Watson, Ian - Novel 16 (18 page)

 
          
‘But
this is all nonsense. It’s still the morning-time, now; and in a million years
it will be the morning of the planet, still. And in a million more. Even the
early afternoon will be unimaginably different - and might be inhabited
gloriously by creatures which are only a few inches long nowadays: voles,
shrews. Or by dogs that walk erect. Or by birds. Or by creatures we can’t even
imagine, because their ancestors haven’t been born yet. . .

 
          
‘Myself,
I rather favour shrews! They’re so like the tiny furry creatures scuttling and
hiding on the forest floor of tree-ferns and cycads while the thunder-lizards
stamped by, to their deaths. But this is mere prejudice: a wish to repeat the
same old story one more time.

 
          
‘Who
can ever
feel
time? Who can really
sense its vast arcades? Ah, but we have performed a clever conjuring trick!’

 
          
He
belched and brought up some of the sea-dark wine, which the woman wiped away.

 
          
‘The
ancient world is obviously older than our own. It is an old man, to our brash
youth - even if we live longer than anyone lived in those days. It is the
evening to our morning-time, because it is ancient.

 
          
‘So
by re-creating it - by reviving the dawn of civilization, which is now dust -
we take a giant leap into the afternoon of life, and even perhaps into the
evening, in our psyche. So we reach beyond the callow early morning of time -
to other, later hours of the future . . .’

 
          
A
scribe took all this down, scratching quickly with a stylus. Why copy down his
words, if there was a microphone listening, a hidden camera watching? Surely in
the king’s room, if anywhere, there ought to be. How could any team of
observers cope without the latest semi-aware, fuzzy-logic computer to screen
the flood of input?

 
          
Perhaps,
in its supremely arbitrary yet wholehearted adoption of ancient, alien
customs,
Babylon
had become the first self-aware
polis
in the history of the world:
self-aware beyond time and space. As nowhere else. A communal brain. Maybe
Babylon itself was the computer, built of human beings. Its memory chips were
clay tablets and waxed boards.

 
          
Alexander
slumped further back into his pillows, exhausted, drained. He closed his eyes;
Alex saw that there was kohl on his eyelids. The chamberlain plucked at Alex’s
sleeve; the audience was at an end.

 
          
Alex
stood his ground. He had said next to nothing himself. He wanted to babble, to
throw himself on his majesty’s mercy.

 
          
‘King
Alexander!’ he called; and the chamberlain’s pulling became more insistent.
‘Pardon, Your Majesty, but you asked me a question.’

 
          
An
eyelid opened. ‘And you answered it.’

 
          
‘I
have something else to tell you!’ But which tale should he tell? The tale of
the tape? The tale of Thessany? The tale of Deborah, Shazar, and Marduk? They
were all really one tale but at the same time the three strands could be
separated, rewoven to better effect. And Alexander’s men did not use torturers
to plumb the truth, only logicians ... He felt out of his depth. Yet there was
nothing dishonourable about reporting his discovery. He might be rewarded. With
what? With a purse of coins? With Deborah’s hand? No; with the truth . . .

 
          
‘Your
Majesty, I found a scroll made by
tekhne
of the future.’

 
          
The
eye shut again, but the rouged lips moved once more: ‘Another omen book? Tell
Aristander about it, not me.
I am
the
omen book of Babylon; Apollo

 
          
Prophetes.’

           
The chamberlain wrenched Alex down
upon the carpet. ‘Bad boy,’ he whispered.

 
          
As
Alex backed out of the room on hands and knees, cheeks hot, his brain burbled
to itself.

 
          
*
* *

 
 
          
The
chamberlain snapped his fingers at the escort. ‘To Aristander, at the double!’

           
Along another corridor they
hastened, through the reek of scent and myrrh, past a dozen doors; halted at
the thirteenth.

 
          
The
chamberlain’s knock was answered by a tall, skinny Greek with a long drooping
nose like the proboscis of a tapir. He was about fifty years old, cleanshaven,
his hair looping into ringlets down upon his nape. Around his brow he wore a
ribbon woven of silver thread. His body was wrapped in a gown of mauve wool.

