Cautionary Tales Read online

  “They try that, I kill them all.”

  “They’re pretty tough hypocrites. They claim to support Jesus, but they’re really out for themselves. They’ve got modern weapons, and they won’t hesitate to use them. Don’t tackle them unless you have to.” She shrugged. “Now do you have anything else for me before I return to my coven and report on my conquest?”

  “One more hard one,” he said, taking hold of her. “By your leave.”

  But she paused. “I smell danger. It’s beyond my magic, so I don’t know its nature, but there is something.”

  “That lout I drove off. He’s returning with friends.”

  She gazed at him. “How can you know that?”

  “I know the nature of louts.”

  There was a commotion nearby. A voice lifted in protest. “Hey, you jerks! What’s the matter with you?”

  “Shut your face, creep.”

  “You’re right,” Leyla said. “I recognize that voice. They’re looking for us. We’d better get dressed and get out of here.”

  “And miss a good fight? We should have time for that one last clinch.”

  She laughed, as she so often did. “And I like danger. But hurry.” She clasped him to her. They rolled, with her coming out on top. She rocked on him, her breasts heaving. Lusty? She was well beyond that. She had spoken of making a conquest. She certainly had. Cartaphilus didn’t know what love was, but if he was capable of it, she was the one who would evoke it.

  They were still connected when their tent was lifted and thrown to the side. “Found them!” the man called. “Bat on her back, right?”

  “Get out of here,” Cartaphilus told her. “I’ll handle them.”

  “I’d better,” she agreed, drawing off him. “But first I’ll distract them so you can get your spear.”

  “That will help,” he agreed. Actually weapons were more decorative than essential; he was by no means helpless nude. Then he said what he seldom did: “Thanks.” She really was his kind of woman. It wasn’t that politeness came naturally to him, but that he wanted her to be favorably impressed with him. He didn’t want to lose her, physically or emotionally.

  Now there were four burly young men, standing around the two of them in the remnant of the tent. One had a sore nose. They had no weapons; they were depending on their fists and muscles. They were fools.

  “Get clear,” he murmured. “I’ll handle them.”

  “I’ll distract them first,” she said. She jumped to her feet, flashing the men with her bouncing breasts. “Get lost before you get hurt,” she warned them. Maybe that was her notion of fair play: to give them at least a chance to save their lives.

  Two of them stared, mesmerized. Cartaphilus knew exactly how that was. That was all he needed. “Wow!” That was an understatement. They grabbed for her, and missed, of course.

  Meanwhile Cartaphilus reached out and caught hold of his spear. “Are you ready, turds?” he inquired. He could play fair too, when he tried.

  The two who weren’t watching the woman dived for him. He whipped the spear around to stab one through the belly. He shoved him to the side and caught hold of the descending head of the other. He opened his mouth, baring his teeth, and bit off the man’s nose. He shoved him to the side so as not to get too badly spattered with the blood.

  Then he got to his feet, spitting out the nose. Leyla was gone, along with the clothing. That was best. She would probably not enjoy seeing the rest of it, as it might get ugly. Cartaphilus cared what she thought. They would get back together at another time; she had promised.

  The remaining two men closed on him. They were not cowards. Too bad for them. They were about to learn that numbers did not necessarily make an advantage. Not when they faced a psychopath who longed for death.

  All in all, it was a fine fracas. The perfect end to a perfect day.

  Note: In late 2005 I heard from David A. Rodriguez, Lead Video Game Designer with High Voltage Software, also the writer and creator of a comic book titled Starkweather, published through Arcana Studio. He was setting up a companion volume, Starkweather: The Grid, which would consist of five short stories written by five authors, going into the background of the series, which would be translated to comic format. He sent me a copy of the original volume, and I concluded that I would like to do it. I needed a character for Cartaphilus to interact with, and he gave me Leyla. Intrigued by her body art, I made something of it, and came to like her well. Cartaphilus is actually historical mythology, the Wandering Jew, condemned by Jesus as shown; he’s not original with me, any more that Leyla is. So I wrote it, and I believe it was published, though I did not see the book. It was an interesting project.

