Sorcerers!, page 14
So that was one reason why John L. Limekiller had eventually decided to forget the new suit of sails for the time being.
Filial piety had prompted him to send a nice long letter home, but a tendency towards muscle spasms caused by holding a pen had prompted him to reduce the n.l.l. to a picture post card. He saw the women at the post office, one long and one short.
"What's a letter cost, to St. Michael's?" the Long was asking. "We could, telephone for a reservation," the Short suggested. Jack was about to tell them unsolicited, how fat the chance was of anybody in St. Michael's having a telephone or anything which could be reserved, let alone of understanding what a reservation was—then he took more than a peripheral look at them.
The Long had red hair and was wearing dungarees and a man's shirt. Not common, ordinary, just-plain-red: copper-red. Worn in loops. Her shirt was blue with a faint white stripe. Her eyes were "the color of the sherry which the guests leave in the glass." Or don't, as the case may be. The Short could have had green hair in braids and been covered to her toes in a yashmak for all Jack noticed.
At that moment the clerk had asked him, "What fah you?"—a local, entirely acceptable usage, even commonplace, being higher than "What you want?" and lower than "You does want something?"—and by the time he had sorted out even to his own satisfaction that he wanted postage for a card to Canada and not, say, to send an armadillo by registered mail to Mauritius, and had completed the transaction in haste and looked around, trying to appear casual, they were gone. Clean gone. Where they had been was a bright-eyed little figure in the cleanest rags imaginable, with a sprinkling of white hairs on its brown, nutcracker jaws.
Who even at once declared, " 'And now abideth faith, hope, and charity, these three, and the greatest of these is charity,' you would not deny the Apostle Paul, would you, then, sir?"
"Eh? Uh . . . no," said Limekiller. Pretense cast aside, craning and gaping all around: nothing.
"Anything to offer me?" demanded the wee and ancient, with logic inexorable.
So there had gone a dime. And then and there had come the decision to visit St. Michael of the Mountains, said to be so different, so picturesque, hard upon the frontier of "Spanish" Hidalgo, and where (he reminded himself) he had after all never been.
Sometimes being lonely it bothers the way a tiny pebble in the shoe bothers: enough to stop and do something. But if one is very lonely indeed, then it becomes an accustomed thing. Only now did Limekiller bethink himself how lonely he had been. The boat and the Bay and the beastie-cat had been company enough. The average National boatman had a home ashore. The two men and two women even now aboard the Sacarissa in jammed-together proximity—they had each other. (And even now, considering another definition of the verb to have and the possible permutations of two males and two females made him wiggle like a small boy who has to go—). There was always, to be sure, the Dating Game, played to its logical conclusion, for a fee, at any one of the several hotels in King Town, hard upon the sea. But as for any of the ladies accompanying him anywhere on his boat . . .
"Whattt? You tink I ahm crazy? Nutting like dot!"
Boats were gritty with sand to fill the boggy yards and lanes, smelly with fish. Boats had no connotations of romance.
Such brief affairs did something for his prostate gland ("Changing the acid," the English called it), but nothing whatsoever, he now realized, for his loneliness. Nor did conversation in the boatmen's bars, lately largely on the theme of, "New tax law, rum go up to 15¢ a glass, man!"
And so here he was, fifty miles from home, if King Town was "home"—and if the Sacarissa was home . . . well, who knew? St. Michael of the Mountains still had some faint air of its days as a port-and-caravan city, but that air was now faint indeed. Here the Bayfolk (Black, White, Colored, and Clear) were outnumbered by Turks and 'Paniar's, and there were hardly any Arawack at all.(There seldom were, anywhere out of the sound and smell of the sea.) There were a lot of old wooden houses, two stories tall, with carved grill work, lots of flowering plants, lots of hills: perhaps looking up and down the hilly lanes gave the prospects more quaintness and interest, perhaps even beauty, than they might have had, were they as level as the lanes of King Town, Port Cockatoo, Port Caroline, or Lime Walk. And, too, there were the mountains all about, all beautiful. And there was the Ningoon River, flowing round about the town in easy coils, all lovely, too: its name, though Indian in origin, allowing for any number of easy, Spanish-based puns:
"Suppose you drink de wat-tah here, say, you cahn-not stay away!"
