Julian Comstock: A Story of 22nd-Century America

by Robert Charles Wilson

  “Philosophers,” I said.

  “What?”

  “Julian has made friends among the city’s Philosophers, just as Sam has made friends among the Jews.”

  “Those are Philosophers? I suppose that means Philosophers also have their own particular foods, and that Julian is partial to Philosophical dinners?”

  “Yes, in a sense, though it’s more likely the conversation than the food that attracts him. Philosophers discuss Time, and Space, and the Purpose of Humanity, and such topics as that, in which Julian is deeply interested.”

  “They have enough to say about those subjects to carry over more than a few minutes? I doubt I could talk about Space any longer than a second or two before I ran out of thoughts altogether. In any case, I overheard two of those Philosophers who followed Julian into the coffee-shop, and their discussion was all about some musical review that opened here in town.”

  “I don’t know all the details,” I confessed, “but Julian says there are Aesthetes among the Philosophers, who are more concerned with Art than with human destiny.”

  “They seemed more concerned with the fellow who played the romantic lead in the piece.”

  “I imagine that’s a legitimate subject of debate among Aesthetes.”

  “Well, it’s all beyond me,” said Lymon Pugh, and he called for another pitcher of beer. “You, too, Adam, if you don’t mind me saying so—you’re a mystery! You come into a city as fine as this one, with all its sinful opportunities, and you wander from church to church like a Godstruck pilgrim, though it’s not even Sunday.”

  This wasn’t a topic I cared to discuss. “I was looking for someone,” I said. Of course the person I had been looking for since Easter was Calyxa. But I had not been able to find her. When I approached the choirmaster at the Cathedral where I had first seen her, he explained that the Easter chorus had been put together specifically to sing to the troops. The Church’s own choristers refused to entertain “occupying forces,” as they called us; and the choirmaster had been forced to hire substitute singers at fifty cents an hour plus a free lunch. But the names of these women had not been recorded. That led me to make inquiries at several other grand Churches, of which the city possessed a dizzying number—all without success. “What about you, Lymon? Since you find our pursuits so unrewarding, what are your plans for the weekend?”

  “Well, to get drunk, first of all …”

  “That’s a noble ambition—or at least easily achieved.”

  “But not stinking drunk. Not so drunk I can’t navigate. Then it’s off to the Shade Tree Hotel.” The Shade Tree was one of those establishments in which “women sell their virtue for money, and throw in their diseases free of charge,” as Major Lampret had put it in one of his sermons. I asked Lymon whether he was not afraid, as Lampret had also put it, that he would come back “absent those three essential possessions of any decent man: his health, his savings, and his hope of salvation.”

  “The women at the Shade Tree are pretty clean,” Lymon said earnestly. “And what I’m afraid of is that I’ll come back absent what I came to get, which is the satisfaction of a man’s deepest need, the unsatisfaction of which can also make him sick, or at least surly.”

  He clenched his scarred fists as he said this, and I told him he was probably correct in wanting to avoid any condition that left him surly. “But shouldn’t you brace yourself up before you begin such an adventure? And I don’t mean with liquor. Have something to eat.”

  “I am a little hungry,” he admitted, and I watched with a quiet pride as he puzzled out the items on the menu board. He was surprised that the word “eggs” did not begin with A, as it was pronounced—but by this time he had become resigned to the inevitable inconsistencies of the written language, and accepted them without rancor.

  Both of us ordered meals, and we enjoyed them as the tavern grew busier around us. Lymon had just made quick work of a plate of boiled eggs and stewed onions when he detected an expression of astonishment on my face and said, “You look like you’ve been ambushed.”

  And, in a sense, I had.

  She didn’t recognize me; but—of course—I recognized her.

  She had been sitting just yards away, hidden by the crowd of coarsely-attired men and women who shared her table. It would have been easy to miss her altogether. But right now she stood up, and strode through billowing pipe smoke light and humid air to the tavern’s small stage; and I knew her at once—Calyxa!

