The Bone Magician (7 page)
Authors: F. E. Higgins
Outside on the Bridge, Harry stumbled across the pavement, only just keeping his balance by planting one foot heavily in
the gutter. His foot sank ankle-deep in the thick sludge. He swore when he saw the state of his boot and then again as he felt the chill of the freezing water seeping in between the split seams and his laces. To add insult to injury a cart drove by at a
tremendous pace, the spinning wheels spattering him with filth. He gritted his teeth and flapped his shirt and trouser legs in a futile attempt to clean himself up.
He was sweating heavily and his stomach felt as if it was tying itself in a knot that was going to prove hard to undo. His head was
filled with the sounds of the Beast. The
slurping and belching, the crunching of bones. And the smell! ‘By God,’ he expostulated softly, and immediately his breath clouded around him. ‘That was some
hellish stink.’
The last time Harry had smelt something quite so repugnant was some years ago when for three high summer days and nights the air in
the city had stilled and the river had almost curdled.
He set off for home with that curious gait peculiar to all Urbs Umidians, instinctively mindful as they were of the crooked slabs and
potholes underfoot. At least it wasn’t snowing, he thought, and as he walked he was haunted with visions of what he had just seen. He breathed in a lungful of cold night air. ‘Lord above,’ was all he could say, over and over. To think
that some people went to see the Beast again and again. ‘How?’ he wondered. ‘Why?’ But already he was considering it too. Could the Beast really have been so horrific? Perhaps he might go back, in a week or so, a few days maybe,
just to see if his mind wasn’t playing tricks . . .
With his head down into the sharp wind, Harry didn’t notice the man stepping out from an alley and falling in beside him.
‘So
you’ve seen it then?’ asked the man.
Startled, Harry stopped and looked up, but the moon chose that very moment to hide behind the snow clouds, and the next street lamp
was some distance away, so the figure beside him was as a shadow against a wall.
‘Seen what?’
‘The Beast,’ hissed his new companion.
‘Yes,’ said Harry, and it was a relief to say it out loud. ‘I have seen the Gluttonous Beast.’ He felt as if
he had just confessed to a priest. At least he imagined that was what it felt like, having not seen the inside of a church for twenty years.
‘And what of him?’
Harry frowned. ‘Such an ugly creature, put me right off my food he has.’
‘Tell me this,’ said the man. ‘What is it about the Beast that makes you want to see him?’
‘Well,’ said Harry, walking again. ‘I can’t say what it is exactly. But it’s like with all ugliness, you
want to look away but you can’t.’
‘Can’t?’ queried the stranger.
‘It’s very difficult,’ said Harry, almost apologetically. ‘Why do you ask?’
The
man seemed not to hear. ‘Do you think the Beast should be on display?’
‘Why not?’ replied Harry, by now a little confused and slightly uneasy. It wasn’t often a complete stranger in the
City would strike up a conversation. Usually they would say ‘Give me your money’ in a threatening way. Under other circumstances – that is, Harry not being in shock after a difficult experience – he probably would have run
away.‘What else can someone, some
thing
, like the Gluttonous Beast do?’ he said. ‘Didn’t God put such creatures on earth for our amusement? It’s a reminder to us all to thank the Lord
it ain’t us. Poor wretches.’ For a nonreligious man, Harry seemed unusually preoccupied with God at this moment.
‘Do you think this creature wishes to be stared upon?’
Harry was growing tired of this inquisition. ‘People needs their entertainment, you know. I paid money to see the Beast and
that’s what I saw. Anyhow, I’m on my way home, so I’ll bid you goodnight.’
The man chose that moment to step in front of Harry, blocking his way. Harry, exasperated and a little frightened, turned into the
short lane on his right that sloped down to the river. He walked quickly, but he knew the man
was following; he could hear footsteps crunching in the icy snow and at the same time a strange high-pitched whirring noise.
Harry turned around, his back to the river, and challenged the oncoming stranger.
‘Why are you following me?’
‘You’ve told me all I want to know,’ he said, again ignoring the question, ‘and I thank you for your
time.’ Then, before Harry knew what was happening, his pursuer thrust a short stick at his portly stomach. Harry felt a sudden shock of pain explode through his body, causing him to leap backwards, stunned and breathless, clutching at his chest. He
heard the whirring noise again.
‘What’s – going – on?’ he gasped.
‘Nothing you’ll ever know about,’ came the reply.
Harry felt another shocking blow and fell on to the wall, his head dangling over the water. He could hear and smell the Foedus below.
In one swift movement the man shoved something into Harry’s waistcoat pocket and then he felt strong hands gripping him around his ankles and he was lifted over the edge. His last thought was ‘What’s that in my pocket?’ for it
wasn’t a carrot or an onion. Then the water parted like a tear in cheap fabric only to close over him, the gash mended invisibly, and he sank into oblivion.
There was really no way to describe Deodonatus Snoad other than downright ugly. And even to say that would be considered
a kindness. His ugliness was unique in its physical manifestation. His stubby neck was lumpy, and supported at an angle a most unfortunate head that was far too big for his crooked body. On his lopsided face there sat a large red misshapen nose and a
pair of muddy eyes that were half hidden under his protruding brow. He was a hairy chap and his eyebrows ran into each other in one long bushy line that dipped slightly to meet on the bridge of his nose. Like many of his fellow citizens, his teeth, at
least those that remained, were in pretty poor shape, and caused
him pain on a daily basis. But Deodonatus had never been one for smiling.
