Babayaga: A Novel (44 page)

“I’m confused. Jake’s dead? How?” Brandon asked.

“As I said,” the little man replied, his tone a bit impatient now, “I do not know. You see, I was interrupted in my work by a group of enormous Negroes who burst into the laboratory firing tommy guns. Zoya Polyakov was with them. They killed Jarl and Malte and then took this Will away. So, your friend Jake’s death is only one part of our problem.” He began explaining what had happened, and although Elga tried to keep up, the many details made it difficult to follow. The one word that did catch Elga’s ear, sticking like a hungry tick to her ear, was the name “Zoya.” The girl had been here, only hours ago. Hearing the name, Elga’s blood flared and her brain hummed with violence. She sat forward and tried to listen more carefully. Finally, frustrated with all the words, she interrupted: “You are looking for Zoya?”

The little man stopped talking and turned his gaze to Elga. “Why, yes, we might be, do you happen to know where she is?”

Elga nodded. “Maybe. I don’t know. There are a few places to try. I was hunting for her too. We can hunt for her together now.”

The little man looked slightly baffled for a moment but then looked at Brandon and smiled. “Yes, Elga, by all means, let us hunt for Zoya together.”

X

Witches’ Song Ten

Oh I do, I do and I am never done

adoring that which is the automobile.

No, not only one, but all together,

the massive swarm, seething and choking,

teeming and festering, these slithering steel insects,

black, red, and baby blue, swelling veins stiff,

enfolding the globe in their great gray

gaseous cloud of progress’s passion.

Mere metal boils bubbling upon the earth’s surface,

shuttling and speeding while oh how I adore

being nestled inside, armored against the world,

sinking into the plush ovum of velvet comfort.

Our first rides were with virile old generals

who lured us to seduction, humping us amazed

till their hearts exploded as the tin radio played that fine new jazz.

Yes, yes, this is truly a carriage for creatures such as us.

I know, for you it’s your century’s most wondrous innovation,

but it is truly no more than the same infernal tale,

man burning for power’s gain,

peat and straw, cow pies and corpses,

all manner of forests torn bare,

whole mountains chewed free of their coal,

all this, all that, merely kindling to burn.

Caves and campfires first, then hearths and stoves

sooting your great cities black

before adding a coat of locomotion steam, and now

the inferno trapped, locked in iron, internal combustion,

no different, not a whit,

only wheels on gears on stone on steel,

a new can of burning, always forward motion.

Man inflames everything he finds,

first squatting naked, roasting poached fowl,

then dropping bombs from those droning trumpets buzzing high

as the floating pond geese gaze up in awe

at what is so coming down.

Man was born to char the earth and

when there’s no swamp gas, black tar, or proud timber to tap

he sends out his canines hunting rabid far afield.

While, awaiting their return

he solemnly builds the looming tall pyres

that will burn every enemy down.

XI

Vidot regained consciousness as he was hanging out at the end of a thread of hair, floating in a high wind. He did not know how long he had been lost in that dream state. In a way, he wished he was back there now, it had been so reassuring to feel like a whole man again, in his old suit, walking the streets of his neighborhood with two strong legs and a sure and steady gait.

When Vidot had first watched Bendix inject the needle into Will, the flea had nervously wondered what the best course of action might be. After Will’s initial ear-shattering scream, his host had collapsed into a deep slumber, only twitching slightly, with no outward signs of pain or discomfort. Vidot had thought it might be fine to simply watch and wait. Bendix was busy cleaning up and putting things away, only returning every few minutes to take notes on Will’s condition. As the scientist finished a third observation of his prisoner, one of the gargantuan men came lumbering down the stairs. Bendix pointed at Will. “He’s been in the dream state for about ten minutes. I suspect it will only be another five or so before Jake completes his task. Then I’ll need you to dispose of the body.”

“Where?” asked the giant.

“The basement,” said Bendix. “with the others.”

This sentence set off all sorts of alarms in Vidot, as he realized the fatal danger Will was in. Immediately, Vidot’s professional instincts took over. He was thrilled. As a policeman, he had always waited for this moment, when he would actually protect the innocent from a real looming threat. Policemen generally arrived too late, not because they were lazy or incompetent but because nobody ever called them until the window had already been smashed, the blade had been stabbed, or the head crushed. By the time he and his colleagues arrived, the safe was bare, the blood was cold, and the only thing left for him to do was dry the tears, collect the clues, and help sweep up the shattered glass. This did not bother many of his peers, who were happy enough to simply cash their checks and go home, but Vidot lived perpetually on the balls of his feet, waiting for that desperate moment when his sense of duty and honor would be called into action. He longed to leap in front of a speeding car to save a heedless child or push a bystander out of the path of an oncoming bullet.

