The Last Cato (60 page)

“Or how that drop of sweat sounds,” he continued unperturbed, “that’s sliding down Ottavia’s back at this very moment?”

I was frightened. What was he saying? I kept my mouth shut when I noticed that, on account of nervous tension and excitement, a very small drop of sweat did rush down my spine.

“What’s going on?” I exclaimed, totally disconcerted.

“Ottavia, tell me,” the man with the rings was implacable, “at what rate is your heart beating? I can tell you: like this…” He tapped the table with two fingers, perfectly in time with the palpitations I felt at the center of my chest. “And how does the wine you’re drinking smell? Have you noticed its spices, the slightly buttery texture it leaves in your mouth, and its dense, dry woody flavor?”

I was from Sicily, the greatest wine-growing region of Italy. My family has vineyards and we drink wine at meals, but I’d never noticed anything like what he was describing.

“If you can’t perceive what is around you or feel what’s happening to you,” he concluded with an amiable but clear and firm tone, “if you don’t enjoy the beauty because you can’t even detect it, and if you know less than the youngest children in my school, don’t pretend to be in possession of the truth or allow yourself to fear those who have welcomed you warmly.”

“Come on, Shakeb,” Mirsgana said, coming to our defense. “That is all well and good, but that’s enough. They just got here. We need to be patient.”

Shakeb changed his expression quickly, showing some repentance.

“Forgive me,” he asked. “Mirsgana is right. But accusing us of murdering Dante was impertinent on your part.”

These people certainly spoke their minds.

Farag, on the other hand, was tense and clearly deep in thought. As he followed Shakeb’s logic, I was sure I could hear the gears in his brain turning at top speed.

“Forgive me, Shakeb, for what I’m about to say,” he said in a monotone voice. “Although I accept the possibility that you can see that flame from afar or smell the aromas of the cabbage jam coming from the kitchen, I refuse to accept that you can hear Ottavia’s heart beating or a drop of sweat sliding down her back. It’s not that I doubt you, but…”

“Well,” Ufa interrupted him, taking up Shakeb’s reply, “in fact we all heard that drop and right now we can hear the beats of your heart, just like we can hear in your voice how nervous you are or how the food in your stomach is digesting.”

I couldn’t have been more incredulous; my unease increased at the thought that something in all that was true.

“No, that’s impossible,” I stammered.

“Want proof?” Gete offered amiably.

“Of course,” Farag replied curtly.

“I’ll give it to you,” declared Ahmose, the builder of chairs, who had not joined in till then. “Candace,” she whispered, as if she were speaking in the servant’s ear. I looked around, but Candace wasn’t in the room. “Candace, would you please bring some of that elderberry flower pastry you just took out of the oven?” She waited a few seconds, then smiled with satisfaction. Candace answered: “Right away, Ahmose.”

“Ha!” Farag blurted out. Farag had to swallow his disdain when, almost immediately, Candace came through one of the doors bringing a plate of a white pudding that had to be what Ahmose had requested.

“Here’s the elderberry flower pastry, Ahmose,” he said. “I fixed it thinking about you. I have already put aside a piece for you to bring home.”

“Thanks, Candace,” she replied with a happy smile. There was no doubt they lived together.

“I don’t understand.” My distrustful
didaskalos
continued to be suspicious. “I really don’t understand.”

“You do not understand… but you’re starting to accept it,” said Ufa, raising his wineglass joyfully in the air. “Let’s toast to all the wonderful things you are going to learn in
Paradeisos!”

Everyone in our group raised their glasses and toasted enthusiastically. Those in the Rock and Cato’s group didn’t moved a muscle, fascinated by whatever it was they were listening to.

Shakeb was right. The wine smelled of spices; its flavor was dense and dry like wood. A minute after we toasted, its smooth buttery texture lingered on my taste buds.

