Edward Whittemore - Jerusalem Poker

Oh no. That is, I was emerging from the caverns but there was no one around at all, unfortunately for me.

You remember how low the ceiling is on the stairway up from the grotto? Well my torch had gone out and it was night and I kept banging my head with every step I took. Finally I became so angry I butted the ceiling and got stuck.

Stuck?

My helmet did, O'Banion, in a cleft between two rocks in the ceiling. And then I lost my footing and there I was hanging in mid-air by my helmet. I felt like the top of my head was coming off.

Awful, I know the feeling. I have it some mornings myself. How did you escape?

I didn't. I had to hang there the rest of the night. The next day a group of pilgrims came along at last and freed me by pulling on my legs, which was terrible. Then I really felt as if the top of my head was coming off.

Haj Harun stirred uneasily.

O'Donnell?

Yes?

O'Driscoll?

Still here as best I can be.

You know all at once my mind seems to be a perfect blank.

Why?

I can't imagine. I'll have to think about it

Good.

But that won't help, will it, if my mind's a perfect blank to begin with? Oh dear, I just seem to be going around in circles today.

Suddenly Haj Harun laughed.

I know why it is. It's because we're here. This is a very special place to me.

The old man chuckled and put his helmet back on his head. He drifted over to the church where a part of the wall attracted his attention. He examined himself carefully in a small nonexistent mirror, then stepped back to examine himself again in a full-length, nonexistent mirror. All the while he was humming and smiling and raising and lowering his eyebrows.

Seems unusually concerned with his appearance, thought Joe.

O'Brien?

Yes?

I've never seen a helmet with more dents in it than mine, and isn't that just like history? Always new blows to the head? Inevitable blows it would seem?

Seems so, yes it does.

But there are other moments in life, O'Connor, truly unforgettable moments. Here in this garden, for example, in my youth.

Your youth? A journey, I'd say. How far back are we going?

To the Persian occupation. Oh those were the days, you can't imagine.

Haj Harun laughed softly.

Such long lazy afternoons, O'Dair. I ate garlic incessantly during the Persian occupation and always wore my leather bracelet, the one with the right testicle of a donkey inside it.

Do you say that. Why these customs?

To increase my sexual powers.

Ah.

Yes. And when it was necessary I induced abortions through the mouth.

By way of, you mean?

No, out of. That could still be done then.

I see.

And I had to do it frequently because I was very active with the ladies. Feverish days, O'Casey, when the Persians were here.

Feverish?

Sex. Just sex and more sex. Rampant sex. I was insatiable.

Groin fever in other words. Couldn't get enough of it?

No, never. Not until the princess finally accepted me as her lover. I even remember the year. It was 454

B.C.

True? Garlic and a donkey's right one doing the job in 454 B.C.? That strikes me as uncommonly precise dating for you. Generally an era is as close as we get.

But I'm not in error on this one. My experiences that year were wholly unique. Let me show you where it started.

Joe followed him across the garden. Haj Harun kept stopping to admire flowers, referring to each one as a Solomon's-seal.

How can that be? asked Joe. They're all different. Don't they have different names?

Not here. Here every flower is a Solomon's-seal. Do you see that pool, O'Nolan?

Oh nullify me, I do.

Well that's where I met her, right there. And she was holding a Solomon's-seal in her hand.

Who?

The princess.

Where's the sun gone? said Joe. Why is it looking like rain?

Joe sat beside the pool rolling a cigarette while Haj Harun roamed around the edge of the water, absent-mindedly straying into the mud. Every so often he paused and shouted.

Right here, O'Ryan. The pool was also called Bethesda then, did you know that?

O'Ryan am I now, muttered Joe. A constellation prize if that's any help when Jerusalem time is out of control. Daft heavens above and a daft gathering of the clans below in the Holy City, everybody's Holy City.

He leaned back against the bank and closed his eyes.

It smelled like rain but it was a good time for a nap all the same. Late game last night persuading a patriarch from Aleppo to see through his watery eyes. And too much poteen for sure so forty winks, why not

The cigarette fell out of his hand. His head rested on the grass. From far away a faint wail came to him in his sleep.

I'm sinking, O'Meara. Sinking.

And so he is, thought Joe, and so are we all. Hour by hour and day by day, that's what's happening to us.

O'Boyle, clay feet, wailed the voice, louder now and much closer.

That's it all right, thought Joe. That's what we have and none other.

O'Halloran, please

A voice of desperation? Joe opened his eyes and saw Haj Harun stranded in the middle of the pool. The old man had wandered in to see his reflection in the water and gotten stuck in a mudhole. He was in up to his knees and unable to move. Joe scrambled around to find a pole and pulled the old man out.

A close call, whispered Haj Harun.

No it wasn't that bad, said Joe. The water's not very deep.

Not very deep? Two thousand four hundred years ago is not very deep?

Oh that's right, I was forgetting. Now just sit down here beside me where you'll be safe.

Haj Harun smiled and did so.

It's just as well, he whispered. I shouldn't have been over there shouting in the first place. It wouldn't do to have other people overhear. It might excite them too much. I mean sexual exploits like that are unheard of today.

All true.

Well, whispered Haj Harun, where shall I begin?

At the beginning I suppose. Right here by the pool where you met her.

All right, said Haj Harun proudly. And will you keep in mind that I was quite a different person in those days?

I will.

Not at all what you see today? Strong and energetic in my youth? At the peak of my sexual powers?

The very peak, yes.

Well then, I met this Persian princess here and she was so beautiful I immediately fell in love with her. I told her so and she was also taken with me. But first, she said, she wanted to be sure I could truly satisfy her. Of course I already had a great reputation in such matters but still she wanted to be sure, given the fact that she was a princess from Persia while I was just a youth in conquered Jerusalem.

Given. And so?

And so she said she would set three tasks for me to accomplish. The first task was to come to her castle on the next full moon and deflower eighty virgins from her court, in one night, without ejaculating.

Saints preserve us. You were at a peak in those days.

And that was only the first task of three. Are you still with me, O'MacCarthy?

I am in one guise or another, some as unheard of as the sexual adventures of your youth. Now please to proceed. How went this heroic effort?

As required. Fortified by garlic and wearing my leather bracelet and bursting with love for the princess, I did what was necessary.

The donkey's right one was there on the job, I can see that.

Indeed it was. And then the next morning the princess presented me with my second task. I was to spend one full month standing naked in her court with a full erection, and the ladies of the court were to come and go as they pleased in any state of undress, fondling me as they might as frequently as they might, while I was neither to ejaculate nor go limp in all that time. I was to begin this task, O'Gara, on the next full moon.