Bathing the Lion (35 page)

Authors: Jonathan Carroll

BOOK: Bathing the Lion

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Kaspar said, “It’s one of the reasons why they let me keep my memory—so I’d recognize any working mechanics who appeared in my retirement life.

“You’re wrong about what they want from us, Crebold, completely wrong.

“We’re seeds. When mechanics are retired they’re planted like seeds across the universe into different civilizations.” Kaspar slowly moved an arm in a 180-degree arc in front of his body as if to indicate how widespread the practice went. “These seeds grow like plants—hybrid plants—that combine a mechanic’s knowledge and experience with whatever culture they’ve been planted in.

“These singular plants bear whole new species of fruit. Periodically it’s harvested, but never the whole plant. That would be like pulling up all the trees in an orchard only to get the apples. They
want
us hybrids to keep growing, developing, and bearing new fruit.”

Crebold’s eyes were burning from fatigue. Wiping his mouth again, he tried to grasp all this and add it to everything else he’d recently learned, but the alcohol he’d had to drink fogged his brain. “You lost me between the seeds and the apple orchard. Talk about
us
; just tell me about right now.” Making a fist he brought it down hard for emphasis on the porch banister.

Kaspar nodded. “Okay, I’ll talk about Earth. When retirees come here and mix with human society, new hybrids that have never existed before are created. Just like cross-pollinating plants. It’s not even necessary for us to physically mate with humans—we only need to live among them. After a while together a kind of organic synapse takes place. This same kind of synapse happens wherever retired mechanics are mixed with sentient beings anywhere in the universe.

“When the fruit from these hybrids is ripe, it’s gathered from everywhere and distilled into the food that’s needed to feed the ones who battle Chaos.”

Crebold choked out, “We’re
fruit
?” He looked at Kaspar in disbelief.

“
Part
of what we are is, yes; part of what we create while living here is, yes.”

Crebold’s mouth was dry and his tongue felt heavy as lead. “How do you know these things, Kaspar?”

“Before I was retired they told me to be on the lookout here for working mechanics. Whenever they appeared in my life I would be able to recognize them even though I was human. And I did, Crebold—it happened once before last summer and when I saw you just now.

“Their instructions were, whenever it happened the first thing I was to do was shake hands with any mechanic I recognized because eventually one would have that fruit with them. When it was given to me everything I needed to know would be made clear. And it has; what you gave me just now explained everything.” Kaspar smiled and nodded reassuringly.

“It
did
?” Staring at the ground now because he felt he could concentrate better by looking at nothing, Crebold shook his head. “What did I give you? How could I—I don’t know
shit
!”

Kaspar said, “That’s true—y
ou
don’t, but you held the lives and knowledge of others inside you and many of them know a lot, believe me—
a lot
.”

Crebold was flummoxed. “Well, what about the crazy dream you shared with your friends? I thought it caused all this trouble in the first place. They told me that’s why they were sending me here. Did they lie? What was
that
all about?” Crebold remembered
this
Kaspar hadn’t had the dream yet; it would happen to him several months from tonight. “Wait—were they inside me too just now—your three friends? Do you know?”

“Yes, they were.” Kaspar spoke with the confident air of a man who knows the answers. “When the dream happens in the future it will be part of what’s called
the joining
. Before the fruit is harvested anywhere, there’s a joining together of all retirees’ minds for a short time so their information can be gathered in one …
place
, like putting all the apples from a harvest in one basket.

“But that joining has to take place gradually and with the greatest care because every retiree is different—some understand what’s happening immediately while others fight it. A shared dream is one way of bringing a bunch of minds up to a basically equal level.”

Crebold didn’t want to ask the next question because he was afraid of the answer, but knew he must. “What will happen to us after this
fruit
is harvested?”

Kaspar drank some wine and softly said, “Nothing. What happens to a tree after its apples have been picked? Nothing—when spring comes it starts growing more apples. Every retiree will return to their second existence without a single memory of what’s happened and their days will putter along as normally as they have in the past.

“Nothing is taken from us anyway—they just make a copy of it. Eventually we’ll die as mortals after having had, with any luck, very happy retirements.”