T
hat afternoon we strolled through Stauros accompanied by Ufa, Mirsgana, Gete, and Khutenptah, the
shasta
of agriculture, who became quick friends with Captain Glauser-Röist. She came along to show us the greenhouses and their overall agricultural production system. The Rock, ever the agricultural engineer, was extremely interested in this aspect of life in
Paradeisos.

When we left Cato’s
basileion
after lunch, we walked back through numerous rooms and patios. Our guides, who spoke English, cleared up the mystery of the absence of the sun.

“Look up,” Mirsgana said.

Overhead there was no sky. Stauros was located in a gigantic underground cave whose colossal dimensions were delineated by walls and a ceiling you couldn’t see. If hundreds of excavating machines, like those that dug the English Channel, had worked nonstop for a century, they couldn’t have dug a space like the one Stauros occupied at the heart of the Earth. Its size was equal to that of Rome and New York combined. But Stauros was just the capital of
Paradeisos.
Three other cities were built in grottos just as large. A complex system of corridors and amazing galleries connected the four urban centers.

“Paradeisos
is a marvelous whim of Nature,” Ufa explained, who’d insisted on taking us to the stables where he trained horses, “the result of terrible volcanic eruptions in the Pleistocene era. Hot water flowed through here and dissolved the limestone, leaving just lava rock. Our brothers found this place in the thirteenth century. Can you believe that, after seven centuries, we still haven’t explored the entire area?”

“Tell us how the light works here, without the sun,” Farag requested, taking my hand as he walked by my side. The city streets were paved with rocks. Down them traveled riders on horseback and horse-drawn carts that seemed to be the only means of transportation. On the sidewalks, bright mosaic tiles depicted natural landscapes or scenes depicting musicians, craftsmen, and other snapshots of daily life, all in pure Byzantine style. Several Staurofilakes swept the grounds and gathered trash with strange mechanical shovels.

“Stauros has more than three hundred streets,” Mirsgana said, waving to a woman who watched from a first-floor window. The houses were made of the same volcanic rock, but the cornices and decorative touches, the drawings and colors of the facades, conferred upon them a delicate, extravagant, or distinguished air, depending on the owner’s taste. “In the city there are seven lakes, all navigable, baptized by the first settlers with the names of the seven cardinal and theological virtues that counter the seven deadly sins.”

“The lakes, especially Temperance and Patience, are full of blind fish and albino crustaceans,” Khutenptah pointed out, who looked very familiar to me. My memory is excellent; I was sure I’d seen her before, outside
Paradeisos.
She was very attractive; her black hair and eyes and classic features (including a delicate nose) were triggering a memory within me.

“We also have,” Mirsgana continued, “a delightful river, the
Kolos,
*
that springs from below just outside of Lignum, and flows through our four cities, forming Lake Charity in Stauros. The
Kolos
provides the energy to light up
Paradeisos.
Forty years ago we bought old turbines whose hydraulic wheels generate electricity when water flows across them. I’m not well-versed on this subject,” she apologized, “so that’s all I can tell you. I only know we have power. Up above,” she said pointing to the immense vault, “even though you can’t see them, are copper cables that run from Stauros to different locations.”

“But Cato’s
basileion
was illuminated with candles,” I countered.

“Our machines aren’t powerful enough to light all the houses, which is not our intent. Illuminating the city’s open spaces is sufficient. Have you needed more light at any time? During centuries of darkness, the craftsmen of
Paradeisos
developed candles with very intense light. What’s more, our vision is wonderful, as you may have noticed.”

“Why?” Farag asked quickly. “Why is your vision so good?”

“That,” said Gete, “you’ll understand when we visit our schools.”

“You have schools to improve vision?” the Rock asked admiringly.

“In our education system, the senses and everything related to them are fundamental. If not, how could children study Nature, experiment, draw their own conclusions, and verify them? It would be like asking a blind man to draw a map. The Staurofilakes who arrived seven centuries ago had to pass very difficult hardships that inspired them to develop very useful techniques to improve quality of life and instill survival.”

