The Best of Gene Wolfe: A Definitive Retrospective of His Finest Short Fiction Read online

  Then you get down, and the man standing beside you is Dr. Death.

  He has a white scarf and black leather gloves and his hair is shiny black. His face is not tanned like Captain Ransom’s but white, and handsome in a different way like the statue of a head that used to be in Papa’s library when you and Mother used to live in town with him, and you think: Mama would say after he was gone how good-looking he was. He smiles at you, but you are no older.

  “Hi.” What else can you say?

  “Good afternoon, Mr. Babcock. I’m afraid I startled you.”

  You shrug. “A little bit. I didn’t expect you to be here, I guess.”

  Dr. Death turns his back to the wind to light a cigarette he takes from a gold case. It is longer even than a 101 and has a red tip, and a gold dragon on the paper. “While you were looking down, I slipped from between the pages of the excellent novel you have in your coat pocket.”

  “I didn’t know you could do that.”

  “Oh, yes. I’ll be around from time to time.”

  “Captain Ransom is here already. He’ll kill you.”

  Dr. Death smiles and shakes his head. “Hardly. You see, Tackman, Ransom and I are a bit like wrestlers; under various guises we put on our show again and again—but only under the spotlight.” He flicks his cigarette over the rail and for a moment your eyes follow the bright spark out and down and see it vanish in the water. When you look back, Dr. Death is gone, and you are getting cold. You go back into the restaurant and get a free mint candy where the cash register is and then go to sit beside Aunt May again in time to have coconut cream pie and hot chocolate.

  Aunt May drops out of the conversation long enough to ask, “Who was that man you were talking to, Tackie?”

  “A man.”

  In the car Mama sits close to Dr. Black, with Aunt Julie on the other side of her so she will have to, and Aunt May sits way up on the edge of her seat with her head in between theirs so they can all talk. It is gray and cold outside; you think of how long it will be before you are home again, and take the book out.

  Ransom heard them coming and flattened himself against the wall beside the door of his cell. There was no way out, he knew, save through that iron portal.

  For the past four hours he had been testing every surface of the stone room for a possible exit, and there was none. Floor, walls, and ceiling were of cyclopean stone blocks; the windowless door of solid metal locked outside.

  Nearer. He tensed every muscle and knotted his fists.

  Nearer. The shambling steps halted. There was a rattle of keys and the door swung back. Like a thunderbolt of purpose he dived through the opening. A hideous face loomed above him and he sent his right fist crashing into it, knocking the lumbering beast-man to his knees. Two hairy arms pinioned him from behind, but he fought free and the monster reeled under his blows. The corridor stretched ahead of him with a dim glow of daylight at the end and he sprinted for it. Then—darkness!

  When he recovered consciousness he found himself already erect, strapped to the wall of a brilliantly lit room which seemed to share the characters of a surgical theater and a chemical laboratory. Directly before his eyes stood a bulky object which he knew must be an operating table, and upon it, covered with a sheet, lay the unmistakable form of a human being.

  He had hardly had time to comprehend the situation when Dr. Death entered, no longer in the elegant evening dress in which Ransom had beheld him last, but wearing white surgical clothing. Behind him limped the hideous Golo, carrying a tray of implements.

  “Ah!” Seeing that his prisoner was conscious, Dr. Death strolled across the room and raised a hand as though to strike him in the face, but, when Ransom did not flinch, dropped it, smiling. “My dear Captain! You are with us again, I see.”

  “I hoped for a minute there,” Ransom said levelly, “that I was away from you. Mind telling me what got me?”

  “A thrown club, or so my slaves report. My baboon-man is quite good at it. But aren’t you going to ask about this charming little tableau I’ve staged for you?”

  “I wouldn’t give you the pleasure.”

  “But you are curious.” Dr. Death smiled his crooked smile. “I shall not keep you in suspense. Your own time, Captain, has not come yet; and before it does I am going to demonstrate my technique to you. It is so seldom that I have a really appreciative audience.” With a calculated gesture he whipped away the sheet which had covered the prone form on the operating table.

