belly of a whale!”
“The ship shuddered and dipped. Water bubbled up everywhere. When the ship rolled over, the logs in the hold broke loose—”
“An entire forest!”
“—shattering the ship.”
“Like a matchbox!”
“As the ship sank the sailor was spat into the water. He was crushed against the rocks by the trees that boiled and leapt in the sea. Just before he died he saw Amadée floating past—but fast. Churning the water! Like the Devil speeding back to Hell! But it wasn’t Amadée any longer—”
“It wasn’t? It wasn’t? Who was it?”
“Wormwood.”
“Wormwood!” P’tit Pierre took my hand and held it against his heart, which was wildly beating. “Tu m’as fait grand peur, Nanu,” he said. “I am so afraid!” For a time he was silent, brooding. “Nanu?” he whispered then, his voice tremulous. “He’s here, in this room with us now!”
“Je sais
“Nanu?”
“Be quiet now, Pierre.”
“How did le pére Foucart get him?”
“Because he is evil, “I whispered.
“Yes, but how did he get him?”
“Once a beggar came to the door wanting bread. It was winter and he was near dead with cold and hunger. ‘Fuck you!’ said Gran’père. ‘Why should I give you bread?’ The beggar pulled Wormwood out from under his rags. ‘I’ll give you this for a piece of bread,’ he said. ‘He’s a precious thing . . . very, very old. . . ’ ”
“And it does a trick! But you know, Nanu . . . le père Foucart won Wormwood at the fair in St. Firmat.”
The shadows in our corner of the room dispersed for a moment; it was Margarethe, come in with a candle. Looking up I saw her standing over us, her breasts like loaves of good, round country bread.
“P’tit Pierre!” she whispered, bending down and tugging at his sleeve. “Get up and go to sleep! Nanu, you come too. I’ve made a bed for you in the kitchen.” I said, “Non. I want to stay here with M’man and Gran’père.” “Bien,” she said. She took off her shawl and put it across my knees. Then she went to the cupboard and fetched a pillow. When she gave it to me I told her it smelled like sour milk. “Sour milk?” she said. “What will you dream up next? I’m going to sleep for a few hours if I can. Le père Foucart has kept me up for two nights in a row. Come and get me, Nanu, when he’s near the end.”
M’man snorted in her sleep and Margarethe winked. “You’ll come for me?” I nodded. My hand ached because I had been squeezing the key. I said, “Margarethe? After he is dead and I am sleeping, will I see his face behind the flames?”
“Only if you are bad, Nanu.” She left the room, taking p’tit Pierre by the hand.
For a time I lay there on the floor. Then, because I could not sleep, I went back to the desk and picked up Wormwood. He was not very large—maybe thirty centimeters tall—but being made of solid brass he was very heavy. It was too dark for me to see where to put the key, so I rubbed Wormwood’s base and felt where his toes curled into the bark of the stump; I rubbed Wormwood’s skull and ears, and I put my finger into his mouth. At last I found the place—a small hole in Wormwood’s back, between his shoulder blades. I slipped in the key and slowly wound Wormwood up. A small sound came from him, a little like the sound a clock makes before it strikes the hour, only far fainter. And then I saw Wormwood’s penis—invisible before—rising between his thighs like a great green finger. Slowly, slowly it rose, revealing a majestic set of balls. At that instant Gran’père seemed to crow and M’man, waking, cried out: “What is it?” Springing to her feet, she stood over Gran’père shouting, “What is it? What is it?” I put out my hand to hide Wormwood’s penis but there was no need; it had vanished.
Magarethe came running up the stairs and p’tit Pierre too; suddenly there was a commotion in the room as though a flock of birds was feeding there or a flock of sheep on their way to slaughter, bleating. My heart was in my throat and I could think of nothing but winding Wormwood up again. M’man called to me then: “Vite,” she cried, “Hurry, Nanu! Come to your Gran’père’s bedside right away, because he is dying. Come here at once, Nanu.”
“He’s dead,” Margarethe said even before I reached him; and as M’man and I looked on she tied Gran’père’s jaw shut with a handkerchief. He looked very odd—as though he’d just had a tooth pulled—and I could tell that p’tit Pierre was thinking the same thing.
Then Margarethe walked to Gran’père’s desk. Overturning the china vase she said: “There were two coins; where are they? Did you take them, Nanu?” M’man shrieked: “Give them back! Otherwise we cannot close his eyes!” and she grabbed me by the arm. Terrified, I pulled the coins from my pocket. When M’man slapped me—and she slapped me hard—the key flew from my hand, flashing once in the lamplight as it fell, flashing once again as it hit the floor.
for Harry Mathews
Our name is Gabriel Temporal-Lux-Blason, son of Hermine Temporal-Lux and Gerard Blason: Phallic Instrument of French Imperialism, for fifty years actively dangerous, gaga for ten and now defunct. As We tackle this memoir, Hermine weeps and Gerard seeps into mud.
Simple names are never good enough and this is why Hermine Temporal-Lux is also called “the Angel of Patience” and Gerard Blason “the Butcher of Madagascar.” These designations serve to preface the following: If We are Gabriel Temporal-Lux-Blason, We are also known as “Soft-in-the-Head” (although our head is as hard as yours; We know this having tested it again and again against the Bughouse walls, walls of mortared brick).
We, also known as the “the Lunatic,” are the author of unique scholarly works, including “Domesticity as Universal Error,” “Cosmic Disorder and the Ordered Domicile,” “Delirium as System,” “The Inspired Integument,” “Birth: A Questionable Event,” “The Ideal Uses of the Trochus: An Architectural Manifest,” “Reflections on the Fall of Man, the Flood, God’s Wrath and an Inventive Solution”; author of an ongoing inquiry into the similarities between the Turritella, the mazurka, the tongue of the anteater, the corkscrew, the soup mill; author of an infinite set of pamphlets, including “Architectural Indications of the Inner Ear,” “The Anti-Gravity Domicile,” “The Submersible Domicile,” “The Quasi-Perpetual Environment,” and “An Inquiry into the Structural Limits of Time.” (All these fascicles are printed on dove gray Arches and may be had from us for the price of postage.)
If the brain, as We believe, is shaped by thoughts and not the other way around, then our own is composed of one nacreous coil, our thoughts sweeping upward under the influence of a lucent tide, the whole protected by a layering of scales. It is evident that as long as We are living, this supposition cannot be demonstrated. The Memoir, in this instance, must be read as our testament: We wish our skull’s contents to be scrutinized by Dr. Aromal with