"En otros paises, señor, otros lugares, dicen mañana. Pero, por acá, señor, se dice ningún!"
And so forth.
Limekiller had perambulated every street and lane, had circumambulated town. Like every town and the one sole city in British Hidalgo, St. Michael's had no suburbs. It was clustered thickly, with scarcely even a vacant lot, and where it stopped being the Town of St. Michael of the Mountains, it stopped. Abruptly. Here was the Incorporation; there were the farms and fields; about a mile outside the circumambient bush began again.
He could scarcely beat every tree, knock on every door. He was too shy to buttonhole people, ask if they had seen a knockout redhead. So he walked. And he looked. And he listened. But he heard no women's voices, speaking with accent from north of the northern border of Mexico. Finally he grew a little less circumspect.
To Mr. John Paul Peterson, Prop., the Emerging Nation Bar and Club:
"Say . . . are there any other North Americans here in town?"
As though Limekiller had pressed a button. Mr. Peterson, who until that moment had been only amiable, scowled an infuriated scowl and burst out, "What the Hell they want come here for? You think them people crazy? They got richest countries in the world, which they take good care keep it that way; so why the Hell they want come here? Leave me ask you one question. Turn your head all round. You see them table? You see them booth? How many people you see sitting and drinking at them table and them booth?"
Limekiller's eyes scanned the room. The question was rhetorical. He sighed. "No one," he said, turning back to his glass.
Mr. Peterson smote the bar with his hand. "Exactly!" he cried. "No one! You not bloody damn fool, boy. You have good eye in you head. Why you see no one? Because no one can afford come here and drink, is why you see no one. People can scarce afford eat! Flour cost nine cent! Rice cost fifteen cent! Lard cost thirty-four cent! Brown sugar at nine cent and white sugar at eleven! D.D. milk twenty-one cent! And yet the tax going up, boy! The tax going up!"
A line stirred in Limekiller's mind. "Yes—and, 'Pretty soon rum going to cost fifteen cents,'" he repeated. Then had the feeling that (in that case) something was wrong with the change from his two-shillings piece. And with his having made this quotation.
"What you mean, 'fifteen cent'?" demanded Mr. Peterson, in a towering rage. Literally, in a towering rage, he had been slumped on his backless chair behind the bar, now stood up to his full height . . . and it was a height, too. "Whattt? 'Fifteen-cent?' You think this some damn dirty liquor booth off in the bush, boy? You think you got swampy," referring to backwoods distilled goods, "in you glass? What 'fifteen cent?' No such thing. You got pure Governor Morgan in you glass, boy, never cost less than one shilling, and pretty soon going to be thirty cent, boy: thir-ty-cent! And for what? For the Queen can powder her nose with the extra five penny, boy?" Et cetera. Et cetera.
Edwin Rodney Augustine Bickerstaff, Royal British Hidalgo Police (sitting bolt-upright in his crisp uniform beneath a half-length photograph of the Queen's Own Majesty):
"Good afternoon, sir. May I help you, sir?"
"Uh . . . yes! I was wondering . . . uh . . . do you know if there are any North Americans in town?"
Police-sergeant Bickerstaff pondered the question, rubbed his long chin. "Any North Americans, you say, sir?"
Limekiller felt obliged to define his terms. "Any Canadians or people from the States."
Police-sergeant Bickerstaff nodded vigorously. "Ah, now I understand you, sir. Well. That would be a matter for the Immigration Officer, wouldn't you agree, sir?"
"Why . . . I suppose. Is he in right now?" This was turning out to be more complex than he had imagined.
"Yes, sir. He is in. Unofficially speaking, he is in. I am the police officer charged with the duties of Immigration Officer in the Mountains District, sir."
"Well—"
"Three to four, sir."
Limekiller blinked. Begged his pardon. The police-sergeant smiled slightly. "Every evening from three to four, sir, pleased to execute the duties of Immigration Officer, sir. At the present time," he glanced at the enormous clock on the wall, with just a touch of implied proof, "I am carrying out my official duties as Customs Officer. Have you anything to declare?"