  Ransom could scarcely believe his eyes. Before him lay the unconscious body of a girl, a girl with skin as white as milk and hair like the sun seen through mist.

  “You are interested now, I see,” Dr. Death remarked drily, “and you consider her beautiful. Believe me, when I have completed my work you will flee screaming if she so much as turns what will no longer be a face toward you. This woman has been my implacable enemy since I came to this island, and the time has come for me to”—he halted in midsentence and looked at Ransom with an expression of mingled slyness and gloating—“for me to illustrate something of your own fate, shall we say.”

  While Dr. Death had been talking his deformed assistant had prepared a hypodermic. Ransom watched as the needle plunged into the girl’s almost translucent flesh, and the liquid in the syringe—a fluid which by its very color suggested the vile perversion of medical technique—entered her bloodstream. Though still unconscious the girl sighed, and it seemed to Ransom that a cloud passed over her sleeping face as though she had already begun an evil dream. Roughly the hideous Golo turned her on her back and fastened in place straps of the same kind as those that held Ransom himself pinned to the wall.

  “What are you reading, Tackie?” Aunt May asked.

  “Nothing.” He shut the book.

  “Well, you shouldn’t read in the car. It’s bad for your eyes.”

  Dr. Black looked back at them for a moment, then asked Mama, “Have you gotten a costume for the little fellow yet?”

  “For Tackie?” Mama shook her head, making her beautiful hair shine even in the dim light of the car. “No, nothing. It will be past his bedtime.”

  “Well, you’ll have to let him see the guests anyway, Barbara; no boy should miss that.”

  And then the car was racing along the road out to Settlers Island. And then you were home.

  Ransom watched as the loathsome creature edged toward him. Though it was not as large as some of the others its great teeth looked formidable indeed, and in one hand it grasped a heavy jungle knife with a razor edge.

  For a moment he thought it would molest the unconscious girl, but it circled around her to stand before Ransom himself, never meeting his eyes.

  Then, with a gesture as unexpected as it was frightening, it bent suddenly to press its hideous face against his pinioned right hand, and a great, shuddering gasp ran through the creature’s twisted body.

  Ransom waited, tense.

  Again that deep inhalation, seeming almost a sob. Then the beast-man straightened up, looking into Ransom’s face but avoiding his gaze. A thin, strangely familiar whine came from the monster’s throat.

  “Cut me loose,” Ransom ordered.

  “Yes. This I came to. Yes, Master.” The huge head, wider than it was high, bobbed up and down. Then the sharp blade of the machete bit into the straps holding Ransom. As soon as he was free he took the blade from the willing hand of the beast-man and freed the limbs of the girl on the operating table. She was light in his arms, and for an instant he stood looking down at her tranquil face.

  “Come, Master.” The beast-man pulled at his sleeve. “Bruno knows a way out. Follow Bruno.”

  A hidden flight of steps led to a long and narrow corridor, almost pitchdark. “No one use this way,” the beast-man said in his harsh voice. “They not find us here.”

  “Why did you free me?” Ransom asked.

  There was a pause; then almost with an air of shame the great, twisted form replied, “You smell good. And Bruno does not like Dr. Death.”


  Ransom’s conjectures were confirmed. Gently he asked, “You were a dog before Dr. Death worked on you, weren’t you, Bruno?”

  “Yes.” The beast-man’s voice held a sort of pride. “A St. Bernard. I have seen pictures.”

  “Dr. Death should have known better than to employ his foul skills on such a noble animal,” Ransom reflected aloud. “Dogs are too shrewd in judging character; but then the evil are always foolish in the final analysis.”

  Unexpectedly the dog-man halted in front of him, forcing Ransom to stop too. For a moment the massive head bent over the unconscious girl. Then there was a barely audible growl. “You say, Master, that I can judge. Then I tell you Bruno does not like this female Dr. Death calls Talar of the Long Eyes.”

  You put the open book facedown on the pillow and jump up, hugging yourself and skipping bare heels around the room. Marvelous! Wonderful!

