The Book Of Ian Watson, page 28
I departed in the direction of God’s thigh, with Oëp accompanying me tamely as though my hand was still attached to his neck. Soldier O bravely stayed to guard the tunnel mouth, his spear aimed at the fateful hole we’d cut. I hadn’t told him to defend it, but no matter. He stood quite motionless. What else could he do but guard? He was a soldier.
By now Ho and Emtep were sitting disconsolately on the bank. Quickly I advised them to get back on board. Voices chirruped near and far in warning—not as quietly as I would have liked—but soon all fell silent, even including Otem’s pieces, though thunderous giants could hardly have heard these.
For hundreds of turns we stayed as we were—doing nothing, saying nothing. All this while, strange fearful noises came intermittently from outside. Vast bumpings and draggings. Godly or demonish speech—perhaps! Who could comprehend such sounds? They made no sense.
Finally the culminating horror occurred.
High up, all around the roof, our world cracked open—screeching in protest. Showers of dust fell and billowed about us. Slowly the whole top of our world was lifted off.
Light drenched down through the dust. Sounds drummed at us.
I let myself be paralysed.
Cast of Demons
HARRY, EARL OF DUNDALK
THEODORE PECK
PROF. DANIEL POULSON, of the Egyptian Antiquities
Service
MLLE. YVONNE BIZOT
TOM KEEVES, HARRY’s ‘man’
MME. MARIANNE BIZOT, of the Louvre
ALI BEY
IBRAHIM, a cook
GAMAL, a servant
ACT 1
(Inside a large tent a table is set for dinner. Candles burn brightly. IBRAHIM and GAMAL wait at table; the others sit round it.)
HARRY: How ill-fated we seemed until today;
Nothing was going our way.
All Theodore’s dollars doled out for dust.
How his beef-baron Dad would have fussed. (He raises a glass of Perrier water.)
THEODORE: I’d sure like to know what you think
Is so damn special—pardon me, Ladies—
About old Hotemtep’s tomb!
HARRY: The new Lord Carnarvon Ted would be Paying the check for immortality.
THEODORE: Don’t blame me if I have the cash
And you’re a penniless Earl.
Have you been sneaking gin into that glass?
HARRY: It isn’t my country which prohibited Alcohol—and created Al Capone.
THEODORE: We repealed the Volstead Act
Three years ago. I’m no puritan.
HARRY: And a poet is never penniless.
Riches flourish in his heart.
DANIEL: And a sharp tongue in his head.
(IBRAHIM carries round a soup tureen, and GAMAL serves from it. Both men wear red tarbushes and white uniforms.)
HARRY: Dear me. My only desire was to amuse.
YVONNE: Que vous êtes un bel esprit!
TOM:
(He tears up a bread roll.)
What’s that mean?
HARRY: It means, Tom,
That the charming and ravishing Mam’selle
Appreciates my wit.
(Madame Bizot clears her throat.)
YVONNE: You are charming yourself,
Monsieur le Comte!
TOM: Oh ho,
And maybe she’s hunting a title.
Wed Byron here; become Countess of Dundalk.
MARIANNE:
(She clears her throat more loudly.)
In answer to your question, Mr. Peck:
Hotemtep’s tomb presents a strange enigma
—One which may become as notorious
As any trove of treasure.
THEODORE: There’s little enough of that commodity.
A couple of sandals with gold buckles
And a cofferful of earrings
Spilled in the antechamber.
The tomb was robbed, by hasty thieves.
MARIANNE: But absence is revealing in itself.
TOM: As on the Marie Celeste, do you mean?
MARIANNE: I refer to the absence of tampering
With the seals on the burial chamber.
The twine was still tied. The wax,
Still stamped intactly with Hotemtep’s sigil.
DANIEL: Ergo, the robbers did not break in there.
TOM: Ibrahim lad, this soup’s boiling hot.
IBRAHIM: It will cool, Effendi, if you look at it.
HARRY: Better boiling hot than bubbling with typhoid!
MARIANNE: And yet inside the inner coffin
We find ruination, total wreckage of the mummy.
Explain that if you can.
THEODORE: I blame that mouse hole.
MARIANNE: Mice?
Mice don’t bite through granite!
HARRY: Maybe some malicious enemy of Hotemtep—
Such as his mother-in-law—inserted beetles
Down a readymade hole at the last moment
To feast on his flesh? Dung-beetles.
Scarabs. Or that other kind we found.
MARIANNE: The larder beetle, which feeds on dead flesh.
No beetles could account for such damage.
DANIEL: If Hotemtep’s mother-in-law had wished him ill,
She would hardly have fed him to scarabs!
The ancient Egyptians viewed the scarab
As a symbol of eternal life. Deified as Khefri,
The scarab is the God of Life ever renewing
And ever transforming itself, forever reborn
Out of its own substance. You’ll recall
We found glyphs for Khefri carved here and there,
Hmm?
YVONNE:
(She claps her hands.)
But we did find a treasure, didn’t we?
The little figures.
MARIANNE: The Ushabti. Yes indeed.
