The Freedom Artist, page 17
Some rumours said that two members of the Hierarchy were chained by the neck to the cracked cubic stone. One was a man, the other a woman, and they were both naked. Fragments of the rumour said the Devil held a flaming torch in its left hand and that the Hierarchy members had long tails.
These were rumours swirling from the underworld. The rumours infected the world where people sleep and scream, where they live and wail. The rumours took wing like bats at night.
3
No one knew where the tower of the Hierarchy was. No one had seen the tower. It was only when the rumours began to circulate that anyone heard of the existence of the tower. They had no idea that the Hierarchy had anything to do with a tower.
But the tower standing on the peak of a lonely rock grew in the minds of the populace. Rumour said the tower was twenty-two storeys high. Other rumours said that it was merely composed of twenty-two layers of brick. All the rumours agreed that it had three windows. All the rumours also agreed that, due to an unusual atmospheric condition, it was always pitch black around the tower.
4
The most persistent rumour of all was of the arrival in the city of a strange boy. Some said they had seen him descend from the sky in a spacecraft. Others said they had seen a star fall from the sky and found this innocent boy with uncanny eyes where the star had fallen.
But the most probable of the rumours held that one day a boy dressed like a fool in a garment stitched with eight-pointed stars had arrived in the city. He had a dog at his heel and a knapsack with an open eye on his back. He caused havoc wherever he went. The nature of the havoc caused was never made clear.
Some said he caused havoc in the hearts of women. It was said that women who gazed on him fell in love with him instantly. Wherever he went people burst into joyful song. Some said his presence induced visions. There was much talk of spontaneous healing.
Strange rumours held that trees blossomed at his passing and flowers grew out of the ground on which he had trod. It was said he could appear and disappear at will. He was seen in several places at the same time.
People became curious and crowds gathered.
‘Have you seen him? Have you seen him?’ they cried.
They would rush to the nearest park. Then he was seen on a hill. The sick and diseased and troubled of mind hurried to that hill. It turned out that everyone was sick in mind. All were weighed down with fears and troubles. All were full of despair.
People abandoned their work. Doctors and patients, bankers and clients, mothers and children, teachers and students went in great waves to behold this strange boy who had come to the city on whispers of glory.
When they finally got to the hilltop they found not a boy dressed as a fool, but a boy dressed as a magician. He had a wand pointing upward and a finger pointing to the depths of the earth. Some believed he was pointing to the underworld.
He was surrounded by trees with ripe fruit, trees in flower. Before him were flowering bushes of lilies and roses. Near him was a table. On the table was a wand, a chalice, a sword, and a golden coin with the sign of a pentagram.
He wore a red cloak. There was a wreath on his head and above him some discerned the mysterious sign of eternity. He was heard reciting fragments of the original myth.
They beheld him in stillness.
When he finished his recitation there was a sudden flash of light in the sky. Some people heard in the silence that followed the ominous but magical sound of a tolling bell. Then in a heartbeat the boy was gone.
The sick who were present said they had been spontaneously cured. Many who were blind found that they could see. Their cries of jubilation caused panic in the crowds.
5
The strange boy was next seen by the river.
Beyond the river people lived in fear and did not know it. Beyond the river was the centre of the city. It was like a fortress, with walled houses and giant watchtowers. The wailing at night had encroached far into the daytime. At dawn as people went to work in their suits and formal dresses it was not unknown for one of them to break down. One afternoon a man was seen with a gun. He was shouting and shooting into the crowd. When he was finally grappled to the ground it was discovered that he was fast asleep.
One morning a woman in the crowd was on her way to work when she suddenly tore off her clothes and ran through the streets singing holy songs long forgotten by the people.
A week later another woman did the same thing. She stripped naked and ran through the streets singing. But that day changed the history of the world. For the police chased after the woman, caught up with her and, in full public view, ate her raw. They tore her flesh and drank her blood and ate chunks of her buttocks and gorged themselves on her bones.
After that a new madness came among the people.
At night, in a restless neighbourhood, someone might be heard screaming. Those who looked out of the window saw a white van appear outside the house. An hour later men in uniforms would be seen emerging from the house with blood on their faces and blood and gristle on their shirts as if they had been feasting on raw wild animals. The next day nothing but the cracked skull and the long bones of the victim were seen in the bedroom.
A new stage in the elimination of undesirables had been reached.
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No longer were those who transgressed dragged away to unknown places. No longer were they thrown in grinding machines. The Hierarchy, in its wisdom, unleashed a new form of punishment. All those who were not contributing to the happiness of society, all those who sought to undermine the state, to undermine the new myths, all these people would be eaten. They would be devoured by a special police force.
Those who saw them at night said they had the faces of wild dogs. The old said they had the faces of jackals. But when members of this special police force were seen in daylight they had handsome faces with strong jaws. They seemed healthy young men and women in their prime.
