“Silence!” he cried.
And got it instantly.
“I am the pope,” he said. “I—you must listen to me. Please.” Now that he stood here, now that everyone’s attention was his to command, the old fears came rushing back to assail him. What would he say? How could he convince these people of the truth he knew so well?
His eyes moved from their staring faces and went to the walls. Again, he focused upon the fresco of Sebastian, letting his indignation grow. He felt a divine anger welling up inside him, like a raging beast; it seemed as if he were possessed by an avenging angel.
He cried: “Blasphemy!” and waved his fists at the wall.
The men below stared, turned their heads slowly, one by one, until all were gazing into the gloom of that dark corner.
“Yes,” said Julian. “You see it, don’t you? Look closer, please. That is Sebastian whom you see. Do you hear the way I speak that word? As though it were a curse.”
The angel inside drew him onward. He could not have stopped even if he had wished.
“A curse—and do you know why? Because it is a curse. And why do I find this monstrous painting upon the walls of this blessed chapel? Because the devil himself has put it there—Satan come to Earth in order to resurrect the black soul of his precious son. Sebastian, born the spawn of that dark devil and come among men, tempting them to leave the world of their ancestors. This world—our world—lovingly created by the hand of the Lord. I call upon each of you to read your Bible. Read it all—and I do not refer to that blasphemous volume composed by Satan which goes about in certain lands disguised as the Word of God—but especially read the Book of the Apocalypse, for it is there that you will see Sebastian revealed in his true form. As the spawn of Satan. I know of what I speak. Am I not the pope? I beg of you to listen. You must, oh, you must.”
But he sensed, in spite of the angel’s presence, that he had not stirred them. Looking upon them, he failed to glimpse the emotions that should have stood plainly upon their faces: fear, anger, indignation, loathing. Instead, he saw curiosity, puzzlement, confusion, bafflement, and shock. He threw up his hands, preparing to fight again. He would not cease talking till his voice ran dry, until no words were left to utter, until they brought him down and killed him.
“Have you ever tried to live in it?”
“What?” Julian tilted forward, seeking the source of this interruption.
“I asked if you’d ever tried living in this world, tried existing off the bounty of a dead land, avoiding starvation, plague, and death? Have you ever left the walls of your castle and tried to live like a man?”
Julian still could not find this man; there were too many other faces.
“I am the pope,” Julian said.
“But we are the people. You can’t tell us about Satan because we know him. We’ve fought him and beat him. Not forever—no—but for the moment he is vanquished. And, having done that, we know this, too: Sebastian was the Son of God, the second appearance of the Messiah. And all the lies of a jealous church cannot transform that single fact into an ugly lie. We know—the priest knows. Ask him.”
The unseen man had succeeded in moving the crowd more deeply than all Julian’s ravings.
A cry spread through the room like the roll of thunder: “Ask the priest!”
“No, no,” cried Julian. “The devil is here among you. I beg you to fight him. Don’t let him inside you. Please—listen to me, I pray.”
“It’s you who’s got the devil inside him,” said the man. “It’s you we pity.”
Now Julian saw him. His eyes touched those of the man and, the instant this occurred, he raised his hands and clutched at his face. Julian screamed, for there—not twenty feet away, one among hundreds—stood the man with black skin and golden eyes.
He screamed and screamed and did not stop until he looked again. The man was gone. Someone else stood in his place. The devil had come, the devil had gone.
The bishop came forward and led Julian gently from the altar.
When he awoke, his leg was hurting awfully and he uttered a mournful wail.
“Shut up,” said Andrew. “I’ll be done in a second.”
“But it hurts.”
“It’s supposed to.” Andrew leaned over, holding up a hand, showing Julian the needle and thread. Then he held up his other hand, displaying the stump of the severed leg.
“Oh,” said Julian.
“That’s two you’ve lost so far. I hope you’re more careful after this. I only brought two of each.”
“Was it the same leg?” The pain was fading already. Carefully, he hopped on his new leg. It felt as natural as the old.
“No, the other one.”
“That’s good.” For the first time, Julian looked around. It was dark. Nearby, a fire was burning. He spied a plate heaped with food—greens and com—and hurried over. Using his fingers, he filled his mouth. “What happened?” he asked.
“The priest said you fell down a flight of stairs. Two bones broke in your leg.”
“Maybe so.” Julian shook his head. “I really can’t remember. I must have hit my head.”
“I didn’t see any bruise.”
Julian shrugged, setting down his plate. “What was the trouble back there? Do you know?” He was lying. He remembered everything. But he didn’t want Andrew to know.
“I don’t know anything about it. They wouldn’t tell me.”
“I suppose not.” Julian was sitting in his underwear. Realizing this, he stood quickly. “I’ll be right back.” He went over to where the mule was tied and found his armor on the ground. Hastily, cursing the slowness of his fingers, he began to dress.
But before he had finished, a horrible sensation came over him: he thought he could hear someone breathing.
Julian stepped around the mule and went to where Donna Maria lay. He lifted the silk dressing and stared at her pallid, shadowed face. Then, reaching out, he brushed her lips with the back of his hand. The touch was cold, dry. Like death, he thought with satisfaction.
