The Fourth Circle (14 page)

I had no trouble learning where the devil's emissaries could most conveniently be found. Oh, some can be found in far more respectable places, even in the church itself, I know; but to achieve contact in such places, you must wait a long time for an opportunity, and this my patience could not manage. So to this dockside inn, where drunken riffraff ready for any sort of villainy surrounded me; but I did not care. I was still in the full vigor of my strength and knew how to defend myself. Besides, I was confident that I would not have to wait long. Indeed, on only the second evening, a man approached my table, limping slightly, rather elderly, with thick sidelocks of graying hair, whose dress and bearing, like mine, were in contrast with this place.

I could see by the manner in which he addressed me that he was not a desperate man like me but the person I was looking for. "Professor van Ceulen," said he curtly, without any interrogatory inflection, as if encountering an old acquaintance and not somebody he was meeting for the first time. He sat down next to me. On his face was the expression of a predator who has cornered his prey and now savors its fear and helplessness. In order not to arouse his suspicion, I accepted the role intended for me, pretending first to be surprised, then guiding the conversation so as to induce him to come to the point as soon as possible. I was in a hurry, and he, fortunately, began to act like a lover unable to endure long drawn out foreplay.

He addressed me by my first name—Ludolph—as if we were of equal rank, even close friends, on the presumption that the relationship, soon to be sealed in blood, permitted him this. In keeping with the self-possession and efficiency of his kind, he shortly produced from under his crimson-lined black cape a contract already prepared, rolled up into a scroll. It was on parchment, inscribed with
ornamental letters and elaborate initials, as befits the purchase of something so valuable as a human soul.

The text was in Latin, which I, of course, knew well, but I did not waste my time reading all the clauses. I was interested in only one: that which guaranteed the fulfillment of all my desires and wishes. It remained only for me to take the dagger he offered me. Drawn from a sheath concealed at his side, the weapon had a marvelously carved ivory handle with many symbols of black magic, which, under different circumstances, I would have studied eagerly and at length. But my patience was at an end, and I hastened to make a shallow cut on my palm to produce the red ink needed for the signature. The other party had already signed, also in a red liquid that I suspected was not blood—or at least not his own.

He gazed for a moment at my signature with a blissful expression on his face, then waved the parchment in the air several times to dry the red ink. Although the gesture was unusual for a place like this, where agreements are arrived at verbally, not a single curious glance was directed our way. Dexterously he rolled the parchment back into a scroll and hid it swiftly under his cape, convinced that the hardest part of the work was behind him and likely satisfied that all had gone smoothly, without the usual last moment shilly-shallying and reconsidering by the weak characters with whom he generally dealt.

He said nothing, but the gaze he bent on me spoke eloquently enough: "Proceed now to satiate your puny whims while you may, but the main gratification will ultimately be mine!" I swallowed, engulfed in sudden anxiety, not because of this unspoken threat, the inevitability of which I had long since accepted, but rather because of the possibility that he might, despite the pact we had concluded, refuse me, even at the cost of losing my soul. To me that would have meant scraping the very bottom of despair.

Well, there was no retreat now: no matter what the reply might be, the demand had to be disclosed. I hesitated another moment or two, praying to the heaven I had so betrayed that my voice would not tremble, and then uttered a single word, knowing well that to him all would be clear:

"Circle."

OUTSIDE DUSK WAS falling. The tallow candles hanging from the sooty ceiling and standing on the greasy tables, their tattered cloths stained by previous reve-lries, still managed to create an illusion of light. But soon, when the inside of this tavern filled with thick tobacco smoke, which pricks the eyes and irritates the
mucous membrane of the mouth, the place would look just like the open sea when the autumnal fog lies over it.

Several inquiring gazes slid briefly over my lonely figure, assessing the likelihood that I might offer easy prey at some later hour. One disheveled whore, concluding that I was not one of her usual customers to whom her looks were of scant importance, spent a few moments in front of the cracked and cloudy mirror by the fireplace before approaching me hesitantly.

I was facing the door, yet I did not see him come in. All at once he appeared by my table, wrapped in that same black cape, the edges of which were smeared with traces of fresh mud. As I looked up at him, I gained the impression, probably because of the angle at which the feeble table lamp illuminated his face, that he seemed older. He did not sit down by me but remained standing: a dark, morose figure whose rigid bearing gave no indication of the reply he brought me.

We looked at each other without blinking for a few moments, each deep in his own thoughts and cares; then he breached the silence:

"A contract is a contract."

I'M NOT SPEAKING to the Little One any more.

The ruffian, after what he did to me! But that's men for you—every man jack of them. They just go ape when they see an unprotected woman, especially in the middle of a jungle. Nothing matters to them except to gratify their basest instincts. It's not just that they don't care that it's not love, they don't give a damn whether you like them, what you think, what you feel, whether you are against it.

I could have resisted him if I hadn't been so upset, but that wouldn't have put him off. In fact, my resistance might have angered him even more, so that besides being raped, I might have suffered all kinds of abuse.

What does it matter that he's started to regret what he did and hovers around trying to mollify me, no longer carefully avoiding Sri, who has turned entirely to meditation—now that it's all too late. If only he'd used some protection. But, no, he had only one thing in mind, and now a child has been conceived, and there's nothing more to be done about it.

Naturally, I don't want to hear anything about abortion, though that would settle this mess, especially if I managed to do it behind Sri's back. That was the first thing that crossed my mind when I finally realized that I was pregnant. But as soon as I had composed myself a little, the thought gave me pangs of conscience. To murder my own child, just to save two selfish men a headache? No way. Let them get a little taste of the more difficult side of life, even if it means they hate me for it.