 
          
A
drop of liquid appeared at the end of his nose. He wiped this on his sleeve,
but another drop would well out presently. The man had a cold, or perhaps his
nose was like some stalactite which grew longer over the years as liquid
dripped out of him, depositing sweat- salts to dry.

 
          
The
chamberlain explained; Aristander admitted him and Alex, and the guards.

 
          
Tables,
couches, stools, shelves, much of the floor and half of the bed were piled deep
in waxed boards and papyrus scrolls. Charts papered the walls, showing strange
geometries annotated in tiny spidery red ink. A water-clock stood in one
corner, a sundial by the window, and there were other contrivances of bronze
and glass with toothed wheels and discs and gears.

 
          
‘A
scroll made by
tekhne
of the future,
eh?’ Aristander wiped his nose, then tugged on his ringlets. ‘Describe all the
circumstances!’

 
          
‘Yes
. . . but who are you, sir?’ asked Alex.

 
          
‘Silly
boy,’ said the chamberlain. ‘Lord Aristander is Court Futurologist.’

 
          
‘I
am indeed. And time runs on.’

           
Alex sniggered. ‘I thought time
stood still in Babylon.’

 
          
‘My
time runs on. As does the king’s.’

 
          
‘When
he dies, will another Alexander be appointed?’

 
          
Aristander
slapped Alex stingingly across the cheek. ‘Kindly get to the point.’

 
          
Alex
recoiled - and felt the point of a spear in his back. ‘I. . . I’m sorry. May I
speak of things which are not of Babylon?’

 
          
‘You
have permission.’ Aristander glanced past him at the two guards. ‘You men shall
repeat nothing, on pain of being deafened with hot needles.’

 
          
‘Well,
it’s like this,’ began Alex; and some of his story tumbled out. . .

 
          
After
astute questioning by Aristander had elicited a good deal more of his story -
the man had a nose for the last drop of juice - the futurologist smiled thinly.

 
          
‘I
think we shall drink some wine,’ he said. Sweeping papyrus scrolls aside, he
found a jug and three glazed cups; filled all three.

 
          
‘What
do you make of this?’ he asked the chamberlain.

 
          
The
chamberlain slaked his thirst as though it was he who had done all the talking.

 
          
‘A
conspiracy,’ he replied. ‘That’s what. On the one hand, a prankish conspiracy.
And secondly, a deep conspiracy - though I hardly perceive its features yet! -
with this foolish boy located in the middle: a guileful innocent, of
questionable psyche.’

 
          
Alex
felt himself flush. Callow, that’s what he was; still as callow as the boy whom
Mitch had tried to lick into shape as a survivor, none too effectively.

 
          
Yet
what are men, but grown-up boys? Momentarily Alex perceived the chamberlain and
Aristander simply as enlarged, time-worn boys. Briefly he saw lurking in their
flesh the boys they had once been. In the absence of a mirror - other than
certain polished glass discs incorporated into Aristander’s futurological orrery,
or whatever it was - he did not, however, see himself.

 
          
‘Precisely
my sentiment,’ agreed Aristander. ‘The deep conspiracy may be nothing else than
imagination. But we must not ignore a clear omen.’

 
          
‘What
omen?’

 
          
‘The
omen of this scroll falling at the feet of a new Alexander - one who bears the
name of Winter, the season of death! Our king is the ripe full sun. What could
eclipse his city, but a winter of the world?’

 
          
‘Ah!’

 
          
‘If
you’ll excuse me,’ said Alex, ‘my name seems a flimsy reason for believing me.’

 
          
Aristander
shook his head vigorously. ‘It isn’t a reason. It’s a
pretext
for believing you - an excuse. Your story fits in with
various projections I’ve made lately. It defines these, clarifies them. Your
story allows me to choose one option out of several to test the water of the
future and spy a meaningful picture reflected there. Your visit here is rather
more substantive than, say, a flight of seven crows alighting on the king’s
windowsill and shitting there. But as an omen • it is similar. The skill in
reading omens lies in knowing how to
apply
them.’

