Wolfe, Gene - The Best of Gene Wolfe

Half the village came, and the service went on for almost two hours. When it was over I was able to get Rob alone. I said if he would drive us into Kololahi I would buy our Sunday dinner. (He has a Jeep.) He was nice, but no—too far and the bad roads. I told him I had personal troubles I wanted his advice on, and he said, “Why don’t we go to your place, Baden, and have a talk? I’d invite you for lemonade, but they’d be after me every minute.”

So we walked back. It was hotter than hell, and this time I tried not to look. I got cold Cokes out of my rusty little fridge, and we sat on the porch (Rob calls it the veranda) and fanned ourselves. He knew I felt bad about not being able to do anything for these people, and urged patience. My chance would come.

I said, “I’ve given up on that, Reverend.”

(That was when he told me to call him Rob. His first name is Mervyn.) “Never give up, Baden. Never.” He looked so serious I almost laughed.

“All right, I’ll keep my eyes open, and maybe someday the Agency will send me someplace where I’m needed.”

“Back to Uganda?”

I explained that the A.O.A.A. almost never sends anyone to the same area twice. “That wasn’t really what I wanted to talk to you about. It’s my personal life. Well, really two things, but that’s one of them. I’d like to get back together with my ex-wife. You’re going to advise me to forget it, because I’m here and she’s in Chicago, but I can send e-mail, and I’d like to put the bitterness behind us.”

“Were there children? Sorry, Baden. I didn’t intend it to hurt.”

I explained how Mary had wanted them and I had not, and he gave me some advice. I have not e-mailed yet, but I will tonight after I write it out here.

“You’re afraid that you were hallucinating. Did you feel feverish?” He got out his thermometer and took my temperature, which was nearly normal. “Let’s look at it logically, Baden. This island is a hundred miles long and about thirty miles at the widest point. There are eight villages I know of. The population of Kololahi is over twelve hundred.”

I said I understood all that.

“Twice a week, the plane from Cairns brings new tourists.”

“Who almost never go five miles from Kololahi.”

“Almost never, Baden. Not never. You say it wasn’t one of the villagers. All right, I accept that. Was it me?”

“Of course not.”

“Then it was someone from outside the village, someone from another village, from Kololahi, or a tourist. Why shake your head?”

I told him.

“I doubt there’s a leprosarium nearer than the Marshalls. Anyway, I don’t know of one closer. Unless you saw something else, some other sign of the disease, I doubt that this little man you saw had leprosy. It’s a lot more likely that you saw a tourist with pasty white skin greased with sun blocker. As for his disappearing, the explanation seems pretty obvious. He dived off the rocks into the bay.”

“There wasn’t anybody there. I looked.”

“There wasn’t anybody there you saw, you mean. He would have been up to his neck in water, and the sun was glaring on the water, wasn’t it?”

“I suppose so.”

“It must have been. The weather’s been clear.” Rob drained his Coke and pushed it away. “As for his not leaving footprints, stop playing Sherlock Holmes. That’s harsh, I realize, but I say it for your own good. Footprints in soft sand are shapeless indentations at best.”

“I could see mine.”

“You knew where to look. Did you try to backtrack yourself? I thought not. May I ask a few questions? When you saw him, did you think he was real?”

“Yes, absolutely. Would you like another one? Or something to eat?”

“No, thanks. When was the last time you had an attack?”

“A bad one? About six weeks.”

“How about a not-bad one?”

“Last night, but it didn’t amount to much. Two hours of chills, and it went away.”

“That must have been a relief. No, I see it wasn’t. Baden, the next time you have an attack, severe or not, I want you to come and see me. Understand?”

I promised.

T

his is Bad. I still love you. That’s all I have to say, but I want to say it. I was wrong, and I know it. I hope you’ve forgiven me . And sign off.

4

Feb. Saw him again last night, and he has pointed teeth. I was shaking under the netting, and he looked through the window and smiled. Told Rob, and said I read somewhere that cannibals used to file their teeth. I know these people were cannibals three or four generations back, and I asked if they had done it. He thinks not but will ask the king.

I

have been very ill, Mary, but I feel better now. It is evening here, and I am going to bed. I love you. Good night, I love you . Sign off.

5

Feb. Two men with spears came to take me to the king. I asked if I was under arrest, and they laughed. No ha, ha, ha from His Majesty this time, though. He was in the big house, but he came out and we went some distance among hardwoods the size of office buildings smothered in flowering vines, stopping in a circle of stones: the king, the men with spears, and an old man with a drum. The men with spears built a fire, and the drum made soft sounds like waves while the king made a speech or recited a poem, mocked all the while by invisible birds with eerie voices.

When the king was finished, he hung this piece of carved bone around my neck. While we were walking back to the village, he put his arm around me, which surprised me more than anything. He is bigger than a tackle in the NFL, and must weigh four hundred pounds. It felt like I was carrying a calf.

H

orrible, horrible dreams! Swimming in boiling blood. Too scared to sleep anymore. Logged on and tried to find something on dreams and what they mean. Stumbled onto a witch in L.A.—her home page, then the lady herself. (“I’ll get you and your little dog too!”) Actually, she seemed nice.

Got out the carved-bone thing the king gave me. Old, and probably ought to be in a museum, but I suppose I had better wear it as long as I stay here, at least when I go out. Suppose I were to offend him? He might sit on me! Seems to be a fish with pictures scratched into both sides. More fish, man in a hat, etc. Cord through the eye. Wish I had a magnifying glass.

6

Feb. Still haven’t gone back to bed, but my watch says Wednesday. Wrote a long e-mail, typing it in as it came to me. Told her where I am and what I’m doing, and begged her to respond. After that I went outside and swam naked in the moonlit sea. Tomorrow I want to look for the place where the king hung this fish charm on me. Back to bed.

M

orning, and beautiful. Why has it taken me so long to see what a beautiful place this is? (Maybe my heart just got back from Africa.) Palms swaying forever in the trade winds, and people like heroic bronze statues. How small, how stunted and pale, we have to look to them!

Took a real swim to get the screaming out of my ears. Will I laugh in a year when I see that I said my midnight swim made me understand these people better? Maybe I will. But it did. They have been swimming in the moon like that for hundreds of years.

* * *

E

-mail! God bless e-mail and whoever invented it! Just checked mine and found I had a message. Tried to guess who it might be. I wanted Mary, and was about certain it would be from the witch, from Annys. Read the name and it was Julius R. Christmas . Pops! Mary’s Pops! Got up and ran around the room, so excited I could not read it. Now I have printed it out, and I am going to copy it here.

She went to Uganda looking for you, Bad. Coming back tomorrow, Kennedy, AA 47 from Heathrow. I’ll tell her where you are. Watch out for those hula-hula girls.