And now it occurred to me, at last, where the box of bones had come from: an ongoing experiment in which I was taught to inflict pain—in this case, upon a squirrel that the Doctor had caught and caged, and that I was charged with torturing over a period of weeks. As I hung there, between numbness and agony, between wakefulness and sleep, I remembered.
It was a common gray squirrel, presumably caught outside the barren woods, fat with the bounty of summer, cowering in a corner of its cage, its small eyes staring, its tail twitching. The Doctor set it before me on the crude dining table in the courtyard, and explained the aim of the project: to hurt it as much as possible, for as long as possible, without killing it.
I had, of course, no interest in harming this animal—indeed, the prospect disgusted me. As though reading my mind, Doctor Stiles nodded in apparent sympathy and placed a bony hand on my shoulder.
“Eric,” he said, “you will have to free yourself of all personal sentiment. A day will come when misplaced empathy could lead, I’m afraid, to your death. In what we think of as the civilized world—a world, I must inform you, Eric, that is soon to collapse into chaos and lawlessness—it is a virtue to do no harm. In the world to come, it will be a skill as valuable to you as the ability to start a fire, or build a shelter. Throw away your human regard for this animal, Eric. It is an impediment to our goals.
“Now,” the Doctor went on, “if you wished to inflict pain without doing permanent harm, how might you go about it?”
I gazed at the squirrel dolefully, my legs and arms turning to rubber. I wanted to go home. “I… I don’t know, sir.”
The Doctor shook his head. “Think, Eric.”
I understood that I would not be given another chance before I myself became the one to experience pain. “Its… tail,” I blurted. “Sir.”
“What about its tail?”
“We could… cut it off, sir.”
From a sheath on his belt the Doctor pulled his bowie knife, which earlier I had watched him whet against a stone to a deadly sharpness. He now held it out to me. “You, Eric,” he said.
I suppose I should be expected to say that I felt something awful when I crossed this line—that this first experience of doing intentional harm to another creature powerfully impressed me as the deep, terrible transgression that it was. But that’s not what it was like. The Doctor helped me to hold the squirrel down on the table, and I raised the knife and chopped off its tail; the animal squealed and bled. We put it back into its cage, and watched as it continued to cower. Without a doubt, I was saddened by what I had done, and faintly disgusted by the results. But I overcame my disgust very quickly, and put it behind me, and moved on. And with every passing day, the torture of the squirrel became less and less offensive to my sensibilities, and I was able to do it with great efficiency and skill, and without any apparent negative psychological effects. I remember being surprised to learn what I could become accustomed to—perhaps I was, after all, a born warrior.
The squirrel endured a great number of injuries in the next few weeks, losing several limbs and its eyes and ears before at last refusing all nourishment and succumbing to starvation. At this time the animal was skinned and its carcass buried; and a few weeks later, when we dug them up, we found that the bones had been picked clean by insects and bacteria. We allowed them to bleach in the sun for several days, and then I was permitted to take them home. I kept them in my cigar box, with some birds’ bones I had found, and my cicada shell, and my map. It wasn’t until the following summer, when the Doctor and I began to experiment with larger game, that I was forced to give up the box. By this time, however, the sacrifice of worldly goods had become routine, and I handed the box over without the slightest hesitation. I knew that the lessons I had learned from its contents would be with me always.
It was my memory of that younger, newly emboldened version of myself that brought me back to my senses, and focused my mind on the problem of escaping from the wooden cage. The cage was, of course, made of wood, save for the shackles and chains that bound me to it—and now it occurred to me that, if it was the same cage I knew from my childhood, it could not possibly be as strong as it once was. I gathered my strength and tugged as hard as I could with my right leg. The cage emitted a promising squeak.
My ankle, however, had begun to bleed, and it was with considerable anxiety that I realized I hadn’t felt the wound. The sight of the red blood, set off against pale flesh, filled me with revulsion and desperation. I set to work freeing myself.
I heaved my body up off the floor, trembling with the effort. Then, gently, I tugged upon the chains that held my left arm and left leg. My body swayed to the left, then swung back to the right—which motion I reinforced with a tug on that side’s chains. When I reached the rightmost point of my swing, I tugged on the left side again, then the right, then the left, until I was swinging as far as I could go.
Blood rushed back into my muscles, giving me the strength to continue—but the revivification of my nerves brought terrible pain to my limbs. I stifled a cry, continuing my swinging, and soon the cage itself began to groan, then squeal, then rock back and forth.
At this point, my muscles were crying out for relief. But it seemed unlikely that I could ever again achieve this momentum, and I found the inner reserves to continue. The cage was leaning now, first one way, then the other, and for a moment I wondered if perhaps I had made a grievous mistake, that I might be torn apart with it—and then, with a terrible screech and a sickening lurch, the entire thing leaned, then cracked, then folded up like a cardboard box.
Of course I was inside. The roof of the thing—a thick piece of hardwood ply, if my observations were correct—lay on top of my bruised and bleeding form, having crushed my face as it fell. I could feel blood coursing out of my nose. I managed, somehow, to roll over, my chains having broken free of their mounts, and push up the roof with my back. In a few seconds, I had managed to wriggle out from under it, and lay in the courtyard, delirious with pain. It was there that I fell unconscious.
