Robert Wilson - Julian Comstock - A Story of 22-nd Century America

“Don’t the Jews of Montreal understand your limitations?”

“They do, but they’re impatient with my apostasy. Properly so, it may be.” He shook his head. “I’m not one thing or the other, Adam. There’s no suitable faith for people like me.”

I told him not to feel sad, and that he was not the only person daunted by the complexities of religion, even under the generous rule of the Dominion of Jesus Christ. For instance, there was no congregation of the Church of Signs in Montreal , which meant I couldn’t marry Calyxa in the faith of my father (had I wanted to—I confess I did not). We had settled on an interdenominational Dominion marriage, to be performed by the local Dominion man who licensed dioceses and collected tithes on behalf of Colorado Springs. We would at least be married in a church, albeit a nominally Catholic one. The church charged fees for its use by those who confess to other faiths, and the going rate was steep, and it used up much of the money I had saved toward the purchase of a typewriter; but Calyxa was worth it, I thought.

Julian had also made friends in Montreal , and he used the time before the wedding to take his leave of them. These were the Philosophers and Aesthetes who gathered at the coffee-shop called Dorothy’s. Julian had not introduced me to any of them, and they seemed exactly as loose-limbed and pallid as Lymon Pugh had described them, when I saw them from a distance; but I was no judge of Philosophers. At least they did not parade around with unpatriotic signs, or get themselves locked up in military prison. [They were sometimes locked up for other reasons, Julian said; but he changed the subject when I asked him to explain.]

As for me, I spent my time with Calyxa. Part of this devotion was practical, since there were arrangements to be made and invitations to be delivered. But it was an indulgence, too; for we were at that stage of betrothal in which we craved each other’s company in all ways and at all hours. If we “anticipated our vows,” perhaps the reader can forgive us for our eagerness; and I’ll say no more on the subject, except to repeat that it was a very happy time for me.

Of course I wrote to my mother to announce the occasion, and to apologize for not being able to bring Calyxa to meet her, though I assured her I would do my best to make that happen, preferably sooner rather than later. Calyxa had no family except Job and Utty, who had a prior engagement—they were to be hanged on the day of the wedding—but all the Parmentierists would be there, and the staff of the Thirsty Boot, and assorted street musicians and sundry revolutionaries; and “my side of the aisle” would be full up with survivors of the Saguenay Campaign, and perhaps a few Philosophers, Jews, and Aesthetes, at the invitation of Sam and Julian.

In the end it was a wedding like any other—familiar enough in its trappings to subdue the need for description. In short: we were wed; we kissed; there were cheers; refreshments were served.

A carriage had been hired for our trip to the train station. It was not quite a “wedding carriage,” for Sam and Julian shared the transportation with us. All of us had purchased tickets for the New York Express, which was due to leave Montreal at sundown. I rode with my arm around Calyxa, and we cooed at each other, and uttered pleasant trivialities, while Sam and Julian blushed, or coughed into their hands, or made a point of staring out the curtained windows even though the city was dull in the fading light and decorated only with gray banners announcing BOIL ALL WATER or similar hygienic instructions.

There was one stop Calyxa insisted on, however, before we reached the train station, and that was the public square where the Army of the Laurentians conducted its hangings.

Job and Utty had already met their fate, at about the time Calyxa and I solemnized our vows. I suggested she might not want to sully the memory of the day by visiting a gallows; but she needed reassurance that her brothers were truly dead, she told me, and that they wouldn’t spring back to life at some inconvenient time in the future.

So I told the hired driver to stop where the hangings had taken place. It was the policy of the Army of the Laurentians to leave corpses dangling from the gallows until a day or two had passed, so the dead would serve as a useful advertisement of the wages of vice and rebellion. This custom had been but partially honored in the case of Job and Utty. Two ropes dangled from the elaborate scaffold, but only one was occupied. I asked a bystander about this, and the man explained that Utty Blake had been hanged first, but that the scaffold had been built too high, or the rope made too long, and at the critical moment Utty’s head had been “nipped off,” as the man put it, so that the body no longer depended from the rope, but slipped through at the neck and had to be hauled away in two pieces. Stains on the ground attested to the truth of this.

But Job was still “on duty.” He looked much smaller in death. His face was purple, and not pleasant to contemplate, though I had seen uglier corpses during my military career. A chill wind had come up, and it flapped the banners adorning the nearest buildings and turned Job’s corpse like a pendulum at the end of his mournfully creaking rope. Ponderous clouds swept through the darkening sky, and the mood of the place was altogether dour and unhappy.

Nevertheless Calyxa sprang from the wedding carriage energetically, and walked right up to the unkempt and frankly foul body of her brother. His bootless feet dangled at about the level of her shoulders.

I let her stand alone on that dusty, windy square, in contemplation of the ephemerality of life and all worldly things, for many long minutes. Then I joined her, and put a consoling arm around her waist.

“As awful as your brothers were,” I said, “this must be hard to endure.”

“Not very hard,” she whispered.

“Say your goodbyes, then, Calyxa—we have a train to catch.”

I was moved by her somber expression, which implied a soul less hardened than she liked to pretend; and I was even more moved when she found the Christian charity to utter a quick prayer for the soul of poor dead Job. [ “Passe mon bonjour au Diable quand tu le verras. ”]

Then we climbed back into the carriage, and I instructed the driver to take us on to the train station. The atmosphere had cooled somewhat, and there was no more post-nuptial cooing. Instead, Calyxa attempted to make conversation.

She didn’t know Sam or Julian very well just yet. In a sense she didn’t know them at all: despite the confidences we shared, I had avoided telling her that Julian was actually Julian Comstock, the President’s nephew, or that Sam had been the best friend of Julian’s murdered father. I had promised Sam and Julian that I wouldn’t mention these awkward truths, and I had been true to my promise.

But I had told her other things about my friends and my adventures with them. She looked squarely at Julian and said, “You like to tell Bible stories.”

Julian was uncomfortable—as he often was in the presence of women—and seemed not to know how to respond. He swallowed repeatedly, his Adam’s apple bobbing in his throat. “Ah, well… do I?”

“According to Adam. Bible stories of your own invention. Most of them blasphemous.”

“Perhaps Adam exaggerates.”

“Tell me one,” Calyxa said, as the carriage rattled down the gloomy, windy street, and a small rain began to fall. Her gaze drifted to the window of the carriage. “Tell me an Easter story, if you know one.”

I didn’t like the trend of this conversation. Julian’s apostasies were often shocking to the uninitiated, and I had hoped Calyxa would get to know him better before he trained the cannon of his Agnosticism on her at close range. But Julian liked a challenge; and I think he was charmed by Calyxa’s boldness and directness.