Strange News From Another Star Page 6

  'Forgive me, King,' the youth said ingratiatingly, 'forgive me if I put one more question to you before leaving your astounding country.'

  'Go ahead and ask,' the King said, for to him this stranger seemed a paradox, in many ways he seemed a cultivated, mature, and incredibly enlightened spirit, but in others like a small child whom one must spare and not take quite seriously. 'O stranger King,' the messenger now said, 'you have made me sad. Behold, I come from another country, and the great bird on the temple roof was right: here with you there is infinitely more misery than I could ever have imagined; a dream of terror, so your life seems to me, and I do not know whether you are ruled by gods or demons. Behold, O King, with us there is a legend, and until now I have considered it mythical nonsense, empty smoke, it is the legend that once with us too there were such things as war and murder and despair. These terrifying words which have long been unknown in our language are to be found in the old storybooks and to us they sound horrible and also a little ridiculous. Today I have learned that they are all true, and I see you and your people doing and suffering things that I knew only from the dreadful tales of antiquity. But now tell me: have you not in your souls an intimation that you are not doing what is right? Have you not a longing for bright, serene gods, for understanding, for cheerful leaders and mentors? At night do you never dream of a different and more beautiful life in which no one wants anything save for the common good? Where reason and order prevail, where people always meet one another with cheerfulness and consideration? Have you never had the thought that the world might be a single whole and that it might be beneficent and healing to rely on this presentiment and reverence the whole and serve it with love? Do you know nothing of what we at home call music, and the service of God, and blessedness?'

  As he listened to these words, the King had bowed his head. Now he raised it, and his face had changed, it shone with the faint shimmer of a smile and tears stood in his eyes.

  'Beautiful boy,' said the King, 'I do not rightly know whether you are a child or a wise man or perhaps an immortal. But I can tell you that we harbour within our souls all those things of which you speak. We have a presentiment of happiness, of freedom, of the gods. We have a legend about a wise man of long ago who perceived the unity of the world as the harmonious music of the heavenly spheres. Does that answer you? Look you, perhaps you are a saint from the beyond, or you may even be God himself, even so there is no happiness in your heart, no power, no will of which there is not a presentiment, a reflection, a remote shadow in our hearts too.'

  And suddenly he drew himself up to his full height, and the youth stood amazed, for the King's face for a moment was bathed in a bright, unshadowed smile like the glow of morning.

  'Go now,' he cried to the messenger, 'go now and leave us to our wars and our murders! You have made my heart soft, you have put me in mind of my mother, enough, enough of this, dear beautiful boy. Go now, flee before the next battle begins! I shall think of you when blood flows and cities burn, and I will think of the world as a whole from which even our blindness and our rage and our ruthlessness cannot cut us off. Farewell, and give my greetings to your star and my greetings to that deity whose symbol is a heart being devoured by a bird! I know so well that heart and that bird. And note this, my beautiful friend from afar: when you think of your friend, when you think of the poor King embroiled in war, do not think of him sitting on his couch plunged in misery, but rather think of him as he stood with tears in his eyes and blood on his hands and smiled!'

  The King raised the flap of the tent with his own hand, not waking his servant, and let the stranger depart. The youth, plunged in new thoughts, hurried back across the plain, and in the evening sunshine he saw on the horizon a great city in flames, and he made his way over dead men and the rotting carcasses of horses until it was dark and he had reached the edge of the forest.

  There the great bird was already descending from the clouds, it took him on its wings and flew back through the night as silently and softly as the flight of an owl.

  When the youth awoke from an unquiet sleep, he was lying in the little temple in the mountains, and before the temple in the wet grass stood his horse, whinnying at the dawn. But about the great bird and about his journey to another star, about the King and about the battlefield, he no longer remembered anything at all. All that remained was a shadow in his soul, a little obscure pain as from a small thorn, the way helpless sympathy hurts, and a little unsatisfied wish such as sometimes torments us in dreams until finally we encounter the person to whom we secretly long to show our love, whose joy we secretly long to share, whose smile we secretly long to see.

  The messenger mounted his horse and rode all day long and came to the capital and into the presence of his King, and he proved to be the right messenger. For the King received him with the greeting of grace by touching his forehead and exclaiming: 'Your eyes have spoken to my heart, and my heart has assented. Your request is granted before I have so much as heard it.'

  Forthwith the messenger received a charter from the King proclaiming that all the flowers of the whole country were at his disposal, and companions and outriders and servants joined him, and horses and wagons appeared, and when after a few days he made his way around the mountains, returning home on the level highway to his province and his town, he was accompanied by wagons and carts and hampers, horses and donkeys, all bearing the most beautiful flowers from the gardens and hot-houses of the north, and there were enough flowers to wreathe the bodies of the dead and richly adorn their graves as well as to plant as memorial on each grave a flower, a bush, and a young fruit tree, as custom demands. And the pain for his friend and his favourite horse left him and was replaced by a tranquil, happy memory when he had adorned them too and buried them and over their graves had planted two flowers, two bushes, and two fruit trees.