  But no more reading tonight. Save it; save it. Turn the light off, and in the delicious dark put the book reverently away under the bed, pushing aside pieces of the Tinkertoy set and the box with the filling station game cards. Tomorrow there will be more, and you can hardly wait for tomorrow. You lie on your back, hands under head, covers up to chin, and when you close your eyes you can see it all: the island, with jungle trees swaying in the sea wind; Dr. Death’s castle lifting its big, cold grayness against the hot sky.

  The whole house is still; only the wind and the Atlantic are out, the familiar sounds. Downstairs Mother is talking to Aunt May and Aunt Julie and you fall asleep.

  You are awake! Listen! Late, it’s very late, a strange time you have almost forgotten. Listen!

  So quiet it hurts. Something. Something. Listen!

  On the steps.

  You get out of bed and find your flashlight. Not because you are brave, but because you cannot wait there in the dark.

  There is nothing in the narrow, cold little stairwell outside your door. Nothing in the big hallway of the second floor. You shine your light quickly from end to end. Aunt Julie is breathing through her nose, but there is nothing frightening about that sound; you know what it is: only Aunt Julie, asleep, breathing loud through her nose.

  Nothing on the stairs coming up.

  You go back to your room, turn off your flashlight, and get into bed. When you are almost sleeping there is the scrabbling sound of hard claws on the floorboards and a rough tongue touching your fingertips. “Don’t be afraid, Master; it is only Bruno.” And you feel him, warm with his own warm and smelling of his own smell, lying beside your bed.

  Then it is morning. The bedroom is cold, and there is no one in it but yourself. You go into the bathroom where there is a thing like a fan but with hot electric wires to dress.

  Downstairs Mother is up already with a cloth thing tied over her hair, and so are Aunt May and Aunt Julie, sitting at the table with coffee and milk and big slices of fried ham. Aunt Julie says, “Hello, Tackie,” and Mother smiles at you. There is a plate out for you already and you have ham and toast.

  All day the three women are cleaning and putting up decorations—red and gold paper masks Aunt Julie made to hang on the wall, and funny lights that change color and go around—and you try to stay out of the way, and bring in wood for a fire in the big fireplace that almost never gets used. Jason comes, and Aunt May and Aunt Julie don’t like him, but he helps some and goes into town in his car for things he forgot to buy before. He won’t take you, this time. The wind comes in around the window, but they let you alone in your room and it’s even quiet up there because they’re all downstairs.

  Ransom looked at the enigmatic girl incredulously.

  “You do not believe me,” she said. It was a simple statement of fact, without anger or accusation.

  “You’ll have to admit it’s pretty hard to believe,” he temporized. “A city older than civilization, buried in the jungle here on this little island.”

  Talar said tonelessly, “When you were as he”—she pointed at the dog-man—“is now, Lemuria was queen of this sea. All that is gone, except my city. Is not that enough to satisfy even Time?”

  Bruno plucked at Ransom’s sleeve. “Do not go, Master! Beast-men go sometimes, beast-men Dr. Death does not want; few come back. They are very evil at that place.”

  “You see?” A slight smile played about Talar’s ripe lips. “Even your slave testifies for me. My city exists.”

  “How far?” Ransom asked curtly.

  “Perhaps half a day’s travel through the jungle.” The girl paused, as though afraid to say more.

  “What is it?” Ransom asked.

  “You will lead us against Dr. Death? We wish to cleanse this island which is our home.”

  “Sure. I don’t like him any more than your people do. Maybe less.”

  “Even if you do not like my people you will lead them?”

  “If they’ll have me. But you’re hiding something. What is it?”

  “You see me, and I might be a woman of your own people. Is that not so?” They were moving through the jungle again now, the dog-man reluctantly acting as rear guard.

  “Very few girls of my people are as beautiful as you are, but otherwise yes.”