  She wasn’t dressed as she had been at the Cathedral. If that Calyxa had seemed unworldly in her white surplice, this Calyxa was entirely earthbound, in a man’s black shirt a size too big for her and stiff denim trousers.* The easy confidence of her walk suggested that she was at home in this place, and as she took the stage to genial applause I was sure of it.

  “Look at that! That one’s a fireplug,” Lymon Pugh said. “Do you suppose she means to sing to us?”

  “I hope so,” I said, annoyed.

  “Her pants are cut too short, though. Pretty enough face, but look at the thick ankles on her.”

  “I’m sure I don’t need to hear your opinion of her ankles! Her ankles are her own business.”

  “They’re right there hanging off the ends of her legs—as much my business as anyone’s, I’d say!”

  “No one’s business, then! Please be quiet.”

  “What bit you?” Lymon asked; but he subsided, for which I was grateful.

  Calyxa did begin to sing, then, in a voice that was pure but also precise and pleasingly workmanlike. She did not adopt trills, tremolos, theatrical asides, illustrative whistles, or any of those musical furbelows so common among contemporary singers. Instead she sang the songs as they had been composed: plainly, that is, deriving all her nuance from the words and melodies, and not their decorations.

  Nor was she wildly demonstrative in her singing. She just clasped her hands, cleared her throat, and went at it. This was too subtle for some of the audience, judging by the occasional cries of drunken critics; but I took it as an expression of her natural modesty—a striking contrast to the songs themselves.

  She performed five songs before she was finished, most of which had verses that would not have been out of place aboard the Caribou-Horn Train, or wherever less respectable people gather. At first I was dismayed by this. But I was reminded—perhaps for the first time truly convinced—of Julian’s doctrine of cultural relativism, so-called. For these songs, which had sounded so corrupt in other voices, were purified in hers. I reflected that Calyxa must have been raised among people for whom such songs and sentiments were, in effect, their daily bread, and not counted as obscene or irregular in any way. In other words her innocence was innate, and not compromised by the vulgarity of her upbringing—it was a kind of indestructible primal innocence, as I came to think of it.

  Two of the songs she sang were not in English, which astonished Lymon Pugh. “That’s some nerve on her part, to sing a song in Dutch!”

  “Not Dutch, Lymon, but French. The language was spoken here for centuries, and still is, in places.”

  Apparently Lymon had believed there were only two kinds of human speech, American and Foreign, and he was dismayed by the news that languages were prolific, often coming packaged one per country. “Just when I learn to write a language they begin to multiply like rabbits! I tell you, Adam, there’s a catch to everything. The world is as meanly rigged as that Lucky Mug of Private Langers.”

  “English will suit in most circumstances, unless you travel abroad.”

  “I’ve traveled far enough, I thank you—this is as foreign a country as I care to see, even if it is America.”

  I begged him once more to be quiet, as Calyxa finished her singing. She ignored the applause, stepped down from the stage with an air of calm satisfaction, and headed back to her table. I was consumed by the need to attract her attention, and I did this by standing up abruptly as she passed, nearly knocking my dinner plate onto the floor, and exclaiming in a choked voice, �
�Calyxa!”

  I may have spoken too loudly; for she flinched, and there was a lull in the conversation in the tavern, as if some of the patrons expected violence to follow.

  “Do I know you?” she asked, when she had recovered her composure.

  “We met at Easter. I was in the Cathedral where you performed, before Dutch artillery closed it up. Don’t you remember? I hurt my head!”

  “Oh,” she said, smiling faintly, and by this reaction causing the other customers to relax their vigilance, “the soldier with the small injury. Did you find your regiment?”

  “Yes, I did—thank you very much.”

  “You’re welcome,” she said, and walked on.

  Naturally I had not expected her to prolong the conversation, or to ignore her friends on my behalf. Nevertheless this response was a disappointment.