“The first settlers discovered that fish lost their eyesight and the crustaceans their color because they didn’t need them in the dark waters of
Paradeisos,”
Khutenptah explained with a slight smile. “They also noticed some species of bird nested in the cliffs that didn’t use their eyes to fly because they had developed their own system of sight, like bats. They studied thoroughly the fauna of this place and reached interesting conclusions. Through a series of very simple exercises and a lot of practice, human beings adapted. This is what the children in our schools are taught as well as newcomers in
Paradeisos,
like you.”

“But is that possible?” I persisted. “Can you sharpen your vision or your hearing with exercises?”

“Of course. It’s a slow process, but very effective. How do you think Leonardo da Vinci studied and described the smallest detail of birds’ flight and then used that knowledge to design his flying machines? He had sight similar to ours, and he obtained it through a visual training system which he devised.”

On the surface, we made machines that supplemented our sensorial deficiencies (microscopes, telescopes, loudspeakers, computers…); while down in
Paradeisos,
they had worked for centuries to perfect their faculties, sharpening them and developing them to imitate Nature. Like the tests in
Purgatory,
this sensory achievement opened the doors to a new way of understanding life, the world, beauty, and everything that surrounded them. Up above we were rich in technology; down here they were rich in spirit. The mystery of the inexplicable theft of the
Ligna Crucis
was cleared up: Thieves carried out perfect robberies, without clues, violence, or traces of any kind. What kind of monitoring system could stop the Staurofilakes, with their highly developed senses, from taking what they wanted from the most heavily guarded place in the world?

We crossed streets, where carriages and carts traveled calmly, and plazas and gardens where people amused themselves by juggling balls and maces, an activity that was part of the training curriculum, in this case to become ambidextrous. We came to the banks of the
Kolos.
It must have been more than sixty or seventy meters wide, its irregular rocky shores had been reinforced with railings carved with flowers and palms. I rested my hand on the guardrail as I watched boats sail by and I felt like I had put my hand on a patch of grease, but it wasn’t so. My hand was clean, and what seemed like a greasy surface was actually a spectacularly polished one. It was then that I remembered that stone in Santa Lucia that slid so smoothly down the tunnel as if it had been greased.

Canoes and pirogues slid through the quiet waters of
Kolos
with one, two, up to three people grasping the oars. More eye-catching boats transported merchandise. They looked like big, heavy doughnuts whose belly had up to three rows of short, wide oars, like Greek and Roman boats. Those ships, explained Ufa, were the principal means of transporting people and goods between Stauros, Lignum, Edem, and Crucis. Stauros was the capital and the biggest city, with almost fifty thousand inhabitants; the smallest, Crucis, had twenty thousand.

“How can you still use rowers?” I asked scandalized. “Who are those poor men, condemned to the galley, spending their life sweating, poorly fed, and ill in the bowels of a dark boat?”

“Why not?” The four were surprised.

“It’s inhumane!” the Rock roared, as scandalized as Farag and I.

“Inhumane? It is a very sought after position!” Gete said, watching the boats longingly. “I was only allowed three months.”

“Rowing is a very fun job,” Mirsgana hurried to explain, when she saw our look of astonishment. “The young people, boys and girls, all want to get a place on a transport ship. It’s in very high demand. So everyone can be a rower, only three-month licenses are granted, as Gete said.”

“You’ll have to try it,” Gete added, with a nostalgic look. “The speed and different styles of the oars that propel the boat, the synchronized movements, the group effort, the camaraderie… You grasp the oar very firmly, lean forward, flex your legs, then push off backward. It is a great sequence that really strengthens your shoulders, back, and legs. What’s more, you get to know a lot of new people and the bonds of friendship between the four cities are strengthened.”

I thought it might be a good idea to remain silent for the rest of the visit. The looks I exchanged with Farag and Captain Glauser-Röist showed they were thinking the same thing. Everyone seemed happy to do hard, even unpleasant tasks. Maybe they weren’t so hard or unpleasant after all. Could it be that other very different reasons—social opinion, economic status—were what made them unpleasant?