When I woke, my clothes, pack, and quiver lay by my side, and the shackles had been removed from my wrists and ankles. In the peculiar state of mind that my incarceration had engendered, I did not stop to consider the implications of this fact—namely, that Doctor Avery Stiles had seen me lying there asleep, and had freed me completely, leaving me armed.
It was ten minutes, perhaps, before I was able to sit up. With great slowness and deliberation, I dressed and took up my quiver and pack, and when I was through I carefully got to my feet, bracing myself against the wall of the compound.
The courtyard was echoless, the night clear, the moonlight bright.
I stumbled to the compound doorway and quietly made my way down the stone staircase. The Doctor wasn’t there, only the glowing remains of his fire. My childhood possessions, as well, were gone. I climbed back up and staggered toward the tunnel in the west wall, my knees quivering, my breaths quick and shallow. I crouched down before the tunnel opening and crawled through. I had escaped from the castle.
I stood outside the curtain wall, scanning the treeline with my tired eyes. My muscles throbbed, and I wanted nothing more than to lie down on the ground and go to sleep. But I could not. I had to find Doctor Stiles.
Convinced that no one was watching, I limped across the clearing and stepped over the deadfall and into the woods. Little moonlight penetrated here, so I waited as my eyes, already starved for daylight, adjusted to the gloom, and my body tingled and ached. I breathed in the humusy air and tried to imagine what the Doctor was doing out here, and where he might be. Was he waiting for me? Did he expect me to escape? Did he wish to test me, once again, in the wild?
I was not permitted to go to the castle with Doctor Stiles the week after my all-night adventure, nor the week after that. I was uncertain what had transpired between my parents, but there was a tension, and more than once I spied my mother, through the bathroom keyhole, applying makeup to a bruise. Her resistance to my
father, at the time, seemed to me pigheaded and foolish—why couldn’t she see that what the Doctor was teaching me was for my own good, that I was being formed into a man? I had not, of course, forgotten the terror and agony I endured that night in the woods. But already those emotions seemed like the products of a childish imagination, signs of weakness to be renounced and forgotten. I hardened my heart against my mother’s best intentions.
Now, in the forest, my vision had returned, and my body was once again under my control. But I remained still for some time, alert for the presence of my quarry. There had been a breeze when I emerged from behind the castle wall; now the wind had died to nothing, and the woods were silent.
Perhaps it was a sixth sense that caused me to think of the rock. I took a step back, then another to the west, until an opening revealed itself between the boughs of the tall pines, and I was able to see up the cliffside to the northern lip of the “ankle.” At first, I believed that I was seeing nothing more sinister than an unremembered outcropping. But then it moved, and I realized that it was the Doctor’s form, outlined against the starry sky. He had been there, watching me, waiting for my next move.
Before he could decide to give up his wait, I retreated farther into the trees and made my way west, and then south, toward the “toe.” The woods were fairly sparse for the first twenty or so feet beyond the treeline, and I stuck to this easier terrain, taking care not to strain or twist my weakened legs. It wasn’t long before I had made it to the southern end of the rock, and I crept to the clearing’s edge, and peered out from the cover of the woods. The moonlight sharply outlined the rock, and I searched its face for any sign of Doctor Stiles. If he still stood on the northern lip, my angle of sight made it impossible to tell.
I waited several more minutes, to be sure I was safe, then gathered my strength and sprinted across the clearing to the “toe.”
It was easier, this time, to climb up over its lip, and onto the broad plateau where the lone pine grew from its soil-filled bowl. I soon found myself at the base of the “ankle,” staring up into the moonlit night, and trying to remember the series of hand- and footholds that had taken me safely to the top. Time was of the essence—Doctor Stiles wouldn’t stay there forever, and I did not wish to meet him on the rock face, where his doubtless superior climbing experience would put him at an advantage. I could not be burdened by my pack, so I lowered it quietly to the ground, keeping only my climbing shoes, gloves, and quiver. My helmet I had left behind at the house, never dreaming that I would need to scale the rock face again—I would see if the smug sporting goods clerk had been correct in his confidence that it was unnecessary.
With as much speed as I could muster, I began to clamber up the sheer face, pushing my weakened arms and legs to the limit. It was with some surprise that I remembered my former path of ascent—the holds came quickly and naturally, and my progress was speedy. Under normal conditions, I am certain, I would have been unable to find the strength to climb that cliff, but extreme circumstances draw out hidden powers in men, and my aching body proved more capable than I could possibly have hoped.
I paused on a ledge to catch my breath and give my fingers a break. The wind, which had died down to nothing some minutes before, now somehow seemed deader still, as if time itself had stopped, and not merely the motion of the air. I had reached the roof level of the forest canopy, and the treetops stretched out in all directions like a stubblefield. If I didn’t know better, I might have thought it would be possible to walk across it, this landscape of gentle silver swells, or to sail it, navigating around those few signs of human habitation below: radio antennas, church steeples, office buildings. It was a heartening, restful sight.