What could he do? His options here were even more limited than the dutiful police dogs that offered no more than sniffing, barking, or bites. Still, his sense of urgency was strong. Which is why, though he knew it was an insane and potentially even suicidal act, Vidot the flea did the one thing he could do: he valiantly and forcefully bit into the flesh of Will’s skull, sucking up his dangerously drugged blood and plunging himself into the strange and mysterious world below.

Almost immediately, he found himself wandering down through his old neighborhood on rue Mouffetard, which was almost as he recalled it, though now periodically punctuated by curious interruptions: a brook running through an alleyway, an Irish bar with a sign reading “Casey’s” standing where the old man Bourdon’s barber shop should have been. As Vidot kept walking, the unrecognizable elements of the landscape began to outnumber the familiar ones, the hat shop was now a stand of willows, the watchmaker’s now a record store, until, turning a corner by the old library, he came upon the sight of Will kneeling in a muddy field, a man holding a gun against his head. Their backs were both to Vidot as the entrance to Vidot’s old metro stop blossomed out of the field in front of them. Distracted by this, the man with the gun did not notice Vidot’s approach. Nor did he hear the detective lift the heavy branch from the ground and swing it round his head with all his might.

Moments later, the man with the gun lay at their feet as Will rose and dusted himself off. Vidot felt light-headed with excitement. He was not sure how to explain the situation, there was too much to say, so many odd and unbelievable circumstances had stacked themselves up, one upon the other, but then, at the very moment when he was shaking Will’s hand and preparing to start with a simple hello, Will completely vanished, disappearing right before his eyes, leaving the detective alone in a landscape that was now suddenly and completely Paris.

After that, Vidot walked around for what felt like hours, lost in his thoughts amid scenery that was at once surreal and all too familiar. He found himself missing Adèle with his whole heart, completely abandoning the deep hurt of her betrayal. He longed to sit with her again at their little dining room table, where he could relate to her all the colorful details of this incredible adventure. He had just saved a man’s life! It was, perhaps, the most richly satisfying act he had ever accomplished, and yet without Adèle there as a part of it, he felt empty and hollow. He realized that for him nothing existed in the world of any importance until he shared it with her. Adèle was his sole audience, his only validation. He had no eyes of his own and he was completely deaf without her. He was nothing, truly, but a vessel that carried his small puzzles and great triumphs home to her. Only after she absorbed them or interpreted them or merely smiled at his detailed and perhaps occasionally tiresome recital of them did the many dimensions of his existence finally bloom within him as well, opening up like rosebuds in water. This was, he realized, a perspective of their relationship he had never appreciated before, because he had never been so very far away from it.

A great wave of exhaustion overwhelmed him and he lay down on a park bench across from a vision of the Place d’Italie. He liked the neighborhood quiet like this, without the cars endlessly running around the city circle. Closing his eyes, he found himself thinking about all those people who were always on the move, continually driving and darting about the city streets and the country roads. Where are they going? What do they need? They wanted bread and cheese and wine, they sought laughter and sex and company, and then they chased the money they needed to start it all over again. It was a mad carousel, rotating faster and faster to an accelerating scream of a calliope song; the music never stopped, never rested, and now he was so very tired.

He did not know how long he slept. He felt the wind blowing softly against his body and heard the distant whinnying of a horse. Coming to, he was alarmed to find that his tiny body was on the verge of slipping off Will’s head as the strand of hair he was only tenuously attached to was now waving wildly in the wind out an open car window. Vidot pulled hard and managed to climb up the cord of brown hair back to the safety of the scalp. Gathering himself, he was frustrated by the fact that he was still trapped in the confines of this little flea body, yet his brief sojourn as a human had lifted his hopes considerably, for now he knew that he was still, in his soul and spirit, essentially, a man. The rest was only a trick.

He worked his way up to the peak of Will’s brow and took a look around. They were traveling through the night in a Chevy Bel Air, out past the city limits. The passengers were a cast of characters that had by now become all too familiar. Will was in the passenger seat, Zoya lay across the backseat sound asleep, and Oliver was driving, rambling on in his droll, desultory manner. “Impressive, really, I must say. Never had a woman fight like that for me, even when I was truly in love.”