What a wonderful model of society
Three thousand years ago! The detail
Of their faces, hands and tools: exquisite!
TOM: Their faces? You must be joking.
They’re all as alike as Chinamen.
MARIANNE: Well, they are made of china; almost.
TOM: They all look the same, is what I mean.
Like Chinamen all look the same.
MARIANNE: But of course! That’s because
They’re all modelled on dead Hotemtep.
As well as being an entourage to serve him
In the afterlife, they are different aspects
Of his spirit. As a collection they’re unique.
TOM: Box of toy soldiers, I’d say.
DANIEL: Only one
Is a soldier.
THEODORE: Exactly how unique?
DANIEL: Madame Bizot isn’t exaggerating.
They’re exemplary. In my view this alone
Redeems the whole expedition. That’s to say,
Our efforts were worthwhile. All your, um,
Generosity.
THEODORE: You’re kidding.
DANIEL: I assure you,
To a true Egyptologist these Ushabti
Are as much treasure as any golden thrones.
MARIANNE: Oh absolutely.
YVONNE: I feel I could be
A little girl again, and play with them
In my nursery.
HARRY: You are eternal girl, Mam’selle,
Fille éternelle! You will never age,
Never lose—how would Ted phrase it?—
Your peachiness.
DANIEL: No touching!
HARRY: My dear Sir,
I’m well aware we’re at the dinner table.
DANIEL: No touching the Ushabti unnecessarily.
No playing with them, that’s to say.
HARRY: Are they as fragile as all that?
DANIEL: One of them got smashed to pieces
And strung round the necks of the others
With gold wire.
MARIANNE: Another enigma!
One which opens a strange perspective
Into the conscience of Old Egypt.
HARRY: The consciousness.
MARIANNE: Same thing.
HARRY: Not since psychoanalysis. I must glance
At this new Autobiography of Freud’s
Some time, to see if he understands himself.
Not that I care much for analysis—
We murder to dissect—but I might find
The prompting for a poem.
MARIANNE: The Ushabti
Deserve to be staged in a worthy setting.
A tableau. A special exhibit.
They should be posed all together
In a miniature reconstruction of ancient life,
Not just lined up in any old glass case.
Not these little marvels.
DANIEL: Hrumph.
HARRY: Ah, now there’s poetry for you.
How could the mother of such charm and beauty
Not have poetry in her soul?
THEODORE: I get it:
A sort of tableau vivant.
MARIANNE: Tableau mort.
But you understand me. Failing the Louvre,
Which could certainly do our Ushabti justice …
(DANIEL POULSON shakes his head violently.)
The local museum might serve the purpose.
Somehow I feel the figures should stay
Near the tomb where we found them.
Twenty kilometres is no great distance.
DANIEL:
(Brightening, he glances sidelong at THEODORE PECK.)
If only our local museum had more space.
Such as a new gallery.
THEODORE: I’ll endow one.
ALI BEY: Your generosity is exceptional.
THEODORE: Yeah, well.
HARRY: Speaking of damage, did you notice
How one of the Ushabti had lost its face?
The lute-player. How poetically appropriate
If it could wear a new face: namely that
Of Theodore Peck of Chicago, U.S.A.,
Discoverer, patron of Egyptology.
Ah, but Fm forgetting: the lute-player
Would be female. In which case
Only one face could serve as a model
Of eternal beauty and artistry.
(Plucking paper and pencil from his pocket, HARRY starts sketching YVONNE’s face.)
TOM: Ladies and Gentlemen, I pronounce the soup
Drinkable.
CURTAIN
ACT 2
(Six months later; where desert sands meet tomb-pocked cliffs. A full moon shines bright. Holding HARRY’s fingers lightly, YVONNE peers closely into his proffered palm as though reading his fortune; or her own. Actually HARRY is showing her something tiny.)
YVONNE: This is most mischievous of you, Harry.
But I’m flattered.
HARRY: Oh, I was always
As handy at this kind of thing
As a sailor carving scrimshaws.
My fingers are rather subtle—
In a number of ways I could mention.
YVONNE: I’m sure they are. Oh God, Harry,
I’ve been bored. How could it take so long
To erect one wretched gallery?
It was all right for you, lucky fellow,
You went hunting lions in the Sudan.
HARRY: Need I add that all that time
Your face burned in my mind.
Night after night in my tent
I worked at this face from memory.
YVONNE: Truly, a remarkable likeness!
In fact, it’s me. I feel strange—
As though now magically you control
Part of me.
HARRY: Hmm. Now I only need
To fix this face on the little Ushabti
With tiny pins and strong glue.
I brought tools with me: a jeweller’s drill
And such. The join will be imperceptible.
Do you know where your mother keeps her keys?
YVONNE: You are like Monsieur Raffles,
The gentleman cracksman! Whose crimes
Were never pinned at his door.
But won’t this one be noticed immediately?
HARRY: Well, yes. Of course—by your mother
And Dan Poulson and Ali Bey and Ted Peck.
But they’ll all keep quiet as mice.
Just imagine the scandal there’d be
Supposing one of them cried foul
At tomorrow’s opening ceremony
Before all those distinguished guests.
