Chasing the Phoenix, page 2
“A dream, surely,” said the other. “And yet it seemed so real.”
Marveling, they resumed their journey.
* * *
IN THOUGHTFUL silence Surplus and his new servant made their way through the countryside to the edge of a small but tidy village. There they were directed to a thatched hut with a single flowering magnolia in the dirt dooryard. Chickens scratched about among the sparse weeds. It seemed a highly unlikely place to find an illustrious man of medicine.
At a nod from Surplus, Capable Servant knocked on the door.
A white-bearded man, bent over with age and leaning on a stick whose support he clearly needed, answered the knock, frowning. “Go away,” he said, and slammed the door.
The two excludees looked at one another. Then Capable Servant knocked a second time.
Again, the ancient opened the door.
“Brave news, oh renowned Infallible Physician!” Capable Servant said, beaming. “My master, the Sir Blackthorpe Ravenscairn de Plus Precieux of the Land of the Green Mountains of the West, has come to consult with you and to avail himself of your considerable and accomplished skills.”
From the corner of his eye, Surplus saw neighbors peering out of their windows and children climbing up on fences to gawk. He raised his head to emphasize his canine profile and twitched his tail so that all might see it was real.
The Infallible Physician stepped aside from his door. “Very well,” he said. “Enter, if you must.”
* * *
“BRIGHT PEARL!” the old man shouted into the darkness. “Guest! Make tea! My daughter,” he said to Surplus. “Almost useless. Very lazy.”
A middle-aged woman appeared in the kitchen doorway, bowed quickly, disappeared again.
Infallible Physician sat, and Surplus followed suit. After a polite pause to give his host the opportunity to speak, Surplus said, “Sir, I have come seeking your—”
“I am the best doctor there is,” the Infallible Physician said. “But I cannot help you.” He laughed sharply. “You look like a dog! No cure for that.”
Careful not to let his annoyance show, Surplus said, “I have no desire to deny my ancestry, sir. Your services are required not by me but by my friend. In Mongolia, he caught one of the war viruses that still linger from the mad times following the fall of Utopia. To save him, the doctors there swiftly and painlessly put him to death. Then, before putrefaction could set in, they wrapped around his body a silver exoskeleton, a revenant of antiquity, which (and this may sound incredible, but I saw it with my own two eyes) sank beneath his skin like butter melting into toast, leaving neither scar nor incision behind. Finally, they injected him with drugs and packed his body cavities with herbs. Together, these things preserve him in perfect stasis, dead but not deteriorating. One week in this state, they assured me, would be enough to starve the virus, thus destroying it. Unfortunately, while they could preserve his body, they had long ago forgotten how to resurrect it.”
“I see,” the Infallible Physician said.
“Sir, your fame has spread far from the Abundant Kingdom. The Mongolian doctors told me that what they could not do, you and you alone assuredly could. This is why I have sought you out. Will you help me?”
“Ah.” The old man nodded and fell into silence again.
“Sir? Please tell me that my long journey has not been in vain.”
The Infallible Physician smiled and narrowed his eyes so that only slits remained open. From between the lids he peered enigmatically at his guest.
“Sir, I must implore you—”
“It is no use.” Bright Pearl emerged from the kitchen holding a tray with a teakettle and four cups. She poured one cup for Surplus and another for her father, who bent low over it and slurped noisily. “My father has moments of lucidity, but they do not last. He will be silent now for hours and possibly days. In any event—and please pardon me for overhearing your conversation, but the house is small—the man you came here looking for was not he but my grandfather.”
“I beg your pardon?”
Bright Pearl poured another cup of tea for Capable Servant, who accepted it with a bob of his head and a bright smile, and a fourth for herself. Then she knelt, facing Surplus. “Ninety years ago, the original Infallible Physician and his beautiful young wife came to Brocade from what distant land no man today may say. He was everything your friends told you and more. There was no disease he could not cure nor any injury he could not ameliorate. It was said that he retained secrets of medicine which all the rest of the world had forgotten. Thus, for many years, he prospered. His wife bore him a son, and when that son came of age, the Infallible Physician taught him the healing arts.