  After he had thus performed his duties and assuaged his heart, the memory of that journey through the night began to stir in his mind, and he besought those closest to him for a day of solitude, and sat under the meditation tree for a day and a night, and spread out in thought, clear and unwrinkled, the pictures of what had happened to him on that alien star. As a result he approached the Eldest one day, begged him for a private conversation, and told him all.

  The Eldest gave ear, sat plunged in thought, and finally asked: 'My friend, did you see all this with your eyes or was it a dream?'

  'I do not know,' said the youth. 'I believe in fact that it may have been a dream. However, with your indulgence, may it be said there seems hardly any difference if these happenings were presented in actuality to my senses. A shadow of sadness has remained within me, and in the midst of joy in life a chilling wind blows upon me from that distant star. Therefore, I ask you, reverend sir, what shall I do?'

  'Tomorrow go again to the mountains,' said the Eldest, 'and to the place where you found the temple. The symbol of that god of whom I have never heard seems strange to me, and it may well be that he is a god from another star. On the other hand, perhaps that temple and its god are so old that they belong to the times of our earliest forebears, to those long-ago days when it is said there were still weapons, horror, and the fear of death among us. Go to that temple, my friend, and make an offering there of flowers, honey, and song.'

  The youth spoke his thanks and followed the directions of the Eldest. He took a bowl of fine honey such as is set before the guests of honour at the first Festival of the Bees in early summer, and he carried his lute with him. In the mountains he found the place where he had once picked the blue bellflower, and he found the steep rocky mountain path through the woods where he had led his horse. But he could not again discover the place of the temple or the temple itself, or the black sacrificial stone, the wooden columns, the roof or the great bird on the roof, not that day and not the next day, and no one could tell him of any such temple as he described.

  So he turned back towards home and when he came to the Sanctuary of Loving Remembrance, he went in and offere
d up the honey, sang a song to the accompaniment of his lute, and commended to the Deity of Loving Remembrance the dream he had had, the temple and the bird, the poor farmer, the dead on the battlefield, and most especially the King in his war tent. Thereafter, he went home lightened in heart, hung up on the wall of his room the symbol of the unity of the worlds, recuperated in deep sleep from the experiences of the past days, and next morning began to help his neighbours, who were busy in garden and field eradicating the last traces of the earthquake, singing as they worked.

  The Hard Passage

  Beside the dark opening in the cliff at the entrance to the gorge I stood hesitating, and turned to look back.

  The sun was shining in that pleasant green world, above the meadows brownish grass blossoms waved and flickered. It was good to be out there in warmth and well-loved ease, out where one's soul hummed deep and satisfied like a hairy bumblebee in the heavy fragrance and light; perhaps I was a fool to want to leave all this and climb up into the mountain range.

  My guide touched me gently on the arm. I tore my eyes away from the beloved landscape, the way a man forcibly frees himself from a warm bath. Now I saw the gorge lying in sunless darkness, a little black stream crept out of the cleft, pale grass grew in small tufts on its bank, in its bed lay stones that it had tumbled there, stones of all shades, pale and dead like the bones of creatures that had died long ago.

  'We'll take a rest,' I said to the guide.

  He smiled indulgently, and we sat down. It was cool, and out of the rocky entrance flowed a gentle stream of dark, stone-cold air.

  Nasty, nasty to go this way! Nasty to force oneself through this cheerless rocky entrance, to stride across this cold brook, to climb up in darkness into this narrow ragged gorge!

  'The way looks horrible,' I said in hesitation.

  As though from the dying embers of a fire, a strong unbelievable unreasoning hope flared up within me, the hope that we could perhaps still turn back, that my guide might even now allow himself to be persuaded, that we might be spared all this. Yes, why not, really? Wasn't it a thousand times more beautiful in the place we had just left? Did not life there flow richer, warmer, more enchanting? And wasn't I a human being, a childlike, short-lived creature with a right to some share of happiness, to a cosy corner in the sun, to the sight of blue sky and flowers?

  No, I wanted to stay where I was. I had no wish to play the hero and martyr! I would be content all my life if I were allowed to stay in the valley and in the sun.

  Already I was beginning to shiver; it was impossible to linger here for long.

  'You're shivering,' said the guide. 'We had better move on.'

  Thereupon he stood up and for a moment stretched to his full height and looked down at me with a smile; there was neither derision nor sympathy in the smile, neither harshness nor compassion. There was nothing there but understanding, nothing but knowledge. That smile said: 'I know you. I know your fear and how you feel, and I have by no means forgotten your boastings of yesterday and the day before. Every rabbity dodge of cowardice your soul is now indulging in, every flirtatious glance at the lovely sunshine out there is well known and familiar to me before you act it out.'

  With this smile the guide looked at me and took the first stride into the dark rocky chasm ahead of us, and I hated him and loved him as a condemned man hates and loves the axe above his neck. Above all, I hated and despised his knowledge, his leadership and calmness, his lack of amiable weaknesses, and I hated everything in myself that agreed with him, that approved him, that wanted to be like him and to follow him.

  Already he had taken a number of steps, walking on the stones through the black brook, and was just on the point of disappearing from sight around the first bend.