Such as the Director General of Antiquities,
The Queen of the Belgians, the Maharajah
Of Jaipur, the correspondents of The Times
And Le Monde and a Zeitung or two.
What dishonour. What disrepute.
And all observed by photographers
Eagerly popping off their flash bulbs.
Note how our beef millionaire insisted
No photos of the Ushabti should be released
For earlier publication—so that they
Should positively burst upon a moderately
Astonished world. I’ll wager you
Our little lute-player captures the imagination.
She’ll be the most pictured. The enigma!
The beauty! Then who’ll dare denounce her?
YVONNE: Newsmen might remark on the fact
That I bear her a striking resemblance.
HARRY: The Egyptians believed in reincarnation!
You always felt strangely drawn
To an ancient destiny here by the Nile!
Hmm, perhaps that’s a touch extravagant.
Why not just act surprised? If newsmen notice,
Protest! Then let them convert you
Oh so reluctantly.
YVONNE: I’m sure Maman
Won’t be so reticent in private.
HARRY: Serves her right for marooning
A dashing spirit like you in the desert
To dine on donkey giblets for a year.
YVONNE: Ah yes, it has been a cruel exile.
So why did you ever come digging, Harry?
HARRY: In search of inspiration. Ancient passion.
Magic of antiquity—en route to the lions.
YVONNE: And in the absence of adventure
You invent it. As witness this face.
HARRY: That’s how it is with poets.
I create. Though I also shoot.
Blood of death; blood of desire!
Did you read those poems I sent you?
YVONNE: Oh yes. Tres passionants.
HARRY: You know their true meaning, Yvonne,
The meaning of the heart. If only
Our lute-player could set music to them
To serenade you.
YVONNE: If only.
HARRY: I still need keys, though.
Unlike Raffles, I can’t cut and file my own.
Will you fetch the keys for me?
YVONNE: Oh yes. But the night’s still young.
HARRY: True. I shouldn’t make my move too soon.
The guard needs a few hours to get sleepy.
Ah les clefs! Les clefs de mon coeur!
YVONNE: The keys to your heart?
HARRY: To yours too,
Yvonne?
(They embrace.)
YVONNE: Lā lā! I believe, ami,
We are really speaking about another organ
A little lower down the body than the heart.
Let’s touch on that, in the next hour or so.
(They sink down together out of sight behind a dune. Enter ALI BEY, clutching a rifle.)
ALI BEY: First Muhammed quit. Today, Towfik.
Let’s hope the new man proves to be
A less cowardly, superstitious peasant!
Let’s hope he just snores the night away
And doesn’t complain of hearing faint music
Or spying tiny movements from the corner
Of his eye—scurryings out of sight
Which all turn out to be nothing.
Sheer imagination! Or at most
A scuttling spider or a scorpion
Which a rifle butt could crush in a trice.
(Exit ALI BEY. From behind the dune mild sounds of ecstasy are heard.)
CURTAIN
We were taken from our world and transported to a new one. What terrors and bewilderments we endured on the way. How hideous our existence once we arrived.
The new world was twice the size of the old, but its walls weren’t of solid sheltering wood; they were of clear glass. Every now and then a giant demon would come to gape at us. That was during the bright time, time of the Sun. At first, stunned by such light and deafened by demon voices, we couldn’t see or hear sensibly. But we adjusted. Somewhat. There was also a dark time of equal length, when we dared move around and discuss our predicament. The bright time and the dark time were day and night. Though even at night the demons could flood us with light, if they chose.
Could we continue to endure such an existence? Opinion was divided. Some of us said yes, others no. Otem’s head parts insisted that we must tolerate our fate; his heart and viscera argued otherwise.
We were in a mockery of a world. Formerly God’s bones had sheltered us; now box-houses made of card and straw stood here and there meaninglessly. Oh the loss of God’s bones! Sand shifted treacherously underfoot. Our boat was locked upright immovably in a false river of glass. Only a trace of aether remained. A thin thread was still attached to the prow; this snaked away through the glass wall. And oh the loss of our treasure. We were robbed and ruined. Lucky that we had little appetite! There were only sand-mites to sustain us.
One night a dozen of us conferred.
“Are the demons really evil?” queried Carpenter Hote. ‘They didn’t break us or crush us.”
“Just as well,” retorted Ep the Nurse, “since they stole all the honey that heals.”
“Perhaps they are Gods like Hotemtep,” said O the Soldier. “In which case maybe it is our duty to serve them by standing still wherever they put us.”
“So many different Gods?” whispered Otem’s loin. “I can comprehend a dozen Gods, or twenty. But these seem innumerable.”
“Maybe they too live in a box,” said Hote. “With the lamp of the Sun crossing the roof by day; the stars and Moon by night.”
“No,” said Otem’s foot. “The land of life stretches forever.”
“He’s right about that,” agreed Surveyor Oëp, “so far as I can see through that window over there.”
“Could we appease the demons?” said Maidservant Emep. “Could we speak to them?”
Otem’s mouth-part cackled. “Their words are not our words. And would you have sex with a demon’s little finger?”