  Caution: none; this isn’t really about Jesus.

  4. A Picture of Jesus

  It was dull in the violent ward. Ethan had worked here only two weeks, but an hour had been enough to satisfy him that the patients here were the opposite of violent. This was simply the dumping place for the ones that didn’t fit in elsewhere in the hospital. And, it seemed, for the aides with least seniority, who had no choice about assignments.

  One patient was a fat old man, cheerful but incoherent. Say “Hello” to him and he would smile and respond “Zig—zig—zzigh.” That was about the extent of his vocabulary. Mucous tended to collect in his throat; periodically he would hawk it up and spit on the floor. But usually the spittle didn’t clear his bulging belly; it would hang there in yellowish gobs until someone came to clean him off. Now that was Ethan’s job. Despite that, he liked Zig; the man certainly meant no harm, and made no trouble.

  Another patient was small and lean. He muttered constantly and mostly incoherently. He seemed to hate the world, but he internalized it, ignoring the aides. When Ethan helped him bathe, he saw that the man had an enormous hernia filling his scrotum. He reported it to the hospital authorities, but nothing was done. Apparently it wasn’t worthwhile to mess with what was termed a benign condition. So it was ignored, and the violent ward was the place to ignore it.

  Another patient was young. He lived normally in the regular men’s ward, but periodically he got wild, and then they would put him in a straitjacket, sedate him, put a tube through his nose into his stomach, and force-feed him until he settled down. A day or so usually did it. Every so often he would make strangling noises, but it was because of the tube; he wasn’t in physical trouble. Then he would return to the men’s ward for a few more days.

  Sometimes they would dump a patient here after he had shock treatment. Electroshock was horrible to watch; it looked as if the man were dying of torture and going into instant rigor mortis. But he was unconscious; it was a controlled seizure, and it did seem to improve attitude. When the man woke, his mind would be blank. He would ask endless questions: “Where am I? How did I get here? How can I get out?” Ethan would try to explain, but he could see that he just wasn’t making much sense to the patient. It would be several hours before the patient achieved stability, and then he would be returned to his usual ward.

  Then there was Ulysses. He sat staring at the wall and blinking. But when Ethan brought his tray with food, he would focus on it and eat it efficiently. He would take his own shower when asked to, and was able to handle the toilet cleanly, which was more than could be said for many other patients. He seemed, well, sane, when he was doing something. It was as if he could interact with the world when he chose to, but just seldom bothered.

  Finally, in a dull period, Ethan sat down beside him and tried to make conversation. “Hello, Ulysses. I’m Ethan.”

  “Frome?”

  “What?” He was startled by the fact that the man had responded; he had never spoken to Ethan before.

  Ulysses smiled. “Ah, you don’t get the education we did in my day. Ethan Frome is a novel by Edith Wharton which shows the futility of foolish love. I meant no affront.”

  Sane? This man was completely lucid! But Ethan was wary, because some patients did have flashes of rationality. Indeed, some were completely sane,
most of the time. It was their flashes of irrationality that made them unfit for general society. One had told him how he was driving from New York to Chicago when he blanked out; when he woke he was here at Bedlam. He seemed quite normal, but that could be extremely deceptive. So Ethan wasn’t about to take Ulysses on faith, but he was interested in what the man had to say. So he encouraged him. “Foolish love?”

  “Frome was locked into a sterile marriage. Then he met his wife’s cousin and they fell in love. It was hopeless, so they tried to commit suicide together. They got on a bobsled and steered it into a tree. But they didn’t die; they both wound up horribly crippled, while Frome’s wife took care of them. It was, in a fashion, the wife’s salvation.”

  Ethan shook his head. “You’re right. That was foolish. Today the man would simply have dumped the wife for her sister.”

  “They don’t make morality the way they used to.”