And, So much for that suggestion, Limekiller thought, a feeling of having only slightly been saved from having made a fool of himself tangible in the form of something warmer than sunshine round about his face and neck.
The middle-aged woman at the Yohan Yahanoglu General Mdse. Establishment store sold him a small bar of Fry's chocolate, miraculously unmelted. Jack asked, "Is there another hotel in town, besides the Grand?"
A touch of something like hauteur came over the still-handsome face of Sra. "Yohanoglu. Best you ahsk wan of the men," she said. And, which one of the men? "Any men," said she.
So. Out into the sun-baked street went lonely Limekiller. Not that lonely at the moment, though, to want to find where the local hookers hung out. Gone too far to turn back. And, besides, turn back to what?
The next place along the street which was open was the El Dorado Club and Dancing (its sign, slightly uneven, said).
Someone large and burly thumped in just before he did, leaned heavily on the bar, "How much, rum?" he demanded.
The barkeep, a 'Paniard, maybe only one-quarter Indian (most of the Spanish-speaking Hidalgans were more than that), gave a slight yawn at this sudden access of trade. "Still only wan dime," he said. "Lahng as dees borrel lahst. When necessitate we broach nudder borrel, under new tox lah, iay! Pobrecito! Going be fifteen cent!"
"¡En el nombre del Queen!" proclaimed the other new customer, making the sign of the cross, then gesturing for a glass to be splashed.
Limekiller made the same gesture.
"What you vex weed de Queen, varón?" the barkeeper asked, pouring two fingers of "clear" into each glass. "You got new road, meb-be ah beet bum-py, but new; you got new wing on hospital, you got new generator for give ahl night, electricity: Whatt? You teenk you hahv ahl dees, ahn not pay uh new tox? No sotch teeng!"
"No me hace falta, 'ahl dees,'" said the other customer. "Resido en el bush, where no hahv not-ting like dot."
The barkeep yawned again. "Reside en el bush? Why you not live like old-time people? Dey not dreenk rum. Dey not smoke cigarette. Dey not use lahmp-ile. Ahn dey not pay toxes, not dem, no."
"Me no want leev like dot. Whattt? You cahl dot 'leev'?" He emptied his glass with a swallow, dismissed any suggestion that Walden Pond and its tax-free amenities might be his for the taking, turned to Limekiller his vast Afro-Indian face. "Filiberto Marín, señor, is de mahn to answer stranger question. Becahs God love de stranger, señor, ahn Filiberto Marín love God. Everybody know Filiberto Marín, ahn if anyone want know where he is, I am de mahn." Limekiller, having indeed questions, or at any rate, A Question, Limekiller opened his mouth.
But he was not to get off so easily.There followed a long, long conversation, or monologue, on various subjects, of which Filiberto Marín was the principal one. Filiberto Marín had once worked one entire year in the bush and was only home for a total of thirty-two days, a matter (he assured Jack) of public record. Filiberto Marín was born just over the line in Spanish Hidalgo, his mother being a Spanish Woman and his father a British Subject By Birth. Had helped build a canal, or perhaps it was The Canal. Had been in Spanish Hidalgo at the time of the next-to-last major revolution, during which he and his sweetheart had absquatulated for a more peaceful realm. Married in church! Filiberto Marín and his wife had produced one half a battalion for the British Queen! "Fifteen children—and puros varones! Ahl son, señor! So fahst we have children! Sixty-two-year-old, and work more tasks one day dan any young man! An I now desires to explain we hunting and fishing to you, becahs you stranger here, so you ignorance not you fahlt, señor."
Limekiller kept his eyes in the mirror, which reflected the passing scene through the open door, and ordered two more low-tax rums; while Filiberto Marín told him how to cast nets with weights to catch mullet in the lagoons, they not having the right mouths to take hooks; how to catch turtle, the tortuga blanca and the striped turtle (the latter not being popular locally because it was striped)—
"What difference does the stripe mean, Don Filiberto?"