“Yet, oddly enough, he and his wife did not age like normal people do, so that when the son was grown, they looked not like his parents but like brother and sister to him. The neighbors began to gossip that they were not human at all. There was talk of bringing them before the magistrate as demons.
“Then, one night, before any violence could occur, the couple simply disappeared. After an appropriate period of mourning, their son took over his father’s business and, because he had been wisely taught, in time became known as the Infallible Physician himself. For while his skills were inferior to his father’s they greatly surpassed those of all other doctors. That man was my father, and in turn he married and had two sons and a daughter. That daughter was I.
“Alas, my brothers both died before I was born and my father thought it shameful that a woman should become a doctor. I had ambitions of my own, however, and studied his books in secret and stood at his elbow, watching while he worked. I would have become the third Infallible Physician if only he had allowed it. But he would not. Even when he began to sink into senility and I begged him to let me cure him, he forbade it absolutely.
“Finally, he was as you see him now.
“Surely, I thought then, he would want me to restore his mind to its old acuity. Surely he would be grateful to me for doing so. For two weeks I mixed potions and dosed and treated him with calculation and care. He recovered—and beat me for disobedience. Then, perversely, he mixed himself counter potions and returned to senility.”
Horrified, Surplus said, “How is such a thing possible?”
“Men are stubborn,” Bright Pearl said, “and my father is far more stubborn than most men. Irrationally, he blames me for the deaths of my brothers. Wickedly, he prefers to live without memories rather than dealing with those he earned.” She dipped her head in sadness. “So we live in poverty, and my skills, which are considerable, go unused. Because I have neither certification nor reputation, people will trust me with only the smallest of medical chores—cleaning a knife cut or splinting a broken arm—and pay me accordingly.”
A spark of hope still burned within Surplus. Now, in his thoughts, he heaped tinder against it and, pursing mental lips, gently blew. “You studied your grandfather’s books, you say. Perhaps you could—”
“No,” Bright Pearl said. “I saw nothing like what you describe in them.” She looked away. “But enough about my problems. Tell me of yourself and the adventures that brought you to our door.”
“It is a long and convoluted story, and one which I do not care to relate at this time.” Surplus waved a paw vaguely. “Suffice it to say that when I entered Siberia, I possessed tremendous wealth and a living friend. Now I am as you see me.” He sighed. “And I must find an appropriate place to bury the illustrious Aubrey Darger, who was the nonpareil of his profession and the best and truest of friends.”
Abruptly, Capable Servant, who had been quietly poking about among the handwritten codices that thronged the room’s many shadowy shelves, said, “Madam lady doctor, look! Within this book titled The Thwarting of Death there is a drawing of a physician placing a silver skeleton about the body of a corpse and of his assistant exclaiming at the fact that the skeleton begins to sink beneath the skin. And look! A caption below the drawing reads: The Reversible Death. Furthermore, on the next page, there is another picture showing a second physician using a strange device to extract that same skeleton from the anus of a man who is no longer dead.”
Leaping to his feet, Surplus snatched the book from his servant’s hand. “It’s true! This first picture illustrates the exact method I saw employed in Mongolia.” He looked sternly at his hostess. “You have been lying to me, Bright Pearl.”
Defiantly, Bright Pearl scrambled to her feet and closed the book in Surplus’s paws. Then she placed it back on its shelf. “There is a rich collector of antiquities who wishes to buy all my father’s books and instruments. We are negotiating the price. Further, the instrument shown in the book can only be used once. And I can see by looking at you that you are not a wealthy man.”
Surplus favored Bright Pearl with his most winning and sincere expression. “It is true that I am currently penniless,” he said. “But that is a condition that will not last long. Inevitably, money will, one way or another, flow into my pockets. There is no need to await that happy event, however, for I am currently prepared to offer you a price beyond imagining if you return my friend to life.”
“And what is that?”
“My yak.”
“I am no farmer. Why should I desire such a creature?”