  Which was something Ethan’s grandfather might have said. “At any rate, I’m Ethan Drake, and I’m not about to try to commit suicide for a woman. But you—how is it that you are here, staring at the wall all day, when you are obviously rational?” He was afraid that question would snap the man back into his daze, but it had to be asked.

  “I am rational. It is your society that is blind.”

  Uh-uh. It was starting. “In what way, Ulysses?”

  The man turned a disquietingly knowing gaze on him. “Take my word: you are better off not knowing.”

  Ethan had a slight ornery streak. “Let me be the judge of that. What do you see in that wall?”

  “I see a picture of Jesus.”

  So he was off the deep end about religion! Ethan looked at the wall. “All I see is a pattern of white paint and black stain. That wall is overdue for cleaning.”

  “That would be a shame. Jesus should not be hidden.”

  “But there’s no picture there! It’s just random splotches.”

  “So it may appear to you.”

  Ethan realized that he wasn’t getting anywhere. He tried another tack. “Let’s look at the wall together, and maybe you can explain to me how to see what you see.”

  “This isn’t wise.”

  Ethan never had liked being dismissed as if he were some slightly obtuse bystander, and he liked it even less from a mental patient. He was also afraid that if this dialogue broke off now, Ulysses would never speak to him again. Not because of any anger, but because the window of opportunity would be closed. Other aides would simply laugh if Ethan tried to tell them that the man was speaking rationally. “Tell me.”

  “If you insist. But you are apt to regret it.”

  The man was not being threatening. He seemed genuinely concerned for Ethan’s state of mind. What a reversal! “I think I will regret it if I don’t get your side of things.”

  “Then I will tell you my story. If it begins to disturb you, or if you find yourself believing it, then you must break off, for your own safety. What I have to say concerns phenomenal insight, and power through that insight, but equivalent danger. You have used a computer?”

  “Sure. I spent an hour on a letter, then lost it by hitting Delete instead of Print. That was one lesson I learned in a hurry!”

  “Exactly. What magnifies your power of insight and action also magnifies your power of destruction. Misuse it, and you destroy yourself, even if your intention was innocent. Or you can be destroyed by the action of a computer virus, because you didn’t guard against it.”

  The man was making uncanny sense. Why was he put away here in a mental institution, and why did he put up with it? They would let him out soon enough if he talked to the psychiatrists the way he was talking now. “I never made that mistake again, with the computer,” Ethan said. “And I have an anti-virus program.”

  Again Ulysses turned his disquieting stare on him. “But when your life is at stake, there may be no second chance.”

  Despite himself, Ethan felt a rippling chill in the small of his back. “Are you telling me that I can put my life in danger, just by listening to you? What are you, an alien spy?”

  “No, I am a normal human being, as you are. But I have learned to see in a way you have not. You can learn too, but you would not care to share my fate.”

  “I wouldn’t care to be locked in a mental hospital when I was sane,” Ethan agreed.

  “You may change your mind.”

  He seemed so sure! But of course the man was a patient. “Tell me your story.”

  Ulysses began to speak.

  I was always a puzzle freak. If there was a riddle, I had to guess it; if there was a maze I had to thread it; if there was a mystery, I had to fathom it. So when I saw the picture, it was a challenge. It was in a book, and it said it was a picture of Jesus. But it was just a mass of light and dark, as if someone had spilled coal dust on snow and sections had melted together. I was never religious, so I had no imperative to see Jesus. But I wanted to know just what it was the author of that book thought I was supposed to see. So I stared at the page until my eyes grew bleary, seeing nothing of any man, let alone Jesus. I would have dismissed it, but I knew there had to be something, however farfetched.

  Next day I looked at it again, with similar unsuccess. But I remembered a picture I had seen years before, with two women: the pretty young one I had seen right away, but eventually I had seen also the old woman. It was all in the way a person looked at it. The mind shapes familiar images from scattered hints, and so what was hidden can come into view, with the right mind-set.