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It was around this time, when whole sections of the populace were being eaten by the state jackals, that the strange boy was seen by the river. The cry of his sighting went from mouth to mouth. Great numbers flocked to catch a glimpse of him.
He wore a cuirass and golden-blue armour. He looked like a warrior-king. He came down from his star-spangled chariot and stood there before the gathered people and gazed upon them in silence.
They were fascinated by his chariot. No one had seen such a thing before. Some saw hints of an infinite sky on the canopy of the chariot. Others were amazed at the two sphinxes that pulled it. They stood perfectly still.
The gathered people looked at the boy-warrior in vague expectation. Was he going to speak to them? There were many who were sick in the crowd; many lame, who had been carried; many blind, who had been led; many crawling with diseases, who had been borne on litters. Those who seemed whole were riddled with neuroses, with discontent, insomnia, rage, misery, fear, and great sicknesses of the spirit.
There were some among them who were rich beyond description and spent their days going from guru to oracle, seeking cures for mysterious perennial illnesses. There were some who were very famous and who were among the unhappiest people in the land.
Many of the rich and famous were devourers of others. In their sleep they turned into jackal-faces and devoured their neighbours. They ate their neighbours in their sleep and didn’t know it. They were known to howl at night like blinded bulls.
Many of the devourers were lords and baronesses and knights. They were the pillars of society, the doughty men and women of the realm. Many of them were in the crowd. There were also many children in the crowd, devourers in training, with sweet innocent faces, carried on the shoulders of their devourer parents.
The judges and doctors, the ministers of state and the directors of broadcasting stations, the ordinary citizens, all stood and watched the boy-warrior. They watched to see what he would do, what miracles he would perform.
But the boy-warrior gazed back at them. His golden-blue armour flashed dazzling lights into their eyes. He seemed intent only on studying them. And when he had studied them enough he stepped back into his chariot. With a crack of the invisible reins, he drove right through the crowd, and vanished into a vision.
There were cries of bafflement. One moment there, the next gone. Many in the crowd who could see were blinded.
☆
He could never explain her disappearances. She was always disappearing. When she came back she always had an amazing light around her. She always looked unusually healthy and well. Always glowing.
‘Where do you go?’
‘Nowhere.’
‘Where is nowhere?’
‘Nowhere.’
‘Is there someone else?’
‘Never.’
‘Is there someone else?’
‘That can never be.’
‘Is there someone else?’
‘You’ve got the key to my body and my heart.’
‘Why don’t you tell me where you go?’
‘It’s best if you don’t know.’
‘But why? Don’t you trust me?’
‘I trust you with my life, that’s why.’
‘You speak in riddles. I don’t understand.’
‘There’s nothing to understand.’
‘Where do you go?’
‘Nowhere.’
‘Nowhere?’
‘Nowhere.’
‘Why are you so different when you come back?’
‘Am I?’
‘You come back with a glow.’
‘Do I?’
‘Does nowhere give you this glow?’
‘It must do then.’
‘Can I come with you the next time?’
Amalantis would go off again, into that deep world of thought, with that curious smile in her eyes.
8
They used to be afraid of the darkness and the disappearances. Now they were afraid of being devoured. It was not unknown for people to be eaten in their sleep. It was not unknown to be eaten on a visit to the bank. Political rallies became notorious places for being suddenly devoured.
The consumption of people was confined initially to the jackal-headed figures of the night who emerged from white vans. Now the activity had spread. Normal people next to you at a concert might suddenly sprout a jackal-face and bite off a chunk of your shoulder. Famous artists became devourers overnight. A party, a dance, or a dinner, among friends, became occasions for the hosts to turn on their guests and devour them. It was increasingly common for guests to pounce on their hosts and eat them for dinner. They could often be seen leaving with contented expressions on their bloodied faces.
It got so bad that children were devoured at school, in their classrooms, by other children. Sometimes they were eaten by their teachers. Sometimes they ate their teachers alive.
People were not always devoured whole. They often had large chunks bitten out of them. It was not unusual to see someone who was whole one day and armless the next. They might even be without a leg. They might have a side of their face bitten off as if by a giant dog.
These maimings and devourings were not reported in the papers. But it became a source of pride to be known as a devourer. The devourers became the most respected, most feared, most celebrated people of the times.
The real shame was to be among the devoured. It was thought better to be dead than to wander about the world with the badge of your devouring, a missing arm, a hollow chest, a bitten off nose.
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As the devouring of people got worse, so did the rumours from the underworld. It was said that a woman dressed like an angel was seen pouring water from golden vessels onto the head of a lion and the head of an eagle. This took place on the shore of the river. The woman had one foot on earth and the other in the water. No one knew what to make of such an elaborate rumour.
