Recovery and the Return of Ethan Hart (32 page)

But wait.

Other countries? Other customs? Other times?

Well, I'll tell you. In my heart I dared to hope that all that nonsense had been forgotten. Or never seriously intended. Meant only to frighten and confuse.

For—think about it—sixty years!
Over
sixty years! Wouldn't you imagine they'd have felt impatient to get on with it, witness its results, an experiment as exciting as that? Because that's what it would have been, of course. An experiment. (And presumably, in
their
eyes, an exciting one.) Which perhaps they'd now discovered—glory be—that they weren't capable of carrying out. Faces all covered in egg! How are the mighty fallen!

An enterprise dreamt up on the spur of the moment—and possibly fairly soon regretted.

Though be that as it may, they must have realized they'd let too much time slip by, far too much. “Oh, yes, Cartophilus! You'll most certainly
get
to know…” Yet in the first place I was no longer mobile and in the second place I had cataracts. How could I possibly get to know?

Yet, even so, I was worried. One night I thought about the Witch of Endor—I don't know what put
her
into my mind. No way was I thinking of journeying to Endor or of travelling back through past centuries; it was enough that I must travel forward through future ones. (You see, I still hadn't
quite
convinced myself.) Besides, I now had a fear of witches, since I'd seen that woman perish in the fire. But the notion remained with me: might witchcraft cure my ills? After all, I couldn't go on like this, not unless they simply put me in a cage and left me there as some interesting exhibit—a decrepit, aging, floorbound, defecating beast, barely recognizable as human.

And it defied belief to suppose that
that
could have been the projected manner of it. Some sort of travelling peep show? “Step right up and see the world's oldest and ugliest inhabitant!” No, surely not. To get to experience different lands through only the smells that drifted between the bars of some endlessly swaying cage? Or through the barely heard ribaldries of those who came to gawp at me? That couldn't be what they'd had in mind.

So the question then remained.
If
it was going to take place,
how
was it going to take place? Was it conceivable there could be anyone out there—other than a witch or a warlock or an outcast of some other variety—who might have the potential to help me? And even if they had the potential, would they possess the generosity? Remember, I was penniless. Would it be within their nature to take pity?

However. Finally it happened. Somebody
did
take pity.

She set down her buckets and her yoke and procured me bread and gave me water and didn't seem to mind that she almost had to shout at me on account of my poor hearing. I felt so starved of talk, of normal human intercourse. I would have liked to touch her face but didn't dare request it—my warty fingers, no doubt filthy nails. And anyway. Again it was only sentimental: who cared what she looked like, so long as she delivered?

She wasn't a witch. She couldn't deliver. Not directly. But it was she who told me of the wizard who had recently arrived in Jerusalem. “I could take you to visit him,” she offered, “or…”

I pictured her looking first at me and then at the state of my hovel.

“Or perhaps he could visit you here, if you'd be willing to receive him.”

Willing
? I'd have been willing to receive King Herod if King Herod could have offered me the least degree of hope.

So he came. Not Herod. The wise man she had spoken of.

“I hear you need assistance.”

What glorious words! To show my gratitude I would have sunk down on my knees if I'd been able.

“You can help me die?” I whispered.

“But haven't you been doomed to live; to wander over land and sea for all eternity?”

“
Wander
? Is that what they call it? No, doomed to
drag
myself along! Inch by painful inch.”

“Nobody can help you die.”

I moaned. My gratitude was short-lived. “How can you ‘assist' me, then?”

“Through making sure you
don't
have to drag yourself along. Inch by painful inch.”

“And how, exactly, do you mean to accomplish that? Foot by painful foot wouldn't be so much of an improvement.”

He stared at me, severely. “By offering you the chance of a new life. A new life every century.”

Oh, a new life every century? Why, yes, of course! Why hadn't
I
thought of that?

This fellow must be mad.

“You are very much straining my patience, Cartophilus—but no, in fact, I am not mad.”

Well, he patently had powers. Possibly it would be foolish to underestimate them; and I shouldn't have been so quick to let him know I did. Hot-tempered, that's me. But even if by some outlandish chance he
was
capable of doing what he claimed…no, I just couldn't believe it.

“So what can I say,” he murmured, “to make you believe it?”

And then, ironically, I did. It was as simple as that. But it wasn't the actual question which convinced me—no, of course not—nor the fact he could so clearly intercept what I was thinking…although that, too, was certainly impressive. No, what convinced me was the way he'd
put
the question. The softness of the voice he'd used. For I had suddenly realized something. I could actually hear him! I could actually see him! The process had been a gradual one, but if he was talking miracles I now had proof that he could do it—well, ears and eyes, at any rate. Which was a persuasive testimonial…especially to somebody as keen to be persuaded as I was.

And from that instant I trusted him. Well—as fully as it was in my nature to trust anyone.

“I'm sorry I was sceptical,” I said. “Born again?”

He nodded. I really saw him nod. It was amazing.

But this might have been simply in acknowledgment of my apology. I had to get it straight. No ambiguity.

“Reborn every century? Is that what you're saying?”

“Yes.”

In other words it almost seemed… Well, it almost seemed as if my punishment was about to be suspended. Or lifted. Or evaded. Eternal life—the thing all mortals hungered for. (Especially if, like me, they had their doubts regarding heaven.) No more a punishment at all. A positive reward.

But why? Clearly, there had to be some catch to it. There was always a price tag. Nothing was for nothing.

This time he didn't respond, though—and I remembered that only ten seconds ago I had apologized for my scepticism. So be it! I let my mind dwell on the sheer restfulness of lying in a crib.

“Good health?” I persisted.

“What? Oh, good health. Yes, certainly. You'll be a normal child. A normal youth and adult. With everything normality implies except that—”

I laughed. “Except that I'll still live to be a hundred?”