  'Stop!' I cried, so full of fear that I was compelled to think at the same time: If this were a dream, then at this very moment my terror would dissolve it and I would wake up. 'Stop!' I cried. 'I cannot do it, I am not yet ready.'

  The guide stopped and looked across at me in silence, without reproach, but with that dreadful understanding of his, with that unbearable knowledge and presentiment, that having completely-understood-in-advance.

  'Would you rather that we turn back?' he asked, and he had not finished saying the last word when I knew, full of rebellion, that I would say no, that I would have to say no. And at the same time, everything long familiar, loved, and trusted within me cried in desperation: 'Say yes, say yes!' and the whole world and my homeland were chained like an iron ball to my leg.

  I wanted to shout yes, though I knew very well that I could not do it.

  Then with outstretched arm the guide pointed back into the valley, and I turned around once more towards that well-loved region. And now what I saw was the most painful thing that could have happened to me: I saw my beloved valleys and fields lying pale and lustreless under a white enfeebled sun, the colours clashed, false and shrill, the shadows were a rusty black and without magic, and the heart had been cut out of everything, everything, the charm and fragrance were gone - everything smelled and tasted of things long since over-indulged in to the point of nausea. Oh, how well I knew all this, how I feared and hated this horrid trick of the guide, this degradation of what was dear and pleasant to me, causing the sap and spirit to drain out of it, falsifying the smells and secretly poisoning the colours! Oh, I knew this; what was wine but yesterday, today was vinegar. And the vinegar would never become wine again. Never again.

  I was silent and sad as I followed the guide. He was, of course, right, now as always. It was a good thing at least that he remained visibly with me instead - as so often happened at moments of decision - of disappearing suddenly and leaving me alone, alone with that alien voice inside my breast into which at such times he transformed himself.

  I was silent, but my heart cried passionately: 'Only stay, I will assuredly follow!'

  The stones in the brook were horribly slippery; it was tiring and dizzying to walk like this, step by step on narrow wet stones that slipped away and shrank under one's feet. At the same time the path in the brook began to rise steeply and the dark cliff walls drew closer together, they swelled ominously and every corner showed the malicious intention of clamping down behind us and cutting off our retreat forever. Over wart-covered yellow rocks ran a viscous slimy sheet of water. No sky above our heads, neither clouds nor blue.

  I walked and walked, following my guide and often closing my eyes in fear and disgust. Then there was a dark flower growing beside the path, velvety black with an air of sadness. It was beautiful and spoke to me familiarly, but my guide walked faster and I felt that if I lingered for a single moment, if I bestowed so much as one more glance on that sad, velvety eye, then my depression and hopeless gloom would become overwhelming and unendurable, and my spirit would remain forever imprisoned in that mocking region of senselessness and madness.

  Wet and dirty, I crept on, and as the damp walls came closer together above us my guide began to sing his old chant of consolation. In his strong clear youthful voice he sang in time to each stride: 'I will, I will, I will!' I knew very well that he wanted to encourage me and spur me on, he wanted to divert me from the hideous toil and hopelessness of this hellish journey. I knew that he was waiting for me to chime in with his singsong. But I refused to do it, I would not grant him that victory. Was I in any mood to sing? And wasn't I a human being, a poor simple fellow who in defiance of his own heart had been drawn into situations and deeds which God could not expect of him? Were not every forget-me-not and every pink allowed to stay where they had grown along the brook, to bloom and wither after their own fashion?

  'I will, I will, I will!' the guide sang uninterruptedly. Oh, if only I had been able to turn back! But with my guide's skilful help I had long since clambered over walls and abysses across which there was no possible return. Tears burned in my throat but I dared not weep, that least of all. And so defiantly and loudly I joined in the guide's song, in the same rhythm and tone but not with his words; inste
ad I sang determinedly: 'I must, I must, I must!' But it was not easy to sing and climb at the same time, soon I lost my breath and was forced to fall silent, gasping. But he went on singing unwearied: 'I will, I will, I will,' and in time he compelled me after all to join in singing his words. Now the climbing was easier and I no longer felt under compulsion, in fact I wished to go on, and as for weariness from singing, there was no further trace of that.

  Then there was a brightness inside me and as this increased, the smooth cliff receded too, became drier, became kinder, often aided the slipping foot, and above all more and more of the clear blue heavens appeared, like a little blue stream between rocky banks, and soon like a little blue lake that grew longer and wider.

  I tried to exert my will more intensely and more profoundly, and the heavenly lake continued to grow and the path became more practicable, yes, at times I hurried unencumbered over long stretches, easily keeping pace with my guide. And then unexpectedly I saw the summit close above us, steep and glittering in the shining sunny air.

  A short distance below the summit we crawled out of the narrow crevasse, sun assailed my dazzled eyes, and when I opened them again my knees shook with dread, for I found myself standing free and without support on a sheer ridge; round about were infinite space and terrifying blue depths, only the narrow summit towered above us thin as a ladder. But sky and sun were there once more, and so we clambered up that last terrifying pitch as well, step by step, with compressed lips and knotted brows. And stood on the summit, trivial figures on the sun-warmed rock in the sharp, bitingly thin air.