 
          
‘Would
you have ignored my story if my name had been - let’s see - Philip Spring?’

 
          
‘What,
when the father of our king was Philip? And when a spring rises from secret
places hidden underground?’

 
          
‘Can’t
win, can I?’

 
          
‘I
don’t know about that. We can certainly make use of a guileful innocent. People
notice the naivety rather than the guile. Alex, you will hasten to become a
citizen of Babylon - now, today! Where else but in Babel is the
tekhne
for reading such a scroll? Where
else are the magi who master all means of communication? That hairdresser
person will sneak the scroll into Babel to have it interpreted. You’ll be
shadowed by some sturdy ruffians, who’ll report to me.’

 
          
The
long nose drooped towards Alex as if to anoint him with the last unwiped drop
of chrism.

 
          
‘Tell
me one thing, will you, Aristander? What happens to Mrs Marduk after her year
of glory?’

 
          
‘She
becomes a priestess in the Underworld. In other words, she helps tend Babylon’s
computer.’

 
          
‘Its what?’

           
‘Computer. How do you suppose you
learn Babylonian? By magic?’

 
          
Alex
cackled hilariously. Deborah had travelled thousands of miles and thousands of
years back in time to escape from being a mundane computer operator. Oh, what
a fate worse than death! Death, in the guise of some ornate drugged sacrifice,
she might even have accepted - come crazily to terms with. But to be a computer
slave for the rest of her Babylonian career: oh, delicious nemesis! She would wish
to escape
that.

 
          
Alex
hooted.

 
          
‘Of
questionable psyche!’ The chamberlain clapped him jovially on the back.

 
          
In
which Alex marches right up to the top
 
of the hill, then finds poorly paid
 
employment down at the bloody bottom

 
          
Two
ruffians in mufti robes trailed discreetly behind Alex as he headed at last
into the Esagila quarter, approaching Babel. Farewell to Kamberchanian’s hotel
bill. Farewell to life as a Greek.

 
          
Babel
Tower lofted itself, expanding space, sucking him inward. Here was the tallest
of all ziggurats, a skyscraper amongst ziggurats; though since the sky was a
cloudless desert blue, no white scrape-marks were visible.

 
          
A
single balustraded ramp wound upward, round and round. This was wide enough for
several donkey carts to pass one another, as many indeed were doing. If unwound
into a ribbon the spiral of the ramp would reach right across the city, perhaps
far out into the countryside beyond.

 
          
The
walk up to the top would take at least an hour or two; and the top was where he
must present himself for initiation. He wasn’t sure whether it was possible to
take vertical short cuts. At ramp level, arched doorways opened into the walls
of each tier. Above these arches were two further storeys of windows, so there
must be internal stairways. But perhaps the stairways of one curve did not lead
all the way up to the curve above . . .

 
          
A
while later he decided that for him there should be no short cuts. This climb,
after all, was an approach to initiation; designed as such. It seemed as
necessary to tread each circuit of the ramp as, in a later age, it would be for
Christ to touch base at each station of the cross. A sudden conjuring of the
cross into a ladder to ascend Golgotha more rapidly wouldn’t be appropriate.

 
          
He
leaned on the parapet of the third tier to catch his breath. A hundred cubits
down-ramp he spotted his two ruffians hunker by the inner wall and begin to
roll dice.

 
          
People
and produce and products flowed by. Produce, up. Products, down. The city and
countryside below supplied food and raw materials. Traders conveyed these
upward, exchanging goods for other goods, mediating between levels. The tower
was a giant, wide Archimedean screw with many holes of doorways in it, into
which goods and materials popped, out of which equivalent goods were squeezed
so that a cartload of cabbages starting out from the base would have
transmuted into a load of sweetmeats, scrolls, wire puzzles, perfumes, scarves
by the time it reached the summit; though some cabbages had to continue all the
way to the top, otherwise the Olympians up there would get scurvy.