  “And for that reason I am high priestess to my people, for in me the ancient blood runs pure and sweet. But it is not so with all.” Her voice sunk to a whisper. “When a tree is very old, and yet still lives, sometimes the limbs are strangely twisted. Do you understand?”

  “Tackie? Tackie are you in there?”

  “Uh-huh.” You put the book inside your sweater.

  “Well, come and open this door. Little boys ought not to lock their doors. Don’t you want to see the company?” You open, and Aunt May’s a gypsy with long hair that isn’t hers around her face and a mask that is only at her eyes.

  Downstairs cars are stopping in front of the house and Mother is standing at the door dressed in Day-Glo robes that open way down the front but cover her arms almost to the ends of her fingers. She is talking to everyone as they come in, and you see her eyes are bright and strange the way they are sometimes when she dances by herself and talks when no one is listening.

  A woman with a fish for a head and a shiny, silver dress is Aunt Julie. A doctor with a doctor’s coat and listening things and a shiny thing on his head to look through is Dr. Black, and a soldier in a black uniform with a pirate thing on his hat and a whip is Jason. The big table has a punch bowl and cakes and little sandwiches and hot bean dip. You pull away when the gypsy is talking to someone and take some cakes and sit under the table watching legs.

  There is music and some of the legs dance, and you stay under there a long time.

  Then a man’s and a girl’s legs dance close to the table and there is suddenly a laughing face in front of you—Captain Ransom’s. “What are you doing under there, Tack? Come out and join the party.” And you crawl out, feeling very small instead of older, but older when you stand up. Captain Ransom is dressed like a castaway in a ragged shirt and pants torn off at the knees, but all clean and starched. His love beads are seeds and seashells, and he has his arm around a girl with no clothes at all, just jewelry.

  “Tack, this is Talar of the Long Eyes.”

  You smile and bow and kiss her hand, and are nearly as tall as she. All around people are dancing or talking, and no one seems to notice you. With Captain Ransom on one side of Talar and you on the other you thread your way through the room, avoiding the dancers and the little groups of people with drinks. In the room you and Mother use as a living room when there’s no company, two men and two girls are making love with the television on, and in the little room past that a girl is sitting on the floor with her back to the wall, and men are standing in the corners. “Hello,” the girl says. “Hello to you all.” She is the first one to have noticed you, and you stop.

  “Hello.”

  “I’m going to pretend you’re real. Do you mind?”

  “No.” You look around for Ransom and Talar, but they are gone and you think th
at they are probably in the living room, kissing with the others.

  “This is my third trip. Not a good trip, but not a bad trip. But I should have had a monitor—you know, someone to stay with me. Who are those men?”

  The men in the corners stir, and you can hear the clinking of their armor and see light glinting on it and you look away. “I think they’re from the City. They probably came to watch out for Talar,” and somehow you know that this is the truth.

  “Make them come out where I can see them.”

  Before you can answer, Dr. Death says, “I don’t really think you would want to,” and you turn and find him standing just behind you wearing full evening dress and a cloak. He takes your arm. “Come on, Tackie; there’s something I think you should see.” You follow him to the back stairs and then up, and along the hall to the door of Mother’s room.

  Mother is inside on the bed, and Dr. Black is standing over her filling a hypodermic. As you watch, he pushes up her sleeve so that all the other injection marks show ugly and red on her arm, and all you can think of is Dr. Death bending over Talar on the operating table. You run downstairs looking for Ransom, but he is gone and there is nobody at the party at all except the real people and, in the cold shadows of the back stoop, Dr. Death’s assistant Golo, who will not speak, but only stares at you in the moonlight with pale eyes.

  The next house down the beach belongs to a woman you have seen sometimes cutting down the dry fall remnant of her asparagus or hilling up her roses while you played. You pound at her door and try to explain, and after a while she calls the police.

  . . . across the sky. The flames were licking at the roof timbers now. Ransom made a megaphone of his hands and shouted, “Give up! You’ll all be burned to death if you stay in there!” but the only reply was a shot and he was not certain they had heard him. The Lemurian bowmen discharged another flight of arrows at the windows.