  “She blew you off pretty quick,” Lymon Pugh said, laughing to himself. “You’re wasting your time here, Adam. That type of woman don’t make herself available on a moment’s notice. Come to the Shade Tree, and your luck will change.”

  “I won’t.” Not when my quarry was so close.

  “Well, suit yourself. I have a schedule to keep.”

  Lymon Pugh stood up, not as steadily as he might have, and after some exploration found the door of the tavern, and left.

  I felt conspicuous sitting alone at a table when everyone else in the tavern seemed to have arrived with a party of friends; but I suppressed my uneasiness, and ordered an entire second meal, which I did not plan to eat, simply to keep the waitress from frowning at me.

  Calyxa continued to sit with her companions. Other singers or musicians took the stage from time to time, apparently by arrangement with the management. None was as talented as Calyxa, and the vulgarity of their singing was not adulterated with any kind of Innocence, Primal or otherwise. She herself talked amiably, as it seemed to me, with her friends, who were a mixed group of men and women, all as young as Calyxa herself—my age, that is, or only slightly older. The females among them shared Calyxa’s simple taste in clothing, along with a certain inattention to the finer points of hairdressing and such feminine arts. The men of the group took this charming roughness to another level entirely, seeming to pride themselves on their tattered pants and hempen shirts. Several of them wore woolen caps, despite the heat of the evening, as if they needed something available to tug or pull low at dramatic moments in the conversation. Their gestures were dramatic, their voices were curt and insistent, and their opinions, though I could make out only a few words, were vehement and complex, almost to the point of Philosophy.

  It occurred to me in a dismaying moment that Calyxa might have a male friend or even a husband among the crowd. Tragically, I knew so little about her! I set about studying her, in the hope that I could glean a few facts by observation.

  I noticed that she glanced occasionally at the tavern’s door, and that whenever she did this an expression of anxiety darkened her features. But that was all that happened for an hour or so, and I could make no sense of it, and I had begun to despair of ever passing another word with her, when a series of unexpected events brought us together in a surprising way.

  The waitress who served my table appeared to be on friendly terms with Calyxa. They put their heads together now and then to exchange words. After one of these exchanges an expression of profound concern once more overcame Calyxa, and she nodded solemnly at whatever news the waitress had delivered.

  And dire news it must have been; for Calyxa, although she remained at the table, dropped out of the conversation swirling around her, and seemed lost in the most sobering kind of thoughts. Several times she called the waitress back, and they conferred again; and on one of these occasions they both looked at me in a pointed fashion. But I couldn’t deduce the significance of any of these maneuvers.

  That they had some significance I did not doubt, for before long the same waitress returned to my table, and she pulled out the chair Lymon Pugh had left vacant, and sat in it.

  I was surprised by this bold move on her part. Fortunately the waitress took the commanding role in the talk that followed. “You’re a soldier,” she said, in a tone that was brisk but not unfriendly.

  I agreed that I was.

  “And you have some interest in Calyxa Blake?”

  Finally I had learned her surname!—admittedly, at second hand. I wondered if Calyxa Blake had mistaken my intentions, and had communicated her apprehension to the waitress. “Only the most benevolent interest,” I said sincerely. “I was impressed with her singing, when she sang at one of the enormous churches of this city, last Easter. After that I spoke to her, but only briefly. I was injured at the time. But she was kind to me. I want to thank her for that—well, I have thanked her for it, in fact—and as much as I would like to speak further with, uh, Miss Blake,” hoping I was right about the Miss, “I would never force my attention on her. If I upset her with my clumsy greeting, please tell her I meant nothing by it, except to mark my pleasurable surprise at recognizing her.”

  That was a pretty speech, though extemporaneous, and I was proud of it.

  The waitress sat and examined me with her eyes, displaying no reaction. Then she asked for the second time, “You’re a soldier?”

  “Yes, a soldier. I was drafted away from my home, which is in Athabaska—”

  “Does that mean you carry a pistol? They say all you soldiers do.”