Smiling, he went back and finished dressing.
Andrew speaking:
Many centuries ago, shortly after my graduation from the hutch, I made my first journey to the Shrine of Sebastian. I was already under service to the papal castle, so two older robots agreed to guide me. Though I’ve since revisited the shrine on many occasions, I would still say this first visit was the true high point of my life.
Along the way—we were walking, since robots were forbidden to ride in those years—one of the older robots suggested a shortcut. I knew immediately this was a clever trick to get me to see something without my knowing that I was seeing it on purpose. But I thought I was smart back then, and so I said all right.
It took us only a few hours to reach the outskirts of the village. At least that’s what I thought it was at first: a very old, very large village. We plunged right ahead. The houses sprouted all around us, their walls locked together like magnets, with no open space between and, as far as I could see in any direction—which, of course, was clear to the horizon—there were more houses. All were old; most had long ago collapsed on their foundations, some had lost their walls or roofs or both, and the road we followed was often made impassable by scattered bits of fallen rubble—brick and stone and wood.
“Who lives in this village?” I asked.
“It’s a city, not a village,” I was told. “And no one lives here.”
“Why not?”
“Because it is a city of skulls.”
I had heard of these before, so no further comment was really necessary; I knew they were strictly forbidden to man or robot. I contented myself with trying to spot a skull or two among the rubble—never having seen one before—but I didn’t see any. Finally, I asked about this.
“The skulls have turned to dust. Long ago. But the old name remains.”
We continued walking for several more hours. The city got denser and
denser, the buildings grew higher and higher. Finally, I couldn’t see the tops of the buildings anymore—they stretched clear away into the clouds. I wanted to go inside one of the buildings to look around, but the robots said no, it was too dangerous. The buildings were far older than they themselves, I was cautioned.
“How old?” I asked. “Before Sebastian?”
They seemed startled by my question. I had to ask it again before one answered, “Yes, some of them.”
Finally we reached a certain place and had to stop. There was nothing there; I mean that literally. The place was a huge hole in the ground that stretched for miles and miles, extending deep into the ground with an absolute blackness my eyes could not penetrate. The sides of the hole were jagged and strewn with rubble, but nothing lived down there—no plants, trees, or animals. In fact, I could not recall having caught a single glimpse of life since entering the city.
“Who made this hole?” I asked.
“Men.”
“How?”
“It is forgotten.”
“Why?”
“That, too, is forgotten.”
It was dark by this time. My companions insisted we stop until dawn because it was unsafe near the hole—in many places the ground was not solid—and they were afraid of accidents in the dark. We built no fire. They said there was nothing there to bum.
I waited until both were busy at this and that, then sneaked away. I slipped easily into the nearest building: the walls were full of gaping holes. I found myself in a vast room that stretched the entire length and width of the building. The odor was musty, like dry dust or dead ash. There once had been furniture here: you could see broken pieces of oddly bright wood sticking up everywhere. The carpet was worn nearly to extinction; the few remaining threads were red and blue in color.
I could find no way of reaching a higher floor. I did find a shaft extending far past the ceiling, through which I could glimpse a flash of deeper darkness that I thought might be the cloudy nighttime sky. The sides of the shaft were too steep and slippery for climbing.
I inspected this one room most carefully. I came upon many written messages—including a big sign tacked to one wall—but the writing was of the old kind, which I did not then understand, and the paper crumbled as soon as I touched it.
I even found a letter written in hand, also in the old language. But this, too, crumbled as easily as a spider’s web.
Then I discovered a painting of the most incredible reality. I immediately admired the genius of the artist, yet I could not approve of his subject.
The characters were two men. Both were horribly misshapen, their noses bent and twisted, their lips too thick, their eyes as huge as a normal man’s mouth, their ears like the leaves of some stunted plant, and their skin cracked and wrinkled like the hide of an old bull. I found the sight so thoroughly revolting—remember, I was young—that I tore the painting into shreds and tossed the pieces through the wall, letting the wind whisk them away.
Then I uncovered another painting, one many times larger than the first. The canvas had been torn in many places, but the intact portions showed another man—one hardly less horrible than the first two. His nose was perfectly round, as red and shiny as an apple, and on both cheeks there also were round red spots. Around his mouth was a white square. His lips were huge and bright red—and smiling. I knew he had to be laughing.
So I laughed, too.
Then I studied the painting, ignoring everything else around me. For some reason I could not tear my eyes away from this relic. I looked at the man’s cap, which hid most of his brown, gnarled hair. It had high peaks all around it, like the jeweled points of a crown. On the tip of each peak was a silver bell.
Eventually, I realized why I was so enthralled. I knew this man was the one the pope was always telling the villagers about: this was God. I can no longer recall exactly how or why I formed this conclusion, but I do know that the moment it entered my head I was absolutely convinced of its rightness.
Here was God standing before me, with a bright, happy smile upon his face, a cap with silver bells that jingle-jangled, and, in the only hand I could see, a big bottle of clear bubbly fluid, with a glass nozzle affixed to its stem.