“What do you mean nothing happens to us?” Crebold was so thrown by Kaspar’s answer that he literally lost his balance for a moment and had to grab hold of something to steady himself. Luckily the porch banister was near. Seconds before Kaspar had spoken, Crebold had a horrible vision of being thrown into a cannibal’s big pot and boiled alive to extract his “fruit.”

Kaspar scratched Kos’s head. “How do you feel now, right this minute?”

Crebold did
not
like the sound of the question; it reeked of
uh-oh
. “I feel fine, why?” He swallowed hard—was the other man going to pounce or set the dogs on him?

“Because it’s already happened.” Kaspar clapped his hands together twice, the sound very loud in the otherwise silent night. He joined them together as if in prayer and held them out toward Crebold. “Everything is inside
me
now; I took it from you when we shook hands before. Do you feel any different?”

“N-n-no.”

“See? Your job is done; you can go and enjoy your retirement now. The minute you leave here tonight, both of us will forget this meeting and we’ll just be plain old human beings living out the rest of our lives in peace.” Kaspar looked for a reaction on the other’s face. “You don’t believe me, do you, Crebold?”

“No.”

“Take my hands and I’ll show you. Come on—nothing bad will happen, I promise.”

Crebold looked as deep as he could into Kaspar Benn’s eyes for a lie or a trick but saw none. In a whispery voice he said, “What the hell,” and took them.

The contact lasted three seconds and then it was Kaspar who pulled his hands away.

Crebold’s heart took forever to slow and beat normally again, even longer for his eyes to become focused. For a few sublime seconds both men grew almost exactly the same secret smile when looking at each other, silently sharing the awe and wonder of what was now contained within Kaspar.

“
Son of a bitch!
”

“You said it pal, son of a bitch.”

Crebold patted his chest over his heart as if it were a child, trying to calm its irregular beat. “But what are
you
going to do with it? What do you
do
with all that stuff inside you?”

Kaspar shrugged. “Nothing. I live my happy life here until I die.
Then
they’ll take it from me. Luckily I won’t know that because after you leave here tonight, I go back to being jolly old Kaspar Benn, pants salesman without a single memory of this or anything else to do with mechanics or Chaos or the cosmos … I’ll be wiped completely clean. So will you and all the others.

“It’s great because I like this life very much; no, I
love
it. And you know what? That’s more than enough for me; I am a happy man. I hope you find something to love too in this life, Crebold.”

D Train returned from his walkabout in the yard and stopped next to the visitor. Looking up at the stranger, D asked with gentle golden eyes for a little love.

Cautiously Crebold reached down and touched the dog’s thick warm neck. D Train immediately raised his head up into the hand. Crebold patted it gently with a flat stiff palm. “Kaspar, can I stay here for a little while? Just drink some more wine with you for a few more minutes before I have to go?”

“Absolutely.” Kaspar went into the house to get another bottle. Crebold kept petting the dog, his hand relaxing the more he did it. D Train leaned with full trust against the man’s leg. The two of them waited together in the beautiful fall night for Kaspar to return.

ALSO BY JONATHAN CARROLL

The Land of Laughs

Voice of Our Shadow

Bones of the Moon

Sleeping in Flame

A Child Across the Sky

Black Cocktail

Outside the Dog Museum

After Silence

From the Teeth of Angels

The Panic Hand

Kissing the Beehive

The Marriage of Sticks

The Wooden Sea

White Apples

Glass Soup

The Ghost in Love

The Woman Who Married a Cloud

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Jonathan Carroll is the author of eighteen novels and two story collections, including
The Land of Laughs, The Wooden Sea, The Woman Who Married a Cloud
, and
The Ghost in Love
. Past winner of a Pushcart Prize, the World Fantasy Award, and other awards, he lives in Vienna, Austria. He can be found at both
www.jonathancarroll.com
and on Facebook under “Jonathan Carroll.”

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

BATHING THE LION.
Copyright © 2013 by Jonathan Carroll. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

www.stmartins.com

Cover design by Ervin Serrano

Based on a concept by Ryder Carroll

Cover photographs: hands by Hans Georg Merkel/Getty Images; smoke by Ben

Bryant/
Shutterstock.com
; cityscape by Frauke Schumann/Plainpicture

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The Library of Congress has cataloged the print edition as follows: