Magicians of Gor (45 page)

“Perhaps the trunk is not really magic?” said the ponderous fellow.

“That would seem the most plausible explanation to me,” whispered one fellow to

another.

“I would think so,” said Marcus, more to himself than to anyone else.

I looked at him sharply. I think he was serious.

“Do you not think so?” he asked. He was serious.

“Let us watch,” I said. I smiled to myself. Marcus, I knew, was a highly

intelligent fellow. On the other hand he did come (pg. 262) from a culture which

on the whole maintained a quite open mind on questions of this sort, and these

illusions were, I take it, the first he had ever seen. To him they must have

seemed awesome. Too, as a highly intelligent young man, from his particular

background, he was prepared to accept what appeared to be the evidence of his

senses. Would it not have seemed to him an even more grievous affront to

rationality not to do so? I supposed that I, in his place, if I had had his

background, and had known as little as he did about such things, might have been

similarly impressed, if not convinced. Certainly many Goreans whom I regarded as

much more intelligent than I took such things with great seriousness.

“What have I done wrong? What have I done wrong?” moaned the ponderous fellow.

He then put up the front panel and latched it to the side panel on the left.

“What have I done wrong?” he moaned. He then hooked up the right side of the

trunk. It attached to the front panel. “I do not understand it,” he moaned. He

went to the back and lifted up the back panel and latched it to the side panels.

He then reached down and put the wicker lid back on the trunk. “What have I done

wrong?” he queried.

“You did not call upon the magician!” cried a fellow.

“What?” cried the ponderous fellow, startled.

“No!” said the fellow in the audience. “Remember! You called out before,

expressing a wish that you might be succored in your dilemma, that some magician

might waft her away, if only for a moment, to teach her a little of what it was

to be a slave girl!”

“Yes!” said the ponderous fellow. “Yes! That is true!”

“Perhaps the fellow from Anango, your friend,” said the man, “who is perhaps a

magician, heard you and did as you asked, as a favor.”

“Is it possible?” inquired the ponderous fellow.

“It is possible!” averred the man.

“What must I then do?” inquired the ponderous fellow.

“Ask for her back!” said the man.

“Certainly,” said another fellow in the audience.

“Do you think he would return her?” asked the ponderous fellow.

“Certainly,” said the fellow who had been attempting to be of help in this

matter.

“He is your friend,” another reminded him.

“I think he is my friend,” said the ponderous fellow.

“It is surely worth a try,” said the first fellow.

The ponderous fellow then looked upward and called out, (pg. 263) “Oh, Saba

Boroko Swaziloo, old chap, if you can hear me, and if it be you who has wafted

away my little Litsia, perhaps for her instruction and improvement, please

return her to me now!” Such names, of course, are nonsense, and are not really

Anagan names but they do have several of the vowel sounds of such names, and,

accordingly, upon occasions such as these, by fellows who are somewhat careless

in such matters, are often prevailed upon to serve as such. It was highly

unlikely, of course, that there would be any Anagans in the audience. I hoped

not, at any rate, for the sake of the ponderous fellow.

There was silence.

“Nothing!” said the ponderous fellow, in disappointment. “Nothing!”

There was suddenly a rocking and thumping from the wicker trunk. It shook on the

trestles.

“What is this?” cried the ponderous fellow, turning about.

The trunk rocked back and forth.

“Master!” came from within the trunk. “Master, oh, beloved Master, help me. I

beg of you to help me, Master! Please, Master, if you can hear me, help me! Help

me!”

“Open it!” cried a man.

“Open it!” called another.

The ponderous fellow threw off the wicker, basketlike lid of the trunk and gazed

within, then staggering back as though in astonishment.

“Show us! Show us!” cried men.

Swiftly, losing not a nonce, he undid the side latches and dropped the front

panel of the trunk. There, in the trunk, framed by the sides and back, as men

cried out in wonder and delight, was descried the slave, Litsia, now not only in

the least of slave rags but in sirik.

She was excitingly curvaceous, a dream of pleasure, such a sight as might induce

a strong man to howl with joy, to dance with triumph.

Those on the tiers rose to their feet, applauding.

Yes, the woman was well turned. No longer now could there be the least doubt as

to the promises of her lineaments. Almost might she have been on the block so

little did her brief, twisted, scanty rages leave to the imagination of lustful

brutes. And well did she move upon that wicker surface, in helpless

desirability, in the grasp of the sirik, the metal on her neck, and on her

wrists and ankles, the whole impeccably joined by its linkage of gleaming chain.

“The magician had returned her!” said a man.

(Pg. 264) “And she is in better condition than when he received her,” laughed a

man.

The ponderous fellow then, with a tug, tore away the bit of cloth which had

provided its mockery of a shielding for her beauty and cast it aside.

Men cheered.

“It seems I have a new master,” said the girl, squirming a little, naked, to the

audience.

There was laughter.

She was then pulled from the trunk and flunk to her knees on the stage.

She, kneeling, in sirik, turned to the audience. “I now know I have a new

master!” she said.

There was more laughter.

“Where have you been?” demanded the ponderous fellow.

“I was in my palanquin,” she said. “Then, in the blinking of an eye, I was in

the castle somewhere, stripped and in chains.”

“In Anango, I wager,” said the ponderous fellow.

“And at the feet of a magician!” she cried.

“That would be my old friend, Swaziloo,” said the ponderous fellow.

“Yes,” she said. “I think that is what he said his name was.”

I was pleased that they had managed to get the name right the second time. I had

known the ponderous fellow to slip up in such matters. The girl was not likely

to make a mistake, of course. If she did so, she would probably be whipped.

“And for what purpose were you transported to his castle?” asked the ponderous

fellow.

“To be taught, Master!” she said.

“And were you taught?” he asked.