 
          
By
and large, sub-cultures obeyed their own boundaries, keeping within language
frontiers. Already he had climbed through a succession of language villages
comprising - benefit of hindsight! - Sumerian, Akkadian, Assyrian, Hurrian,
Hittite, Phoenician, Aramaic.

 
          
As
he stared down at those bustling quadrants spreading out below, a disconcerting
reversal of vision occurred. It seemed as though Babel was growing fatter, not
thinner, the higher he ascended. Instead of tapering inward, Babel Tower was
leaning outward across Babylon, Pisa-like but much vaster, threatening to
crush the city.

           
He staggered back, and crashed into
someone. A hand steadied him.

 
          
‘Oh
dear me - vertigo!’

 
          
It
was Gupta. (And the two ruffians had slipped quickly - though inconspicuously -
closer.)

 
          
‘What
are you doing here, Gupta?’

 
          
‘Obviously
I must be chasing my shekel and a half, ha ha! No, in fact I decided my future
business plans all of a sudden. So I must become a citizen. My month is
two-thirds gone. Why squander more of my nest egg on hotels when I could be
earning income? I suppose you had a similar idea; minus the nest egg.’

 
          
Alex
thought of making a hand signal to reassure his ruffians. But Gupta would be
bound to notice. In any case, to convey that the Indian wasn’t about to toss
him over the parapet - that Alex was actually in the man’s debt, yet
nevertheless Gupta ought to be viewed with caution - would have required very
complicated covert waggling of the fingers. Alex compromised by scratching
his head.

 
          
‘What
sort of business plans?’ he asked.

 
          
‘Ha
ha, does a businessman, however humble, spill all his secrets, even to a
friend? Let me merely say that it has something to do with conjuring, and with
the fascinating spectacle we witnessed the other night. Ah, but you missed the
best part. I’m forgetting, most crassly.’

 
          
‘Don’t
tell me you’re going into partnershhip with Kamberchanian!’

 
          
‘How
did you guess?’

 
          
‘Well,
you couldn’t afford to open a strip show on your own - unless you’re wealthier
than you admit.’ ‘You have caught me. I confess. I shall be artistic director
of old Kamber’s other enterprise.’

           
‘You’ll copy the House of the Veil?
You’ll train metaphysical strippers?’

           
‘Copy?
Transcend
, my friend. There’ll be a whole new dimension. It’s the
naked truth, ha ha. Let’s climb on upward together. If you suffer another bout
of dizziness, do take my arm. I shall not misinterpret.’

 
          
As
it happened, Indians resided around the next quadrant of the ramp, which was
rich with smells of stewing curries and tandoori marinades.

 
          
‘Time
for afternoon tiffin! I spy samosas.’ Gupta hauled Alex towards a food stall;
gestured and gabbled in Greek.

 
          
‘You
don’t need to speak Greek here for my benefit.’ ‘My dear fellow, they are
speaking Sanskrit here. Whilst I am of course acquainted with our great Indian
classics, I’m not exactly fluent on a daily basis!’

           
After a snack of spicy lamb samosas
cooled with dollops of mint yoghurt they carried on, tarrying frequently out of
curiosity, of which Gupta possessed an insatiable store. Thus they passed
through Little Egypt, Little Armenia, Little Italia, Little Scythia, and Little
China (Warring States vintage). At no stage did Alex breathe a word about his
visit to the king.

 
          
It
was on the seventh tier of Babel that Gupta exclaimed, ‘Look! Isn’t that our
friend Deborah ahead?’

 
          
By
now the afternoon was nearly over; evening drew close. They had tarried indeed.
In the west beyond farms, beyond desert, the sun had sunk till it was a
quivering bag of molten gold balancing momentarily on the horizon with a few
black strings of cloud cobwebbing it. The light gilded Deborah, who was dressed
in a yellow linen gown. Escorting her were two magi wearing cone hats.

 
          
‘She
must have come from inside,’ said Gupta, ‘using a faster route.’

 
          
‘Deb-or-ah!
Hey, Deb!’