  But there was nothing there. Finally I gave up on it, frustrated. I set it on a corner table and went about my business elsewhere. It was open to the page, but out of the way.

  Then, in the evening, I happened to catch sight of the page in the half-light. And there was Jesus, gazing serenely at me. The irrelevant details had fuzzed out, allowing my eye to shape the whole, and it was the head and shoulders of Jesus, suddenly so clear I wondered how I had ever missed it.

  I brought the book into the full light, and the picture vanished. The page was a random mess again. But now I had the key, and I took it back to the half-light until I could see Jesus, then slowly into the full light. I analyzed it, and soon I was able to see Jesus in any light. But he faded out when I turned the picture upside down. So I kept working on it, training my eye, until I could see him from any angle and in any light. I had fathomed the unfathomable!

  Next day I looked at it again, and Jesus looked back at me. I was now a believer, in this sense. I could see what I had not seen before. I was flushed with victory.

  I went out to do some shopping. When I looked at the sidewalk, I saw pictures on it: animals, flowers, human faces. They had been there all the time, but now I could see them. I had widened my horizons, by learning to see Jesus.

  When I crossed the road I saw in its pattern of cracks and smudges a different scene. In fact I became aware of a different landscape, a natural one, where no road existed. The effect grew stronger as I concentrated, becoming three dimensional. It was as if the road were a picture, which I might almost walk into. But I couldn’t; the true surface of the road seemed like a pane of glass, disappearing, but my feet still found it. This did not detract from the realism of the picture; a person may gaze through a window at the scene outside, yet his hand can not pass through that window. He understands that the scene is there, but that he is barred from it, unless he breaks the glass or finds some way around it. I was fascinated. In fact I forgot my errand, and simply meandered, viewing the new realm. So much I had never seen before!

  Then I came to an awesome chasm that crossed the road and the terrain on either side. It was so deep I was afraid to try to cross it, though I knew it was just a picture. I stood at the brink, gazing down into its murky depths.

  Someone came up behind me. I was so distracted that I never noticed until there came a touch on my elbow. “Don’t do that,” she whispered. “Ignore it. Walk right on across.”

  Startled, I followed her guidance, and walk
ed with her across the chasm. I looked at her, trying to determine whether I knew her, but she seemed unfamiliar. “Why—?” I asked, somewhat at a loss.

  “For God’s sake, act normal!” she snapped. “Have you no common caution?”

  “But I don’t think we’ve ever met before,” I protested. “I’m Ulysses. You’re—?”

  “Chloris,” she said tersely. She forged straight ahead, ignoring the frightening landscape I suspected she saw.

  “Well, Chloris, why are you, well, picking me up like this?” She wasn’t beautiful, but neither was she ugly; she had the appeal of youth, which to my middle-aged eye was considerable.

  “Because I don’t want the dragon to eat you before you catch on.”

  “Dragon!” I exclaimed, laughing.

  “Just keep walking, and I’ll explain,” she said grimly.

  Realizing that she wasn’t joking, I did as she asked. I kept walking beside her, which was no chore. “I suppose you know that I’m seeing strange scenery.”

  “That’s obvious.” Chloris glanced around, but she did it without moving her head. “What brought you to the breakthrough?”

  “A picture of Jesus.”

  She sighed. “I wish they’d abolish those pictures! People think they’re getting a religious experience, and then the dragon kills them.”

  “You act as if there really is a dragon!”

  “Listen, idiot!” she hissed. “There is a dragon, and it will be the last creature you see if you don’t ignore it.”

  “I don’t understand! Am I supposed to see this thing, or not see it?”

  “Both. You are seeing the larger reality, which has always existed, but few people manage to attune their minds to it. They are so accustomed to shutting out things that they actually shut out much of reality itself. That’s their salvation. But those who succeed in seeing more are in trouble. So if you see a dragon, pretend you don’t. Just walk right by it, or even through it, and don’t flinch. Your life depends on it.”

  “My life!” I said, amazed at her claim.