“Yes, Master!” she said.

Then, to the delight of the audience, she reached forth and, holding the

fellow’s leg, and pressing herself against it, kissed him humbly, timidly,

lovingly, about the thigh.

“And I,” said the ponderous fellow, “may have learned something, too, about how

to be a master.”

There was then applause and cheering, and bows were taken by the troupe, the

assistants and the ponderous fellow, and the girl, for her part, performing

obeisance to the audience, and then, to the delight of the audience, being

conducted off, in her chains, with tiny, short steps, no more permitted her by

the linkage on her ankle rings, in a common slave girl leading (pg. 265)

position, bent over at the waist, drawn along at the master’s side by the hair.

Marcus had been shaken by the performance.

Afterward we were walking outside. We would not attend any more performances

that evening, as the shows, and the street, would be soon closed, due to the

curfew. Also, I had discovered what I had been searching for, the fellow I

wished to contact.

“I am puzzled by what I have seen,” he said.

“In what way?” I asked.

“Is he truly a magician, or in league with magicians?” asked Marcus.

“Much depends on what you mean by ‘magician’,” I said.

“You know what I mean,” said Marcus.

“I do not think so,” I said.

“One who can do magic,” said Marcus, irritably.

“Oh,” I said.

“I do not know if it is wise to use magic in such a way,” said Marcus, “for pay,

as a show, for an audience.”

“I do not understand,” I said.

“Magic seems too strange and wonderful,” he said.

“Why don’t they just make gold pieces appear instead?” I asked.

“Yes, why not?” he asked.

“Indeed, why not?” I said.

“I do not understand the audience,” he said. “Some men laughed much, and did not

seem to understand the momentousness of what was occurring. Some seemed to take

it almost for granted. Others were more sensitive to the wonders they beheld.”

“Dear Marcus,” I said, “such things are tricks. They are done to give pleasure,

and amusement.”

“The magician, or the magician, or magicians, the showman was in league with,”

said Marcus, “obviously possess extraordinary powers.”

“In a sense, yes,” I said, “and I would be the last to underestimate or belittle

them. They have unusual powers. But you, too, have unusual powers. For example,

you have unusual powers with tempered blades, with the steels of war.”

“Such things,” said he, quickly, “are mere matters of blood, of instinct, of

aptitude, of strength, of reflexes, of training, of practice. They are skills,

skills.”

“The magician, too,” I said, “has his skills. Let them be remarked and

celebrated. Life is the richer for us that he has them. Let us rejoice in his

achievements.”

“I do not think I understand you,” said Marcus.

(pg. 266) “Would you like to know how the tricks were done?” I asked.

“Tricks,” he said.

“Yes,” I said. “If I tell you, will you then value them less?”

“ ‘Done’?” he said.

“Surely you do not believe that a slave disappeared into thin air and then

reappeared out of thin air in a wicker trunk, do you?”

“Certainly it is difficult to believe,” said Marcus, “but surely I must believe

it, it happened.”

“Nonsense,” I said.

“Did you not see what I saw?” he asked.

“I suppose that in one sense I saw what you saw,” I said, “but in another sense

I think it would be fair to say that I didn’t. At the very least, we surely

interpreted what we saw very differently.”

“I know what I saw,” said Marcus.

“You know what you think you saw,” I said.

“There could be no tricks,” said Marcus, angrily. “Not this time. Do not think I

am naïve! I have heard of such things as trapdoors and secret panels! I have

even heard of illusions done with mirrors! But those are not done by true magic.

They are only tricks. I might even be able to do them. But this was different.

Here, obviously, there could have been only true magic.”

“Why do you say that?” I asked.

“I do not know that there is false magic, or only apparent magic, and false

magicians, or only apparent magicians, but this was different.”

“Why?” I asked.

“If there are so many false magicians,” said Marcus, “then there must be at

least one true magician.”

“Have you reflected upon the logic of that?” I asked.

“Not carefully,” he said.

“It might be well to do so,” I said.

“Perhaps,” he said, irritatedly.

“From the fact that most larls eat meat it does not follow that some larls do

not,” I said. “Rather, if one were to hazard an inference in such a matter, it

would seem rational to suppose that they all eat meat.”

“And from the fact that most magicians may not do real magic one should not

infer that therefore some do?”

“That is it,” I said.

“But some might!” he said, triumphantly.

“Perhaps,” I said.

(Pg. 267) “I grant you the logic of matter,” he said, “but in this case I must

be granted the fact of the matter.”

“What fact?” I asked.

“That there is real magic!”

“Why do you say that?” I asked.

“Because tonight,” he said, “we witnessed not tricks, but genuine magic.”

“What makes you think that?” I asked.”

“You saw the slave in the palanquin,” he said. “It was moved about, it was

lifted up in the air! Do you think the girl could have slipped through a

trapdoor or something? There is no way that could have happened. Similarly the

palanquin was moved about. Accordingly there could have been no mirrors.”

“There could have been some,” I said.

“Do you think it was done with mirrors?” he asked.

“No,” I said. “It was not done with mirrors.”

“It was done by magic,” he said.

“Not by what you seem to mean by ‘real magic’.” I said, “whatever that might

be.”

“How then do you think it was done?” he asked, angrily.

“There were two illusions,” I said, “the first in which the girl disappeared

from the palanquin, and the second in which she reappeared in the trunk.”

“Or two wonders,” said Marcus, “the one of the palanquin and the other of the

trunk.”

“Very well,” I said. “You noted, of course, that the palanquin was roofed, or

canopied, and that the roof or canopy was supported by four poles.”

“Of course,” he said, warily.

“Those poles are hollow,” I said, “and within them there are cords and weights.”

“Continue,” said he.

“The cords,” I said, “are attached at one end to the weights within the poles