The Scarlet Fig: Or, Slowly Through a Land of Stone, Book Three of the Vergil Magus Series (14 page)

And not long afterwards he thought of a sort of equation.

Numa:
Power without goodness.

Emma:
Goodness without power.

And for long afterwards he thought of that equation. And when he learned well how to write letters, he wrote that down. But there were things, he was learning, and things he was to go on learning, questions without answers and answers without questions, and statements beyond orderings; things and thoughts which could not be written down: not written down as simply as an equation: things not writable, things not to be written. At all.

Some time had passed. It was another day.

You require to be a mage; we have none such about here
. About,
where
, then, did they have one such? Or more than one …? Was there an order of them? Numa had spoken of a man in Athens, and of schools in Sevilla. Clearly, he, Numa, had met and known the man; it was not clear if he had gone to such a school or schools, or even if he had been in Sevilla at all. Of course one might ask. Suppose, though, that asking such a question and receiving an answer to it were but part of a sequence, and of a limited sequence, too. Would it be well to begin, so to speak, using it up? It was far from being thrice three years, at which time he would be under some sort of command to return to Numa. But not yet.

What yet?

Seeing, he fell asleep again. He had been mistaken. It was not a dream and he was not at sea. He was in a forest, there ahead of him was Numa’s house: but what a change! It lay fallen in, in ruins, and the grass, the creeper, and the vine had grown over it. Moss lay upon the shattered boards. Someone or something was panting heavily nearby.

How near? He turned his head. Caca was there, the fouled clothes sloughing and in tatters. Caca was there, on all fours, with offals in the mouth. Observed, the creature dropped them between the forepaws, and snarled, like any dog. There were sounds from behind, swifter than thought something sounded, whirling, whistling, past Vergil’s ears, and Caca leaped, writhed, fell back twisting, lay dead with a crossbowman’s bolt in the side.

Overhead, the glittering — It was a dream. He was awake and on the deck of a ship. He recognized the tawny shores of land, needed no cry of, “What land? what coast of people?” which was the traditional question asked of the pilot. Brundisium lay near ahead, and there he had been born; thence the Appian Way led whither all roads led: to Yellow Rome. He had much to do, it was some weeks before, even, he bethought him of the port; then one day he heard the fluter and the middle drum which signalled that a ship was in preparation for a voyage, and that all who would go with her had better hasten to be on board. In fact, as he walked towards the water he heard one man ask another, “What keeps her here? I thought she’d gone by now?” He asked as one might ask an idle question. And, as easily, the one he’d asked made answer. “It seems they await one sole passenger more,” and they strolled away, easy of mind as it appeared, as well they may be, whose way is not with water.

Now he heard a hoot and a whistle and a yammer of words which, for the most part, were really no words at all; he recognized the voice of Bruno. Bruno he had not seen often, lately, but once in recent months: he saw him peeling a scab off some portion of his unsweet person, deeply intent upon the matter, as one examining a leaf from some sibyl. But now the fellow was at another occupation: as often, he was jeering at someone. And of a sudden, no longer hidden from Vergil’s view by trees, there went along and alone, who but the nigromant, Numa, of whom Bruno had sneered that
he
had no more power, that he was grown too
old
: none the younger just now. What had brought him forth from his feculent den? the young Vergil wondered … asked himself, did he
want
to be like Numa? No. Was that the price one paid for wisdom; some said the price was one eye: No. No more than he wanted to be like Bruno. At all. Still …

What had brought Numa forth? For sure, only an errand which he could never even trust his thrall Caca to do … fetch a small jug or gourd of water (was he not holding something like that in his farther hand?), say, from the live waters of a running brook; not to
wash
with, God knows … perhaps for a certain ceremony or spell requiring a certain hour … if indeed he was on a quest and if indeed his quest sought water … Or perhaps “the thing” had since died (in which case it had been no dream). And now the flutist and the drummer suddenly broke off their music; certain men appeared upon the side of the vessel, voices called, voices answered, gestures made, gestures returned; and now it seemed evident that Numa, stooped and slow, was the “one sole passenger more” for which the ship was waiting? And then where was he going? Likely enough, where the ship was going … if not beyond. He seemed indeed very, very old. And he did not hasten him.