 
          
Many
Japanese faces stared at bellowing Alex; though no one in this sector was
speaking Japanese. In this endless, ever-recurring year of 323
b.c.
the Kingdom of Yamato hadn’t quite
got its act together. The Japanese people had still been Korean immigrants
amidst the hairy native Ainu. So Japan was part of China, from which its
literature was yet to come. The Japanese on Babel spoke the Chinese of Confucius.

 
          
‘Deb!
Hey!’ Alex broke into a jinking run.

 
          
‘Wait
for me!’ Gupta dodged along behind, amidst apologies and imprecations.

 
          
‘Deb!’

 
          
This
time she heard, and looked. So did her magi. Deborah hesitated, waved; but the
magi hustled her aside through the nearest doorway.

 
          
Arriving
at the same doorway only moments later, Alex entered a tall hall where several
mahjong games were in progress. A number of lamps already burned. Two further
archways, curtained with silk, led onward; but neither curtain looked any more
perturbed than the other. A wooden stairway climbed to a gallery - several
open doors led off - and the stairs continued to a floor above. Too little time
for Deborah and magi to have reached the upper floor! They had either gone
through one of the curtained arches, or used a mezzanine door.

 
          
‘Sirs!’
he appealed. Disconcerted mahjong players stared at him. ‘The woman and the
magi: which way?’

 
          
No
one answered, though the players twittered to one another.

 
          
He
ran to one archway, parted silk, saw a further dusky hall with sleeping pallets
on the floor - and two more curtained archways leading deeper into Babel.

 
          
He
darted to the other arch; beyond the curtain a different hall was stacked with
sacks of rice. Again, two more distant archways. No fleeing figures.

           
He dashed to the stairs - colliding
with Gupta, spinning him round - and mounted two at a time.

 
          
The
first doorway led to a sunset-lit room of screens painted with roses, herons
and willows; the second, to a brightly lamplit bedroom. A naked Asian woman,
astride a stool, combing waves of black hair, dropped her comb, clapped a hand
to her mouth. He retreated.

 
          
The
third, dingy room was empty save for the shadow of a huge vase upon a lacquer
stand.

 
          
He
climbed the next flight of stairs. At the top was another hall, less extensive
than the halls below, amber-lit by the last of the sun. Bottles, drums and jars
filled shelves and racks: powders, tinctures, ointments, pickled snakes,
ginseng roots, white grass, body organs of animals. Two more archways, more
stairs. He chose the stairs and ended up in a dark, hot, musty attic where he
soon made out hundreds of strings of wizened mushrooms hanging from the eaves
to the floor. No apparent exit, other than the door he had entered by.

 
          
He
went back down to the hall of medicine. From the gallery below he heard angry
singsong voices - and Gupta arguing placatingly in Greek.

 
          
Looking
down, he saw that the younger mahjong players had pursued the intruders aloft.
One man flourished an ornate damascened cleaver. Further below, game boards
were abandoned and angry Chinese (or Japanese) milled about.

 
          
‘Come
down quickly, Alex!' cried Gupta.

 
          
Reluctantly
Alex obeyed. As soon as he was within reach of Gupta, the Indian yanked him
bodily the last few steps and began to belabour him about the head and
shoulders, cuffing and smacking.

 
          
‘Oh,
idiot son!’ the Indian shouted. ‘Foolish curse of my life! Imbecile shame of my
ancestors!’

 
          
Whilst
vigorously punishing Alex, somehow Gupta also managed to guide him downstairs
and eventually out of the mahjong hall entirely. Since aggrieved Chinese
spilled after them, Gupta frogmarched Alex up the ramp, butting and kneeing him
in the behind till they were well clear.

 
          
Then
Gupta stopped. ‘There, I have protected you. Now you are my son. I take
responsibility/

 
          
The
gathering dusk was relieved by oil lamps twinkling outside a good few
doorways. The day’s commercial traffic had ended - no more donkey carts ambled
by - but people were starting to wander abroad to amuse themselves. Alex
noticed his pair of ruffians hiding in the shadow of a nearby wall-buttress.
Why the hell hadn’t they intervened? Exasperatedly, he shook his head in
chastisement.