"¡Seguro! Exoctly!!" beamed Don Filiberto, and, never pausing, swept on: how to use raw beef skin to bait lobsters ("Dey cahl him lobster, but is really de langusta, child of de crayfish."), how to tell the difference in color between saltwater and freshwater ones, how to fix a dory, how to catch tortuga "by dive for him—"
"—You want to know how to cotch croc-o-dile by dive for him? Who can tell you? Filiberto Marín will answer dose question," he said, and he shook Limekiller's hand with an awesome shake.
There seemed nothing boastful about the man. Evidently Filiberto Marín did know all these things and, out of a pure and disinterested desire to help a stranger, wanted merely to put his extensive knowledge at Jack's disposal. . . .
Of this much, Limekiller was quite clear the next day. He was far from clear, though, as to how he came to get there in the bush where many cheerful dark people were grilling strips of barbacoa over glowing coals—mutton it was, with a taste reminiscent of the best old-fashioned bacon, plus . . . well, mutton. He did not remember having later gone to bed, let alone to sleep. Nor know the man who came and stood at the foot of his bed, an elderly man with a sharp face which might have been cut out of ivory . . . this man had a long stick . . . a spear? . . . no . . .
Then Limekiller was on his feet. In the moon-speckled darkness he could see very little, certainly not another man. There was no lamp lit. He could hear someone breathing regularly, peacefully, nearby. He could hear water purling, not far off. After a moment, now able to see well enough, he made his way out of the cabin and along a wooden walkway. There was the Ningoon River below. A fine spray of rain began to fall; the river in the moonlight moved like watered silk. What had the man said to him? Something about showing him . . . showing him what? He could not recall at all. There had really been nothing menacing about the old man.
But neither had there been anything reassuring.
Jack made his way back into the cabin. The walls let the moonlight in, and the fine rain, too. But not so much of either as to prevent his falling asleep again.
Next day, passion—well, that was not exactly the right word—but what was? Infatuation? Scarcely even that. An uncommon interest in, plus a great desire for, an uncommonly comely young woman who also spoke his own language with familiar, or familiar enough accents—oh, well—Hell!—whatever the word was, whatever his own state of mind had been, next morning had given way to something more like common sense. Common sense, then, told him that if the young woman (vaguely he amended this to the young women) had intended to come to St. Michael of the Mountains to stay at a hotel . . . or wherever it was, which they thought might take a reservation . . . had even considered writing for the reservation, well, they had not intended to come here at once. In other words: enthusiasm (that was the word! . . . damn it . . .) enthusiasm had made him arrive early.
So, since he was already there, he might as well relax and enjoy it.
—He was already where?
Filiberto Marín plunged his hands into the river and was noisily splashing water onto his soapy face. Jack paused in the act of doing the same thing for himself, waited till his host had become a trifle less audible—how the man could snort!—"Don Fili, what is the name of this place?"
Don Fili beamed at him, reached for the towel. "These place?" He waved his broad hand to include the broad river and the broad clearing, with its scattered fields and cabins. "These place, Jock, se llame Pahrot Bend. You like reside here? Tell me, just. I build you house." He buried his face in his towel. Jack had no doubt that the man meant exactly what he said, gave another look around to see what was being so openhandedly—and openheartedly—offered him; this time he looked across to the other bank. Great boles of trees: Immense! Immense! The eye grew lost and dizzy gazing upward toward the lofty, distant crowns. Suddenly a flock of parrots, yellowheads, flew shrieking round and round; then vanished.
Was it-some kind of an omen? Any kind of an omen? To live here would not be to live just anywhere. He thought of the piss-soaked bogs which made up too large a part of the slums of King Town, wondered how anybody could live there when anybody could live here. But here was simply too far from the sea, and it was to live upon the sunwarm sea that he had come to this small country, so far from his vast own one. Still . . . might not be such a bad idea . . . well, not to live here all the time. But . . . a smaller version of the not-very-large cabins of the hamlet . . . a sort of country home . . . as it were . . . ha-ha . . . well, why not? Something to think about . . . anyway.