The effect of all these rumours, all these sightings, was to awaken unrest in the populace. The Hierarchy responded by putting out instructions that the boy-warrior be arrested at the first opportunity. Police officers and soldiers were deployed across the land. In this way a universal state of emergency was imposed. Sirens sounded everywhere.
Then one evening the boy-warrior was seen in a park, under a ghostly light. This sighting was the strangest. He was first seen by a child. Reports of the sighting flew round the city and people abandoned their jobs and left their homes and schools and poured to the field where the boy-warrior was said to be. They came and saw something they did not understand. They saw a boy hanging upside down from a beam. He was a little grown now. He was hanging from a rope attached to his right foot. His left foot was crossed behind his right foot at an angle, as if he had stopped in the middle of a country dance. He was upside down and his arms were folded in front of him. His rich hair, white and luminous, pointed straight down towards the earth. There was a soft light about his head, and an expression of sublime tranquillity on his face. His eyes were smiling. It was as if upside down was the best way to be, the right way to see things.
The sighting of the boy-warrior hanging upside down perplexed the gathered crowd. They didn’t know what to do. They just stood there and stared at him as if he were a sign, a new language that they had to learn.
They stared in silence. He stared back peacefully. When the authorities learnt about this new appearance of the boy- warrior, troops were sent to the field in great numbers. White vans surrounded the area. Armed police splintered the crowd with violence, causing great commotion. But when they closed in on the boy-warrior hanging upside down from a cross-beam, they were struck by his stillness. He was perfectly still and serene, like a pendulum that had come to a stop.
For a moment the armed police hesitated. Then their senior officer barked out an order and they woke from their mesmerism. They rushed at the hanging boy, but when they got to the beam they found he wasn’t there. Only the rope was left dangling. They arrested the rope as necessary evidence.
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Feeling itself undermined by the escapades of the boy-warrior, and weakened by the persistent rumours flowing from the underworld, the Hierarchy unleashed a regime of unprecedented ferocity on the populace.
People were not allowed to gather in certain places. There were more arrests. There was an epidemic of devouring. People disappeared at alarming rates. Whenever people congregated somewhere the police would descend and scatter them. People were spied on in the streets, at work, and in their homes.
During this period there was a silence of signs. No words sprouted on billboards, or on roads, or on the sides of lorries. No words were stencilled on walls or appeared in the sky. It seemed a victory had been wrought over the question-askers.
The truth is that there was a new silence in the land. The people who went to work in the morning had faces that were bleak and dissatisfied. If they were still asleep then it was a bad and bitter sleep.
The victory of the Hierarchy seemed complete in the apparent silence of the land. But from the underworld rumours bubbled up, quietly poisoning the silence.
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Fragments of rumour had it that a high priestess, with a blue mantle over her white garment, wearing a strange crown, sat between two pillars on a high hill. One pillar was black, the other was white. She had a scroll in her right hand. The scroll was partially visible. On it could be discerned a strange incomplete word. Some said the word was Taro or Tora or The La or Revea or Apocal. Rumour also had it that there was a bower of flowers behind her. She wore a white cross round her neck.
There were other rumours that spoke of an empress seated in a rich field of wheat, by a flowing river. All around her was abundance. She had yellow hair, wore a crown of twelve stars on her head, had a sceptre in her hand, and a crescent moon beneath her feet. She was a gateway to a magic scene of nature. No one knew what to make of these rumours. They were received in silence, and passed on in whispers.
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In those dark times, when all had given up hope of catching a glimpse of him, the boy-warrior was seen again. He was seen in the cameo of Justice, holding aloft a sapphire sword, seated between two pillars, with a green crown on his head. Children saw him on their way from school.
This time, before great crowds could gather, the authorities heard about it, and swiftly surrounded the area. It was in full view of the converging populace that he was arrested. The boy-warrior was borne on his throne to the back of a white van. To everyone’s astonishment he made no attempts to resist arrest. He submitted himself to them without a fuss. Some said there was an expression of sublime calm on his face.
The gathered people, expecting a miracle, some marvellous mode of escape that had been characteristic of the boy-warrior so far, were amazed at the arrest. They watched in silence as the white van hurried away, among a convoy of military vehicles.
The rumour of the boy-warrior’s arrest went swiftly round the land. That night there was an uneasy silence. Not many people slept.
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The next day, at dawn, something new emerged from the underworld. The cities were covered not with a word as before, but with a single image. The walls and the billboards and the roads and the sides of lorries were covered with this single image. It was the image of a woman in prison, of a man behind bars. A faint light shone from behind the figure in prison. This mute image descended on people as they staggered to work after a sleepless night. Papers with the image of the person imprisoned fell like grim confetti from the sky. It papered the streets and landed on the heads of commuters and city-dwellers.