When I finally managed to turn my eyes away from the painting, it was morning. I grabbed the painting and ran to find my companions. When I told them what the picture was, both were frightened, but I begged them to look.
“So that’s him,” said one.
“I’m sure of it.”
“But he’s gone now,” said the other.
“Yes,” said the first. “He went with Sebastian.”
But I couldn’t get them to tell any more. In spite of their protests, I carried the painting away with me. By noon, we left the city of skulls behind. By sunset the following day, we reached the Shrine of Sebastian.
Spitting, spluttering, blinking his eyes, Don Julian awoke. He let out a howl of humiliation as the ice-cold water ran down his face. The man holding the empty bucket laughed and said, “Next time you fall asleep, we’ll use boiling water.”
In many ways, having water thrown in his face was a blessing in disguise. Overhead, the sun beat fiercely down and, penned inside his armor, Julian was suffering awfully from the heat. As soon as he was fully alert, he forgot about the water, anyway. The horrible aching in his hands swept over him. Lifting his head, he saw, through the holes in his faceplate, a pair of thin, pale thumbs swaying above. The thumbs were his.
Dropping his head to his chest, he moaned.
The crowd standing across the square had grown considerably since he fell asleep. Besides the two dozen monks in their black robes, many villagers, including several women and children, had also gathered to watch. Seeing them, Julian experienced a flash of hope. Perhaps these people would understand even if the monks had not.
“Hey!” he called to them. “You people—listen to me! I am Julian—the new pope. I bring blessings to bestow upon you. If you wish, you may kiss my hand. I can’t be hung by my thumbs here in the village square like a common thief. Bless you—bless you, my children. God loves you.”
A small boy was the only one to indicate he had even heard. Bending down, the boy scooped a stone off the ground and gave it a heave. The stone skipped across the square, bounced off a bigger rock, and struck Julian on the shin. His armor clanged loudly. He howled with anger and cursed the boy.
“Hey,” a man called over. “Don’t use that kind of language to our children.”
“The voice of Satan himself,” said a monk.
“I thought he was the pope.”
“Sure, and I’m Jesus Christ.”
“You can call me Blessed Virgin.”
The villagers laughed. The monks began to chant in the old language, their voices rising in bleak unison.
“You’re boring them,” said Andrew, who hung by his thumbs not far from Julian. Since his thumbs were not made of flesh, the torture did not appear to have affected him especially. “I think you ought to save some of it for later. We don’t want to hasten the execution.”
“Execution?” Julian asked.
“While you were sleeping, the head monk and I chatted. Come noon, we burn.”
Julian glanced at the sky, but the moment he did, the sun seemed to leap forward, scurrying toward the summit of the sky. Hastily, he looked away and groaned, the sound blending well with the chanting of the monks.
“Do you know what they’re saying?” he asked Andrew.
“I’m not expert in the old language, but I believe they’re asking God to drive the devils away. It’s hard to say; their grammar is atrocious.”
Julian groaned again—this time from an accumulation of pain. They had reached this village late last night. Although they were running dangerously low on food and the village was the last before the shrine, Julian had not consented to stop till Andrew assured him no church was located here. Later, he said he had forgotten about the monast
ery. They had barely drawn their horses to a halt when the monks appeared with rope and torches. The horses and mule—along with Donna Maria’s body—had been confiscated and taken to a stable; within a quarter of an hour, he and Andrew were hanging here. Since then, nothing had changed, except that Julian’s thumbs hurt progressively more with each passing minute.
The chanting apparently had reached a peak, dangling by a slender droning note.
“What it reminds me of,” said Andrew, “is your recent sermon in the Chapel of Diego. You and the gentle monks would appear to have much in common. By the way, while you were sleeping the head monk kindly informed me of the nature of our crimes.”
“Well?” said Julian impatiently, hope rising again within him. He was convinced that, once he knew what was wrong, he could easily make amends. “What is it?”
“A matter of creation. In my case, at least. It’s because we are robots. They believe all robots to be creations of Satan. I assured the monk I was built in a hutch by good robot hands and that I remembered every moment of it. He called me a liar, which is ridiculous; robots cannot lie.”
“And me?” said Julian, struggling with his temper. “You didn’t bother to mention that I was a man?”
“If I had, he would have demanded proof.”
“Well, what more proof do you need than my skin?”
“Your armor, Don Julian. Do not forget your armor.”
There was a long moment of silence. At last, Julian managed: “They think I’m a robot because of this armor?”
“They’re stupid.” Andrew shook his head. “I’m really sorry, Julian. At least it’ll be quick. I have to melt. With you—poof. Will they ever be surprised when you go up like a torch.”
Julian was shouting again. No longer did he bother boasting of his papacy; simply being a man was quite sufficient. But, although the subject of his pleas had changed, the response from the mob was no different. The monks continued to chant, bursting into new, dirge-like rhythms. Small children scattered from the crowd, sprinting into the square and gathering rocks. These were passed to bigger, stronger boys, who did the throwing. His armor protected Julian from any permanent harm. The clanking of rock against metal rang through the square like the tolling of cracked bells.