“It will make your reputation as a surgeon, and that in turn will make you wealthy.”
“Oh?”
“Without question.” Surplus explained carefully and at some length. He laid out his plan step by step, with such detailed clarity that the lady doctor could have no doubt whatsoever that it would work.
When he was done, Bright Pearl rubbed her chin and said, “You are a cunning and deceitful man, sir.”
Surplus smiled modestly. “It is how I make my living.”
* * *
IT TOOK a few minutes to script their performance and a while longer to rehearse it. But at last, leaving Bright Pearl’s father in the house, the three main players walked outside. Up and down the street, old men loitered under trees smoking long pipes and housewives lingered by the well with empty buckets or knelt in their gardens pulling weeds or sat in their doorways weaving. Husbands worked in their yards, carving bone clothesline pins or weaving rattan chairs or building drying racks for fish. Wives hung laundry and smoothed it inch by inch (as no woman ever had before) to remove nonexistent wrinkles. The village was uncannily quiet. Not a person spoke to any other. All were positioned so as to have a good view of the Infallible Physician’s hut.
They had their audience.
Surplus was the first on stage, with Capable Servant scurrying after him. The two carefully took Darger’s corpse from the yak’s back and placed it at the feet of Bright Pearl, who stood, arms folded, watching impassively. They untied and then unwrapped the cloth, revealing Darger’s dead body with a flourish.
A silent gasp arose from the watching villagers.
Bright Pearl knelt and placed her ear against Darger’s chest. She licked a finger and placed it under his nostrils. Then she put her nose to his wrist and sniffed. Finally, she rose and in an angry voice said, “You have brought me a corpse. Why would you do such a disrespectful thing?”
Extending a paw in supplication, Surplus said, “I was told, madam, that you could cure my friend’s condition.”
“Your friend is dead,” Bright Pearl declared loudly enough for all the village to hear.
“That is the condition that I wish cured,” Surplus said, speaking with equal clarity. He fell to his knees before Bright Pearl, and Capable Servant did likewise. They threw dirt into their hair and wailed, “Bring our friend to life! Bring our friend to life!”
“Stop that nonsense immediately.” Bright Pearl picked up a fallen magnolia branch. “Or I will beat you within an inch of your lives. Bringing a man back from the dead is not something to be done lightly. Three things would be required before I would even consider the possibility—and I am certain you can fulfill none of them.”
“Name them!” Surplus cried, still kneeling.
“First, your friend would have to be of the highest moral character.”
“Madam, this is the saintly Aubrey Darger! In London, he freed Queen Alice from the clutches of her greatest enemy. In France, he rediscovered the long-lost Eiffel Tower. In Prague, he single-handedly defeated an army of golems. All of Moscow reveres him for waking the Duke of Muscovy from his decades-long slumber and, shortly thereafter, making certain vital improvements to the Kremlin and indeed to the city itself.”
Visibly unimpressed, Bright Pearl said, “Second, you would have to pay me a tremendous amount of money. More, I am sure, than you can possibly possess.”
Capable Servant leaped up, removed the saddlebag from the yak and, holding open the flap, showed her its contents.
Bright Pearl looked genuinely startled. It was possible, Surplus reflected, that, because he had not washed his spare clothes in some time, their odor was somewhat pungent. However, since Bright Pearl was the only villager close enough to see—or smell!—the saddlebag’s contents, that fact did no harm. With a dismissive wave of her hand, she said to Capable Servant, “Take that inside.”
At last, turning back to the groveling dog-man at her feet, Bright Pearl said, “Two of the three conditions, I must confess, you have fulfilled. But not the third. For an operation this extreme would require a measure of the healing blood of the sacred yak of Shiliin Bogd Mountain, which will cure any illness—and that I doubt very much you can provide!”
With a cry of joy, Surplus leapt to his feet. Tugging at Bright Pearl’s sleeve, he exclaimed, “Come! Look! Knowing you would require it, I have done what no other living being could have accomplished and brought you that very beast. Examine its eyes! Its horns! Its brow! With your discerning vision, you will see in an instant that it is genuine. If you will only cure my friend, this treasure beyond avarice is yours.”