“That wasn't what I had in mind.”

“Money?” I asked. “Will I have money?”

“That all depends. If you want to be well-off it's obviously something you can see to on your own account.”

Slowly, I digested all this information. “Every hundred years…made young again! That's staggering. Really staggering.”

“Yes. I'm glad you look on it like that.”

“Though on the other hand… Do you mind if I make one small suggestion? A hundred years is a long time. Couldn't we make it fifty?”

“No,” he said.

“Seventy-five?”

Although he shook his head he didn't look reproachful. I sensed that with a bit of coaxing I might be able to swing it. “So much sympathy,” I said, “so much compassion! I'm sure the two of us could come to an agreement.”

“Are you?”

“Hugely beneficial to both parties.” I rubbed my hands.

“How so, to me?”

“Oh, I can see you're a real gentleman. A philanthropist! I can see you'd like to make this world a better place.”

“Aren't I doing that already? Your own small part of it, anyway?”

“Oh, you are, you are! You're the kindest person I have ever known!” I could tell he was amused by my flattery—even if I could also tell he didn't mean to be swayed by it. (Yet the funny thing is, it wasn't altogether flattery. He
was
the kindest person I had ever known.) “All right. Not seventy-five. I accept that. But does it have to be a hundred?”

I really felt he might be weakening. “That all depends,” he said.

“Depends on what, O wise one?”

“On how things go.”

What an irritating answer!

But no matter how I wheedled I couldn't get him to expand on it. I heard my tone grow plaintive.

“I don't want to live so long,” I grumbled. “Not to a hundred! Please! No, never again!”

(Okay, so I was stretching a point. Though only by a few weeks—a few short wretched weeks. No. A few
long
wretched weeks! He said: “By eight months and four days, if we want to be accurate.” Why did he think that funny?)

But would you believe it? Already I was grumbling. I should have been dancing.

Tomorrow I'd be dancing.

“A newborn baby finds it difficult to dance,” he remarked.

“Besides,” I pointed out. I wished to demonstrate he wasn't dealing with an idiot. “When I'm newborn I shan't even know I've any reason to dance, shall I?”

“Yes.”

“Exactly,” I agreed.

But then—the very next second—

“I shall?”

“As I was about to tell you a short while ago. You'll be a normal child and youth and man in every respect save two.”

I felt apprehensive.

“First,” he said, “the matter of age. But you're aware of that.”

“And second?”

“Memory.”

My apprehension dwindled. “You mean I'll be forgetful? Hardly to be wondered at over the course of centuries!”

“No. I mean the opposite. Your memory will be excellent.”

So what was the disadvantage
there
? (Though perhaps I'd only inferred one. Ever the pessimist! Yet—following a life like mine—certainly not without cause!)

“From your own point of view,” he said, “the disadvantage will be this. You'll remember more than you would want to.”

“Oh, I think I can live with that.”

But suddenly again, on a far less casual note, “More than I would want to? What kind of thing?”

“Every kind of thing.”

“
Every
kind of thing?”

“You'll remember, for instance, how you struck the Saviour. How you repeatedly tried to kill yourself. How you became an animal. How you—”

I was appalled.

“No,
stop
! All the things I'd most be wanting to forget!”

He ignored my interruption.

“Though undoubtedly you always
were
an animal! I should have said—how you became an out-and-out grotesque!”

His tone remained pleasant, despite his statement having been as damning, virtually, as any statement
could
be. But, for the moment, that wasn't what mattered. What did matter—overwhelmingly—was that even as a newborn I'd be remembering all the horrors I'd assumed I should now be leaving behind. I'd be carrying the full weight of my past even into my cradle. From my cradle I'd be hauling it every interminable step of the way into my grave—and out of my grave—and back into my cradle. It would be
unbearable
.

Iniquitous. Indescribable. Wouldn't it almost be better not to—?

“No,” he said, “think straight, man! What—remain as you are? You can't have forgotten that at the very least now you'll be able to sleep at night?”

Yet even this was qualified.

“Or if you
don't
, it won't be due any longer to crippling physical discomfort, which—although you didn't realize it—must often have neutralized the pain of thought.”

He added, “Naturally you won't be attempting suicide again, now that you're familiar with the consequences?”

No. At least I had learned
that
much.

“And you'll have bread, you'll have wine, you'll have all the things you might have thought would give you pleasure. Even sex, Cartophilus, you'll be able to squirt your juices once again. It's just that you'll also have a new ingredient—an ingredient invariably withheld from others. Your memory of past lives.”

I muttered: “
Mercifully
withheld from others.”

“That all depends—doesn't it?—on the quality of the past lives.”

I considered this a phrase I could very easily grow to hate. Already had. How many times had he used it?
That all depends
…

“I'm sorry, Cartophilus. Those have to be my terms.”

“And you let me think there wasn't any catch. You really let me think there wouldn't be a catch.”

He hesitated.

“You're right to point that out. It wasn't my intention to mislead.”

“Hmm,” I answered, doubtfully.

“Whether you believe me or not is immaterial. But at least I'd like you to forgive me.”

I, too, hesitated.

“I don't know.”

“That's a shame,” he said, “because forgiveness of course—”

I cut him off. “What I
meant
to say…”

“Yes?”

“What I meant to say was…” I gave a shrug. “That all depends.”

There followed a moment of silence. I wondered if I'd have to explain. But then he laughed.

Properly laughed. Laughed with genuine enjoyment.

Which—I have to admit—did a lot to sweeten things.

Yet even so. Didn't he understand that there was weariness of spirit—oh, my God, was there not weariness of spirit—at times every bit as burdensome as the greatest weariness of body?