But for now, my rest was over. The motionless air pressed in. Every sound was magnified—my shoes on the rock, my shallow breaths. I turned back to the wall, found my handholds, and climbed.
As I came closer to the summit, I slowed, and concentrated on keeping quiet. I hoped for a breeze, to cover the noise of my ascent, but there was nothing. Soon I could detect the cliff’s edge just above me, and I knew that Doctor Avery Stiles was there—possibly at the northern lip of the “ankle,” standing with his back to me, and possibly just above, waiting for my face to appear, waiting to send me to my death with a single kick.
For one brief moment, I wondered if it was all really worth it, if I should simply turn back and leave all this behind—the woods, the castle, the rock, the Doctor. I doubted the very reasoning behind my entire mission: was it absolutely necessary to have come out here in pursuit of the old man? If Doctor Stiles wanted to kill me, then why didn’t he come into my house while I slept, and do away with me there? There had been ample opportunity for him to take me by surprise, to attack when my guard was down. Indeed, his capture of me was entirely attributable to my encroachment into his territory. If anything, it was I who was the aggressor.
And what would I do once I’d gained the upper hand? Would I attempt to extract some promise from him, that he would never bother me again? An admission that he was no longer my master—that I had absorbed, then exceeded, his tutelage? Or would I merely kill him?
Moreover, was this the reason I had come to Gerrysburg? To find an old man and murder him? Clinging there on the rock face, I cast my mind back to the day I decided to return to my home town. Obviously, I believed I had unfinished business here—I thought that, by revisiting the site of my tutelage, I might somehow clarify my memories of those strange years, and soothe the humiliations of the recent past. But specifically how this would work, I didn’t know. In fact, I didn’t believe that I’d ever known; and the details of my decision to begin this adventure seemed hazier in memory by the minute. I shifted my position incrementally, seeking a more comfortable hold, and wondered about my motives and desires. In my life, I had dedicated myself to understanding the motives of others, through careful study of their words and actions, as had Doctor Stiles before me. But could it be that neither of us had ever really known himself—indeed, that such understanding was impossible? That this mad adventure in the forest was the product of little more than blind instinct, a pathetic expression of formless paranoia and masculine pride?
I felt rather dejected at this moment, and once again considered turning back. But I shook off my doubts and began to build my resolve once more. To succumb to confusion would be to fall directly into Doctor Stiles’s hands. The danger he represented, after all, had always been subtle, insidious, and difficult to pin down. He controlled others by the threat of action, not by action itself. His very existence was the threat—indeed, he was most dangerous when he was doing nothing, allowing his victims’ imagination to run wild with the terrifying possibilities. My job, as I saw it, was to neutralize this danger, and to shirk that duty would represent a grave cowardice.
With these thoughts still ringing in my head, I drew a deep breath, reached up to the final handholds, and swung myself onto the roof of the rock.
He was there, right where I had imagined him, facing north and peering down at the clearing he mistakenly thought I might, at any moment, re-cross. The sound of my shoes scraping the rock surface spun him around. At last, I faced my nemesis.
The moonlight revealed a wry smile on that ageless face; the Doctor relaxed his stance and took two casual steps forward before he stopped suddenly and raised his hands into the air.
“Eric!” he called out. “What are you doing up here?”
“I’ve come to kill you, Professor.”
It wasn’t until I’d said it aloud that I realized it was true—the Doctor’s death was indeed the real objective of my mission. I felt a long-missing piece of my life’s puzzle falling at last into place. The words hung between us, awaiting a response.
He gave his head a rueful nod, still smiling, as though, in disappointing him, I had nevertheless confirmed some idea he had long harbored about me. He said, “I haven’t been a professor for years, Eric—they took that away from me soon after they took you.” His voice, undim
inished by time, carried flawlessly through the motionless air. It was as though he were standing beside me. He took another step closer.
“Don’t move,” I said, reaching for my quiver. “I don’t intend to listen to your explanations. The time for those is over.”
But Doctor Stiles merely shook his head. “You were an excellent pupil, Eric. I had high hopes for you.”
“You should not have made me your enemy, then,” I replied, and I drew forth my bow and nocked an arrow—the arrow that had murdered the white deer.
The Doctor’s grin widened. “Ah! I see you have a bit of my handiwork, there,” he said.
“So it was you.”
“Of course it was,” he replied. And then, after a moment’s pause, he relaxed his smile, his eyes narrowed, and he went on. “Eric, I can see your mind is made up about me, and about what you’re doing here. But I want to tell you that destroying me is not the answer. In fact, you don’t even know what the question is, do you?”
I drew back the arrow. My fingers ached from the climb, and my right arm trembled.
“You think that by taking my life, your own will be restored.” He lowered his hands, and slipped them into the pockets of his pants. Indeed, he appeared relaxed, as if I were no danger at all. “The fact is, Eric, that you cannot restore your own life by killing me.
“Furthermore, your life doesn’t need to be restored,” he went on, edging away now, toward the northern lip of the rock. My aim tracked his slow movement. “It merely needs to be seized. And my life—my life was never here to be taken.”
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