awareness, almost like the Virgin Marija herself; all the same, Vasojevic never came anywhere near marriage. Whenever he entered the Sultan’s dominions he made do with leering slave-girls playing peekaboo behind their fans, flashing their bangles, whistling, snapping their fingers and singing obscene songs in charming voices. Now that he was in on his master’s secret, he got a cash allowance for such sports. He paid with a silver coin issued by the ancient city of Panemuteichus, or with last year’s ducats; to the Turks it was all the same, for they knew how to weigh money as well as Jovo Cirtovich. Sometimes Vasojevic used to ask after a particular Aida, whom he never found; of late he had given that up. A certain Gypsy-looking girl, nicely laced into her pastel-colored corset, wriggled her gold hoop-earrings at him and leaped on him with the alacrity of a hungry corpse. The other women sprawled sniggering over the bowl of grapes they fed into each other’s mouths. Vasojevic did not care. Knowing what he did, he wished for neither wife nor children.

  8

  What blighted those two men (although it also of course advantaged them) had to do with a strange faculty which Jovo Cirtovic had inherited from his own father, a hajduk* both brave and cheerless who after an almost abnormally long life was shot by Turkish Janissaries whom he had sought to ambush in a high meadow on the eve of Saint George’s Day.* Two of the hajduks, who happened to be the dead man’s brothers, carried him home. The mother commenced to scream and gash herself, while Maksim, the second son, cursed in obscenities of despair. The other sons sat stroking their beards; and presently Alexander said: Please describe those Turks.— To Jovo, the first living son, then fell that neck-pouch of greasy black lambskin, which his father had worn so invariably beneath his shirt that no one in the family even stopped to wonder what it might contain; after all, curiosity has killed tigers as dead as cats. Or had they wondered nonetheless? Gazing on their grim father, whose lips rarely moved, the sons might have wondered indeed, or even speculated, but it proved best to turn away from such courses. That the pouch was supposed to descend from eldest to eldest was all that anyone knew. Maksim had been the last empirical explorer of this subject; although he was hardly seven years old then, their father felled him with his fists, execrating and kicking him without pity; the boy had been lucky to lose nothing but a tooth. After that, whenever their father stepped away and reached into his shirt, they averted their faces. The uncles remarked that on the night of his slaying, Lazar Cirtovic’s hand kept creeping toward his throat, as if he desired the touchstone but denied himself; this was peculiar, and so was the fact that the Janissaries had killed him in near-darkness, at more than a hundred paces, with a single bullet. At any rate, the family held the funeral, then made that renowned toast to the better hour, meaning the rendezvous in the afterworld with our loved dead. By then the better hour of Jovo Cirtovic had already commenced; for, withdrawing himself into a shepherd’s cave, he untied the legacy from around his throat. The leather smelled like his father’s sweat. He unpeeled the half-rotten, salty clasp. Within lay an ovoid object not unlike a drop of sea-glass, or perhaps a mirror. At first it seemed greenish-black, like old bronze. Reader, if you have ever robbed a Roman grave, you might have won yourself twin fibulae like mushroom-gilled breasts of greenish-silver, ready to be yoked onto the chest of some miniature deity. But although metal-comparisons momentarily occluded Jovo’s mind, the object must be comprised of glass, for a fact, although its substance—talk about through a glass darkly!—was blacker than anything he had ever seen. The impossibility of any such night-clot being transparent was more patent than an axiom out of Euclid. But as he peered into it, not without a certain longing connected with his father, he began, so it seemed, to glimpse something moving fitfully within, although how that could be was equally mysterious; in any event, the matter waxed unpleasant to his consideration, for indeed the longer he looked, the greater grew his dread; and now the thing inside, whatever it was, briskened like a treetop in a freshening breeze, and he began to get the sense of a ball (although it could have been pear-shaped or even gourd-like) festooned with myriad kelpish appendages whose incessant flickerings were what so horribly drew his eye. It could have been an upturned many-branching tuber, or a strange tree with a round eye just below the crown, or a new-pulled tooth still attached its bloody root. As his sense of menace increased, the conviction stole upon him that these arms would presently draw away from the
thing’s face, exposing it to him, and that this would be the most fearful thing in the world. His response was of course defiance—for he had been raised to be a true Serb.

  He concluded that this entity must be either death itself, or something contingent to it. It unfailingly appeared to him in this molluscid form, it bore a texture like tortoise-shell, and on occasion its body was colored like quicksilver. Its prickle-studded head resembled a Turk’s cap; and yet there were nights when he could have sworn it was a triangular mask. To prove his courage to himself, he once tapped on the glass; at which the thing coiled up and shrank, as if fearful, then grew an angry purple, and began lashing out against the sides of the crystal. To him the worst part, which rarely occurred, was when it showed him the ultramarine radiance of its eyes.