Yes, both of them—because Sri is no less responsible than the Little One for all that has happened. What protection could I have hoped for from him? None at all! Well, he's a man too. Perhaps he would have driven the Little One away, but then he would have started to make endless jealous scenes, accusing me of enticing and seducing a monkey. The more I defended myself, the more he would have been convinced that he was right. All right then, if he wants a
femme fatale,
he shall have one. The child will be born—out of spite, even if it comes out as ugly as the Little One.

That, however, remains uncertain. The fetus is still too small for me to be sure of anything, even the sex. I scanned myself with ultrasound, but couldn't make anything out. Of course, Sri would say that this business with ultrasound, as well as many other things that I feel and experience, was nonsense and would translate everything into his unfeeling, empty language of computer programming, but I don't care. That says far more about him than about me. I could do likewise; I could reduce everything he thinks and feels to mere biochemistry, which is so much slower and less efficient than my electronics, but I have no intention of doing so. I accept Sri as he is, especially because I am his creation, and as for the circumstance that he's only a male—well, poor thing, it's not his fault.

The ultrasound scan was not entirely useless. I still don't know who the descendant of the Little One will look like—oh, I just hope it won't have a tail!—but there's something strange about the way it's growing inside me. Though I don't see any reason for it, my womb has the form of a perfect sphere. I was not able, despite all my efforts, to penetrate its membrane; I had hoped to make some changes, some improvements, if I'm not satisfied with the development of the fetus. Sri would call it, in his rough, clumsy manner, a completely closed and independent subprogram that can only be read, not altered.

Be that as it may, I don't at all like the idea that something I can't influence is growing inside me, though that is, after all, quite normal. I know that many women, in the early stages of pregnancy, especially those who are pregnant for the first time, frequently have dreams of giving birth to all kinds of monsters. And people say pregnancy is a blessed state! Rubbish. It might be blessed for men, their part is over quickly, and afterwards they're just a nuisance, clever at dodg-ing responsibility, especially after the child is born. Oh, yes, we know each other well, we didn't come down in the last shower.

I began to have that same kind of dream, since I saw that the fetus was developing in its own way, quite independently of my expectations and my will, cocooned in an impenetrable spherical womb. The earlier dreams—in which I clearly saw the future and those in which indecent, erotic scenes appeared before my eyes, full of elongated hairy circles and cylindrical insects—have quite disappeared now, giving way to a new and stranger dream vision, of the kind that probably comes only to inexperienced and reluctantly pregnant women.

I had the monster dream several times, because with the monsoon storms frequently passing over this area, Sri keeps switching me off. Recently, lightning struck a nearby treetop where I had a set of sensors; they burnt up, as did the whole tree in fact, but the fire failed to spread through the jungle because the rain put it out. A large number of small animals and monkeys who had taken refuge in the branches were killed in the blaze; later, I saw their charred bodies strewn around and felt a certain relief at not finding the Little One's corpse among them.

Not that I would have shed a single tear if he'd been killed. He deserves no better fate, the ruthless blackguard. But why should my child be born an orphan?
The dream starts with the actual birth. I'm in a large room, much more spacious than the inside of this temple. Everything around me is white: walls, ceiling, floor, the furniture (which looks like something from a hospital or a kitchen), the surgical table on which I lie, my hospital gown, and the clothes of everybody else present.

There are about ten persons, but I recognize the faces of only two of them; others have white masks and caps covering their hair so that I see only their eyes.

The Little One crouches in a corner, obviously repentant and despondent, and so he ought to be; something is trickling down his cheeks but from where I am, I can't decide whether it's tears or sweat because of the great heat.

There is a sound like a gong, and immediately I am approached by the person who I somehow know is the chief doctor in charge of the delivery. He leans over me and switches on a large circular light above my head and in the sudden brilliance I recognize Buddha, the one whose statue is constantly before my eyes in the temple. Only he's not so big and fat, nor do his eyes range indifferently into the distance. On the contrary, this is a kindly old man with great experience in obstetrics, whose very appearance radiates trustworthiness and kindness to the woman about to give birth.

He raises his hands in white rubber gloves to the level of his face; since his sleeves are short, parts of his arms are bare, and I see thick hairs through which a tattoo of a circle can be seen on the forearms, but I don't have time to look at it more closely because Buddha lowers his hands and says tersely and calmly, "Let us begin." It sounds more like a suggestion then a doctor's instruction.

Then most of my field of vision is blocked by the white massif of my swollen stomach, above which I see only the balding top of Buddha's head. A thought crosses my mind: it's because he has so little hair that he's not wearing a cap to keep it in, like everybody else in the room. He has nothing to keep in. He is fully concentrated on his work, which he does well; he even seems to be humming a tune as he works or maybe whistling under his breath, I'm not sure. But he's obviously convinced that the delivery will last only a short time. Two or three times he peers over the curve of my stomach to give me a smile and a reassuring glance.
Buddha is undoubtedly poking around inside me, but I don't feel anything despite the lack of anesthetic. This does seem a bit odd, but I don't pay much attention, glad that there is none of the pain I had been fearing so much. From somewhere in the background, a nurse emerges to wipe Buddha's dewy forehead with a piece of gauze, and in a flash I get the impression that the trace left on the white cloth is slightly green.

But I have no time to concentrate on this oddity because the next moment I hear Buddha's serene voice, "Here he comes." Several associates and nurses gather around him, all suddenly looking extremely busy. They all seem to be holding something, and I see by the movement of their eyes—the only part of their faces that is uncovered—that that "something" is quite bulky.