  I was off-duty, and not in uniform, but it was standard practice for an American soldier in these parts to keep his pistol with him at all times. My pistol was strapped under the waist of my shirt, where it wasn’t easily visible, because I didn’t want to alarm anyone, or provoke any unnecessary confrontation; but it was within easy reach. I nodded. “Does that frighten her?”

  “No.”

  “Does it frighten you, then?”

  She almost smiled. “A pistol in hands such as yours doesn’t frighten me, no. What did you say your name was?”

  “Adam Hazzard.”

  “Stay here, Adam Hazzard.”

  I nodded in mute if bewildered consent. After servicing the handful of customers who had begun to shout in an aggrieved manner for her attention, the friendly waitress returned to Calyxa’s table, and there was more fervid whispering between the two of them, and I tried not to blush at the unusual attention they paid me.

  Not fifteen minutes passed, during which Calyxa stared at the door as if she expected the devil himself to burst in, before the waitress came to my table and whispered, “She’ll meet you upstairs, Adam Hazzard.”

  I was afraid that my interest in Calyxa had been too broadly interpreted, and that an assignation had been set up—but of course Calyxa was not the type of female who would “make herself available at a moment’s notice.” So I was confused by the suggested arrangement; but the waitress evinced some urgency about the matter, and the grave expression on Calyxa’s face seemed to confirm the need for haste; and I nodded and said, “Whereabouts, upstairs?”

  “Second landing. Third door to the right. Don’t run right up there, though. Wait a moment or two after I leave. Don’t be conspicuous about it.”

  I agreed to all these conditions. The next few minutes passed slowly; then I stood up, affecting a nonchalance that might have been a shade too theatrical, judging by the way Calyxa rolled her eyes from her place at the adjoining table. But that couldn’t be helped. Shortly thereafter I was up the dimly-lit stairs, and I found the appointed room and let myself inside.

  It was a small room, containing only a chair, a few boxes loosely stuffed with straw packing, a barrel marked SALT FISH (empty), and a rusty hurricane lamp, which I lit up. The room smelled of moist, mildewed wood. A single grimy window overlooked the crowded stalls and torch-lit shops of Guy Street. From the window I could see a little of the night sky, which was very dark and shot through with distant flashes of lightning; the wind had a gustiness that flapped all the Guy Street awnings, and I guessed a storm was imminent. Certainly the air in
the city was humid enough for it—and swelteringly hot, especially in this upstairs chamber. I perched on one of the boxes, thinking Calyxa might prefer the chair, and waited for her to arrive, trying not to perspire.

  She opened the door not ten minutes later. The reader may imagine the excitement and the curiosity her visit aroused in me. Her hair was a skein of ebony knitwork in the light from the hall. She put her hands on her hips and regarded me.

  “Evangelica thinks you’re harmless,” she said. “Are you harmless?”

  I guessed “Evangelica” was the name of the waitress. “Well, I’m not dangerous, if that’s what you mean.”

  “Adam Hazzard—that’s your name?”

  I nodded. “And you’re Calyxa Blake.”

  “Adam Hazzard, I don’t know who you are—you’re only a loose soldier to me—but I need a favor, and Evangelica thinks you might be willing to help, without wanting too much in return.”

  “Of course I’ll help, whatever your situation, and without demanding anything at all in return.”

  “Western boy. Just as Evangelica said. How old are you?”

  “Nineteen,” I said, exaggerating by less than a month.

  “Do you know how to use the pistol you carry around with you?”

  “As a soldier I’m supposed to, and I do.”

  “Have you ever used it? To shoot at someone, I mean?”

  “I’ve shot at many people, Miss Blake, all of them Dutchmen, with my Pittsburgh rifle; and hit some of them, I don’t doubt. As for my pistol, it’s only shot targets to date, but I understand the principle and I’m not a stranger to the practice. Do you mean for me to shoot someone? That’s a tall order … not that I’m backing down … but an explanation would be welcome.”