Her expression dubious, Bright Pearl examined the yak closely. Her eyes widened. Then she said, “You have done all that is required. Bring your dead friend inside. Then draw three drams of the sacred yak’s blood and bring it to me.” She turned on her heel, as haughty as a queen. “I shall prepare the operation.”
Bowing deeply (and hiding a smile of enormous satisfaction) Surplus said, “As you wish, so shall it be done, oh Infallible Physician.”
2.
Their origins were obscure, their first appearance inauspicious. There was nothing to be said in their favor, save that heaven favored them.
—THE BOOK OF THE TWO ROGUES
FOR THREE days, Darger lay abed in the Infallible Physician’s house, recovering. Occasionally, children tapped on the windows, hoping to terrify themselves with a glimpse of the dog-man or of the corpse that had been brought back from the dead. When their antics drew Darger’s attention, he simply turned his head away.
Capable Servant, meanwhile, had proved more than worthy of his name. He had laundered both Surplus’s and Darger’s clothing and, without being instructed to do so, removed the multicolored ribbons from the Mongolian robes, bleached the stains, and patched the small rips that travel had inevitably conferred upon them, so that they could be worn in public without drawing unneeded attention. He also swept and mopped the floors, cooked meals for them and their hosts, and in a hundred different ways made himself indispensable to their domestic life.
“Nevertheless,” Surplus told him, “Aubrey Darger, though nominally alive, cannot be said to have been brought back to life again. He will not speak and there is an enduring darkness in his eyes. He has always been prone to depression, but I have never seen it this bad before. All my efforts will have been for nothing if he does not let go of whatever holds him prisoner in his bed.” There were only three rooms in the house. Darger had the back room, and a curtain hung in the middle of the front one at night enabled Surplus and Bright Pearl’s father to share it with her without scandal. Capable Servant slept in the kitchen.
“You should have let me rectify that ugly face of his,” Bright Pearl said. “I could have made him a handsome Chinese man. Then he would be more cheerful.”
“Darger can live with the face God gave him. His malady is not of the body but of the spirit, madam, and we must find its cure. I need a business partner, and your reputation requires a brilliant success.” Surplus slapped his knees with both paws. “The time has come for direct confrontation. I suggest, Bright Pearl, that you take your father outside and let him enjoy the sun. There may be shouting, and I suspect that it would disturb the venerable geezer.”
“Bah!” the old Infallible Physician said. “Nonsense! If anyone is to do any shouting, it will be me.”
* * *
“AROUSE YOURSELF, sir!” Surplus cried, slamming the door as he entered. He threw aside the drapes and flung wide the windows, flooding the room with sunshine and fresh air. He and Capable Servant seized Darger by the arms, forcibly hauling him to a sitting position. “The sun is risen and there is work to be done.”
“Work,” Darger said in a voice that might have come from the depths of a tomb.
“Yes, work.”
“What’s the point?”
“You astound me. Honest labor is what we were put here on earth to do. By our efforts we improve our lot and in the process increase the common share of happiness for all mankind.”
Darger shook his head shaggily. “I died.”
“I was present at the time,” Surplus reminded him.
“Now I am alive.”
“You state the obvious. The man I thought I was resurrecting would never have lowered himself so.” Moderating his tone, Surplus crouched down and took Darger’s hand. “Tell us, dear friend. Tell us the reason for this perverse refusal of yours to embrace the miracle of life restored.”
Bleak beyond all telling, Darger’s eyes rose to meet his friend’s. He looked like a man staring into the abyss. At last, he managed to say, “I was dead … and I did not see God.”
“That is a privilege vouchsafed to very few.”
“You do not understand. Neither did I experience an afterlife of any sort. I remember seeing the world shrink down to a pinprick of light. And then … nothing. No heaven. No nirvana. No celestial virgins. No oversoul. No reincarnation. No mystic visions. Nothing at all until you resurrected me. Only a complete and utter negation of being.”