Deodonatus was ugly as a baby, which was not unusual, but even his own mother thought he was a little hard on the eye. As he grew,
people would stare at him in the street and then cross over to avoid him. He quickly realized that the world outside his house was a cruel place so he spent his time indoors shut away in his room. He had an agile mind and taught himself to read and write
and educated himself in all that was considered worthwhile in his day.
As for his parents, perhaps once Deodonatus had loved them, but soon he scorned them. They had always found it difficult to look at him,
his mother especially, and with his ever-increasing erudition they soon had little enough to say to him. Shortly after his tenth birthday, they decided they had fulfilled their parental responsibilities (and admirably so, they thought, under the
circumstances) and one morning they sold him to a travelling show.
Deodonatus spent the next eight years going from town to town, exhibiting under the imaginative title of ‘Mr Hideous’. His
act consisted of sitting stony-faced on a three-legged stool in a small booth for the sole purpose of being stared at. And how people loved to stare!
Occasionally he also had to suffer the indignity of being prodded. Only
then would he react with a vicious snarl which made the women scream and the men utter such phrases as ‘By Jove, but he’s a fiery monster!’
And as Deodonatus sat there and watched the people gape at him and put their hands to their mouths in horror, he considered the nature
of mankind and concluded that the whole human race was hateful and deserved every misfortune that fell upon it, either by luck or by design. This was an important distinction. Deodonatus now harboured thoughts of revenge. Not on anyone in particular
– that would come later – though perhaps his parents might have crossed his mind as worthy candidates once or twice. Deodonatus had a good grasp of economics and fully endorsed the concept of supply and demand. A man must make a living and
the show’s owner was only giving the people what they wanted. If any blame was to be apportioned, then it fell on the general public who came to gawp.
Deodonatus performed as Mr Hideous until his eighteenth year. He grew a thick beard and one night soon after he slipped away, but not
before tying up the proprietor and taking all his money. Thus endowed, he made
his way to Urbs Umida, a city renowned for its own ugliness, in the hope that he might be able to merge into the crowds and live a relatively
peaceful life.
They say that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but experience had taught Deodonatus otherwise. He had learned that if he was to
hope to have any quality of life, then it was best that he wasn’t beheld at all. It is also said that one must not judge a book by its cover. After all, it is a universal truth that what really matters is the substance between the front and the
back. In Deodonatus Snoad’s case, however, when you looked past his repulsive appearance and laid open his particular book, what was within was much worse than that which was without. Moulded by his youthful experiences, Deodonatus was a bitter and
twisted man, physically and mentally, almost wholly beyond redemption.
The very first time Deodonatus passed through the gates to enter the south side of Urbs Umida, he felt as if he was
coming home. He looked around and smiled. Such an ugly and evil city, full of hypocrisy and deceit. He took lodgings in the most insalubrious part of town and soon settled in.
He savoured the ripe smell of the Foedus in
the summer months and he smirked at the homeless wretches in puddles and huddles in the winter. Occasionally he would even venture into the Nimble Finger Inn and stand at the back to observe his fellow citizens at their worst.
He lived well, at first, on his ill-gotten gains, but he knew that eventually he would need an income. But what? He was aware of the
Urbs Umida Daily Chronicle
, a popular newspaper that had a wide readership because of its sensational headlines, simple words and large fonts. Deodonatus wrote a piece on the state of the pavements (constantly
being dug up to repair inefficient water pipes) and had it delivered to the newspaper. It was well received. They liked his outraged tone, his sarcasm, and asked for more, which he duly provided.
And that was the beginning of Deodonatus’s career with the
Chronicle
.
Deodonatus worked from the comfort of his lodgings. The landlady, no great beauty herself, considered money a cure for most things,
repulsion included, and was happy to give this stranger a large room at the top with a view over the City. Deodonatus required little else and luckily for all concerned preferred his own company. So he hid away
from the
world during the day and rarely ventured out before sundown. He delivered his pieces to the newspaper by means of the landlady’s son who, for a penny, came every day to collect them.
At night, after he returned from his regular nocturnal walks, he would sit beside the fire and read. The days of Mr Hideous seemed
very far away and occasionally he was overcome by a strange feeling he couldn’t identify. It was, perhaps, the slightest glimmer of happiness.
Deodonatus felt safe now, surrounded by all that was important to him, namely his collection of books, within the pages of which he
could be transported from the depressing reality of daily life in the City. In his more contemplative moments he liked to consider the words of the ancient philosophers, both Roman and Greek, for they had plenty to say to a man in his circumstances.
Deodonatus also had a particular penchant for fairy tales. It seemed to him that in these stories an inordinate number of characters were rescued from hideousness and turned into beautiful people. But in the harsh light of day, when he uncovered the
mirror that he kept to remind him why he was there, his reflection told him that his life was far from a fairy tale.
So he turned down the lamps and kept the mirror covered over, but left the shutters open to watch and hear the sounds
of the City. He made his room comfortable and kept it tidy, except for his desk. It was strewn with a plethora of writing materials, paper, quills and inkpots and a copy of Jonsen’s dictionary. Pinned to the wall he had some of the pieces that he
had recently written, one of which outlined the dangers of speeding horses and carts. He had thought the headline particularly good:
CAREERING CARTS CAUSE MURDEROUS AND MUDDY MAYHEM
Tonight, while Juno was slumbering in a fug of herbs and Pin was recording his eventful life in his journal, Deodonatus
was standing at the window looking out over the white roofs. They glistened in the intermittent moonlight in complete contrast to the Foedus whose black waters greedily swallowed the light. Deodonatus was restless these days. He paced up and down the
room, muttering to himself and fidgeting his hair into knots. After half an hour he went to his desk, dipped his quill in the ink and began to write feverishly.