Half-loping behind Numa at a half-safe pace (willing to wound, but half afraid to strike), came the lout Bruno, ever enjoying to harass someone for nought … or ought. “Quack! Quack! Duck-foot!” he gabbled, only meaning but to mock; “quack-quack, duck-foot! Numa! Foh! Pfew!” he held his snout between his fingers. Old Numa turned and looked: no word he said, then; he only turned to look. The louse-bub chuckled his booby pleasure at seeing another either vexed or (better yet!) in pain. “Pfew! Numa! Foh! Clout-rag! Suck!”

And Numa, old Numa? He, as he turned away, spoke only the brief words said to those without pride or shame; Vergil meanwhile (suddenly, in fact, he could not have said why) bethought him of what he’d seen a-hanging and a-stinking before Numa’s door; and of the vatic voice. And of the vatic voice, what?

And Numa, old Numa (tattered, dirty, old evil Numa: but still …)? He, as he turned away, spoke only the brief words said to those without pride or shame. “You have no face,” he said. “You have no face.”

And, in a moment, even before the Bruno began his shrill and terrified and endless scream, Vergil perceived that this was now quite true. And was utterly sure that he knew where that face now was: it was hanging by the door of Caca’s cave.

V

Interlude At Sea

From Corsica’s Loriano (its trade, though limited, had even so a somewhat antic tone to it: henna, senna, leeches, peaches, chamois hides, and musk) he had taken water on a tramp trader crawling longside the littoral of the Ligurians … coming from Naples, Zenos had swung north towards Elba in order to take advantage of the wind, and to avoid the Gulf of Dread; now there was another wind to catch, and another course to take. It did seem to him, though, that this, naturally, other course was not taking them at all past Liguria, where in ancient days … so men said … the piddle of lynxes had solidified to form amber: always a great article of trade — Liguria, and the lands of the Franks, and then of the Catalands: where were they? He would soon enough see places not those at all; and, by and by, seeing the vast Herculean Columns and scenting the wild cold wind off the Sea of Atlantis — seeing the gryphons wheeling, gyring overhead …

“What shore?” he asked the helmsman, captain, and crew, “what shore? what coast of people?” But they answered him not, were shifty and silent, not with any great insolence, but with the evasion of those who do not answer because they merely do not choose to and because they do not have to. He soon saw that strict truth did not form any part of the philosophy of the masters, mates, and crewmen of a tramp trader. And why should it? when it did not suit them? They were merchant-men and merchants do not invariably deliver the merchandise as ordered and paid for. There was, after all, nothing in particular for Vergil in the lands of the Catalands, any more than there had been in Frankland or Liguria. He had wanted an escape? Very well, he had gotten one. He shrugged. And he made himself easy. He would see. From the moment of his final shrug he relaxed. The shipmen relaxed, too. Then
ho!
for the lands of the Troglodytes and of the Estridge-Eaters and those who sold the shaggy skins of wild men (such as Punes hanged up in their Temples to Bel, Melcarth, and Juno … particularly to Juno), also, the great plume feathers of great birds which could not fly, and those who traded the horns of strange wild goats (scraped translucent thin) full of sand of gold; traded them for cloth of scarlet and crimson, small bronze bridle bells and copper cauldrons (in series of ever-diminishing size so they fitted one inside the other) and cloaks of softest finest wool dyed the color of russet leaves such as lie so thickly of autumns in the Shadowed Valley And now and then, for boot, these dwellers on the western shores past the dragon-guarded Garden, handsful of beryl and of moonstones they gave, and tourmalines, agates, jasper, jade, and jet. What was strict truth on such a voyage? Oliphaunts baying on the beaches, and Black men in hooded cloaks who sold salt in slices of many colors which the Empery knew not salt to be: rose-red slices, yellow, blue, and green.