Salman Rushdie - Grimus

– Just a moment, said Nicholas Deggle. How on earth are we to choose these people?

It was at this point that Grimus reached into a pocket of the greatcoat he always wore on his Travels and produced the Watercrystal.

– With this, he said, and with the Rose correctly adjusted, we can see the lives of those we Conceptualize, according to the techniques of Dota. Simply we fix our thoughts upon the selected type of recipient and they appear here like a TV picture. Then with a further adjustment of the Rose we go to them.

– Playing God, said Deggle. Dangerous, don’t you think?

– Would you rather we handed our knowledge to the authorities? snapped Grimus. His voice was filled with a bitterness and hatred for authority that must spring from some awful experience in his past, before he became Grimus the birdman. (We never knew his true name.) -Would you rather be locked up in an insane asylum? Or watch as Governments used our gift to make weapons and war? We do it ourselves or not at all. I say only this: to allow knowledge of this magnitude to go unused is more than a crime. It is a sin.

Liv skipped several pages. She made great show of turning to the correct place, though she never glanced at the book in her hand as she spoke.

We have been building a world. Impossible to say whether we found the island or made it. I incline to the latter, Grimus to the former. He holds that Conceptual Technology merely reveals existences which mirror your concepts. I am not so sure. However, we have made the island and it is a paradise, fertile, lush and green. Grimus has named it. Kâf Island. The mountain is Kâf Mountain. But since neither Deggle nor I are masters either of the glottal-stop or of the flat Arabic vowel, I’m afraid we bastardize the name to Calf. Fatted? Golden? Time will tell.

As for its population: Grimus now spends his entire time at the Watercrystal. He has made a discovery: each life he sees there comes from a fractionally different dimension, exists in a slightly different potential present … his phrase. Will there be a problem in assimilating immigrants from these different planets in the one society? Grimus is cheerfully optimistic. The differences are too minute to matter, he says. I trust he is right.

Liv moved on once more.

Calf Island, Day One .

Moonday January 1 .

The date is arbitrary. One may as well begin at a beginning. We are all on Calf Island now, at the town called simply K. Grimus has been clever in arranging this beginning: by astute use of the Rose he has engineered that whoever wishes to come to Calf Island, (he has kept a careful check on all the Recipients) whenever they do so in their own lives and dimensions, they are brought to K on the same day. -It is a time-equation process, says Grimus, and I believe him. He says there has been only one misjudgement.

The philosopher Ignatius Gribb and his wife Elfrida’s journey has been mistimed; they will not be here for some time yet.

There is an air of joy in K today, as the community meets itself, a sense of paradise. We are the immortals and this is our Olympus. It was a lucky day when I took the job in the pets’ graveyard.

Another jump. This time there was a tension in Liv’s voice that had not been there before.

Freyday January 26th .

Today’s is a tale of two women. For my part, it is a happy tale.

Liv Sylwan is a whore. A very exceptional whore. (Curious, by the way, how many whores chose Calf Island. It must be a very fulfilling job.) Liv rejoices in being beautiful and enjoys working with her body. She is without shame. She is also gifted with command. The brothel became hers instantly. Jocasta, who lies second to her, so to speak, was the only real opposition. I like Jocasta. But Liv is… well, Liv is.

I must confess that until the Rose I had never been what you might term a sexual giant. A pigmy would be more accurate for all my bulk. I didn’t blame the ladies, dear sweet bebummed betitted things. Who would want to be squashed under me? The Rose gave me confidence. I journeyed to new worlds where fat men were as much in demand as Rubens ladies. The terror of the titties, I. Virgil Jones, a sex-symbol! Remarkable.

I cannot quite believe that Liv Sylwan wants me. She said she did, though, and I must not call her a liar. So she does. But why? In heaven’s name, why? She says she will give up her work to keep house for Deggle and Grimus and myself-I cannot understand it. But I will not look the gift horse in the mouth. It is a happy day, when beautiful women want ugly men simply because they like them.

We are going to be married. Grimus was apparently a monk once, in his old days, and he will marry us according to the rites of our church, though I am not terribly godly. Ceremonies are fun.

As for Grimus… he’s an odd bird, to coin a phrase. I’ve never been one for judging the attractiveness of men, so I’d have said Nicholas Deggle was the best-looking of the three of us. Apparently not. Grimus is the one they all covet, the favourite of the whores (except, of course, my own Liv), the darling of farmer’s wife and Russian countess alike. The trouble is he shows no interest in them. It’s that monkish background. Trained to celibacy. Perhaps that’s the attraction. He’s hard to get.

The Axona Indian woman called Bird-Dog is the most persistent. As plain a girl as You’ll see, she dogs his footsteps as her name suggests she would. He has no time for her, though she fawns on him. She probably sees him as some kind of shaman, and worships him, poor simple child. She’ll tire of it.

Interesting fact arising from Bird-Dog’s presence here. Grimus became much taken once with the notion of finding his own double. -Logically, he said, in an infinite universe, there must be a precise duplicate of myself. That doesn’t interest me. What I’m after is a certain similarity. A likeness to me which is also entirely alien.

He was very pleased when the Axona Plateau loomed up in the Watercrystal. It hasn’t worked out as he hoped, though. Bird-Dog’s brother hasn’t chosen Calf Island yet. Perhaps he will, perhaps he won’t.

Perhaps it wasn’t really Grimus’ hope that he would. One can never be entirely sure with him.

Liv turned several pages, jerkily.

Thorsday April 5th

It’s all going wrong. I can feel it. The atmosphere of joy has gone. If that goes then it is no longer worth while. Though Grimus disagrees. - It is a Great Experiment, he says. It cannot fail . I am not sure that the force of his will can hold us together. Forever is such a long time.

Besides: the three of us never ran any suitability tests on ourselves. We took it for granted we deserved immortality, and then took it for granted that Calf Island was the place for us. We may have been entirely wrong.

The suicides are doing it. That’s what it is. Grimus is furious about them. They should never have come, he says. They should have drunk their blue bottles in peace, somewhere else. Not killed themselves here. Deggle says it’s like marriage, agreeing to come to Calf Island. A lot of people will inevitably want a divorce no matter how much in love they were at the time.

The suicides are turning people against us and Deggle is on their side. Is he right? No, he must be wrong. Everyone made a free choice. It’s not our fault.

Like a marriage … I was blind, of course. Liv doesn’t love me. I know that. I knew it then. I thought she liked me, though.

Liv loves power. She loves to be near the centre of power. She loves to be near Grimus. Through me, she is. There’s an end to it. An end to paradise. We do not make love. She talks to Grimus incessantly.