“When was that?” Will sleepily asked.

“Oh, some time ago now,” said Oliver, “when I was first in Paris. I met her when she was studying at the Sorbonne. You would have adored her, Will. Jacqueline was beautiful, black hair, pale skin, your Zoya reminds me of her a bit. My Jacqueline was more petite, but with the same broad cheekbones and the same perfect nose. I fell hard for her right away. We had mutual friends, all ex-pats, and we would take our wicker baskets filled with fruit, bread, brie, and champagne down and picnic in the Luxembourg, playing boules or badminton and lounging about like creatures off some Bastida canvas. At night we’d sit and play canasta in the Spanish cafés while the Gypsy guitar players strummed. I pursued Jacqueline quite energetically, but she was a wary one. I suppose I had a reputation for being a bit louche, even back then. But eventually my charms did win her over and she started staying at my flat, first a few nights a week, then every night. Things grew fairly domestic. Frankly, until then, I’d always been the sort of boy who races madly about, forever late to the station. But the whole pace of life changed with Jacqueline, seconds seemed to tick slower, and while she stayed busy with her studies, I began writing, real writing, not the trite stuff, but actual earnest stabs at it. I sent packets off to New York and London editors who were honestly encouraging. I have to say, my life was as solid as it’s ever been, I was wide-awake in the world. Then, as I grew comfortable, for the first time in my life I was finally able to let my true self emerge.”

“That sounds great,” said Will.

Oliver gave him a dark grin and his voice dropped a bit. “Yes, it does, doesn’t it? Though in this particular case my true self turned out to be a complete ass: sarcastic, remote, and glacially cold. A Jewish psychiatrist later told me it was due to a deep, unformed Oedipal anger, not enough imprinting with Mama, or some such bunk. In any case, it was not the best thing to unleash on this innocent girl. I tell you, I loved Jacqueline as much as I’ve ever loved anyone, but that doesn’t mean I loved her very well. I made her miserable. She began losing weight, dramatically, ten pounds, twenty pounds, as if her entire self was trying to escape from me but only her flesh could get away. Finally, she got so thin doctors got involved. It was heartrending. And then, well, it ended.”

This got Will’s attention. “She died?”

Oliver looked shocked. “God, no, she shipped off back home, on the Cunard line. Settled into D.C. society and wound up marrying into a family of some prominence. Actually”—Oliver smiled to himself—“I believe her husband Jack’s likely to become the next president of the United States.” He slowed the small, rattling car and turned it up a bumpy old farm road. “You should probably wake your girl up. I believe this is where she told us to stop.”

XII

The priest was awake in his small bed when the car pulled in. He had been lying there, blinking up into the darkness as he did almost every morning. Now somewhere deep into his eighth decade—even he wasn’t sure of his age—he savored the beginnings of the day, before early prayer. Most mornings he lay indulgently counting through his deep aches, sorrows, and regrets as the waking thrushes and starlings outside punctuated his silence with their optimistic counterpoint. With arthritic hips sore from his daily bicycle route, the priest had, over time, learned to sleep on his back, a pose that used to bother him, seeming too much like rehearsal for the coffin. His slow respiration mirrored the morning’s own breath as the day awoke in soft tones, bird flutters, and tentative stirrings. For some reason, today the world did not hang as heavily on him as it did most mornings, and as he lay there he nursed a fledgling, unsettling feeling that reminded him, eerily, of hope. It was an emotion he had long distrusted. He suspected the cause this time was the night jasmine that bloomed out on his arbor trellis. One of the windowpanes in his bedroom had cracked months before, he wasn’t sure how it had happened, and he had planned on replacing it before winter came, but then the arrival of the blossoms had made him delay. Some nights, the gap in the jagged open pane brought in the rain, but more often the pure fragrance came through it, wrapping its essence around his body and filling his lungs as he lay in his bed. He was amazed that it was still blooming so late in the season, and he breathed it in now, deeply inhaling the scent, feeling as if he was wrapped in the romantic arms of its embrace. He had never been with a woman, had actively suppressed that desire for his entire life, but he felt as though some part of the feeling, its profound and reassuring comfort, could be found within the soft aroma of that jasmine. It made the coming day feel ripe with beauty. Who could hunger for any sin, he thought, when so much satisfaction could be found in the wandering fragrance of a simple flower?