But the details. The details couldn't have been realistic or in proportion. There were simply too many monkeys in the jungle, too many bugs crawling on the leaves. There were thousands of tiny insects in one painting of a summer sky. I came into a large gallery walled on either side by painted men and women staring at me, and I almost cried out. Figures from all ages these were-bedouins,
Egyptians, then Greeks and Romans, and knights in armor, and peasants and kings and queens. There were Renaissance people in doublets and leggings, the Sun King with his massive mane of curls, and finally the people of our own age. But again, the details made me feel as if I were imagining them-the droplets of water clinging to a cape, the cut on the side of a face, the spider half-crushed beneath a polished leather boot. I started to laugh. It wasn't funny. It was just delightful. I began to laugh and laugh. I had to force myself out of this gallery and the only thing that gave me the willpower was the sight of a library, blazing with light. Walls and walls of books and rolled manuscripts, giant glistening world globes in their wooden cradles, busts of the ancient Greek gods and goddesses, great sprawling maps. Newspapers in all languages lay in stacks on tables. And there were strewn everywhere curious objects. Fossils, mummified hands, exotic shells. There were bouquets of dried flowers, figurines and fragments of old sculpture, alabaster jars covered with Egyptian hieroglyphs.
And everywhere in the center of the room, scattered among the tables and the glass cases, were comfortable chairs with footstools, and candelabra or oil lamps. In fact, the impression was one of comfortable messiness, of great long hours of pure enjoyment, of a place that was human in the extreme. Human knowledge, human artifacts, chairs in which humans night sit. I stayed a long time here, perusing the Latin and Greek titles. I felt a little drunk, as if I'd happened on a mortal with a lot of wine in his blood. But I had to find Marius. I went on out of this room, down a little stairs, and through another painted hallway to an even larger room that was also full of light. I heard the singing of the birds and smelled the perfume of the flowers before I even reached this place. And then I found myself lost in a forest of cages. There were not only birds of all sizes and colors here, there were monkeys and baboons, all of them gone wild in their little prisons as I made my way around the room. Potted plants crowded against the cages-ferns and banana trees, cabbage roses, moonflower, jasmine, and other sweetly fragrant nighttime vines. There were purple and white orchids, waxed flowers that trapped insects in their maw, little trees groaning with peaches and lemons and pears. When I finally emerged from this little paradise, it was into a hall of sculptures equal to any gallery in the Vatican museum. And I glimpsed adjoining chambers full of paintings, Oriental furnishings, mechanical toys. Of course I was no longer lingering on each object or new discovery. To learn the contents of this house would have taken a lifetime. And I pressed on. I didn't know where I was going. But I knew that I was being allowed to see all these things. Finally I heard the unmistakable sound of Marius, that low rhythmic beat of the heart which I had heard in Cairo. And I moved toward it.
3
I came into a brightly illuminated eighteenth Century salon. The stone walls had been covered in fine rosewood paneling with framed mirrors rising to the ceiling. There were the usual painted chests, upholstered chairs, dark and lush landscapes, porcelain clocks. A small collection of books in the glass-doored bookcases, a newspaper of recent date lying on a small table beside a brocaded winged chair. High narrow French doors opened onto the stone terrace. where banks of white lilies and red roses gave off their powerful perfume.
And there, with his back to me, at the stone railing stood an eighteenth-century man. It was Marius when he turned around and gestured for me to come out. He was dressed as I was dressed. The frock coat was red, not violet, the lace Valenciennes, not Bruxelles.
But he wore very much the same costume, his shining hair tied back loosely in a dark ribbon just as mine was, and he looked not at all ethereal as Armand might have, but rather like a superpresence, a creature of impossible whiteness and perfection who was nevertheless connected to everything around him -the clothes he wore, the stone railing on which he laid his hand, even the moment itself in which a small cloud passed over the bright half moon. I savored the moment: that he and I were about to speak, that I was really here. I was still clearheaded as I had been on the ship. I couldn't feel thirst. And I sensed that it was his blood in me that was sustaining me. All the old mysteries collected in me, arousing me and sharpening me. Did Those Who Must Be Kept lie somewhere on this island? Would all these things be known? I went up to the railing and stood beside him, glancing out over the sea. His eyes were now fixed on an island not a half mile off the shore below. He was listening to something that I could not hear. And the side of his face, in the light from the open doors behind us, looked too frighteningly like stone. But immediately, he turned to me with a cheerful expression, the smooth face vitalized impossibly for an instant, and then he put his arm around me and guided me back into the room. He walked with the same rhythm as a mortal man, the step light but firm, the body moving through space in the predictable way. He led me to a pair of winged chairs that faced each other and there we sat down. This was more or less the center of the room. The terrace was to my right, and we had a clear illumination from the chandelier above as well as a dozen or so candelabra and sconces on the paneled walls. Natural, civilized it all was. And Marius settled in obvious comfort on the brocade cushions and let his fingers curl around the arms of the chair. As he smiled, he looked entirely human. All the lines, the animation were there until the smile melted again. I tried not to stare at him, but I couldn't help it. And something mischievous crept into his face. My heart was skipping.
"What would be easier for you? " he asked in French. "That I tell you why I brought you here, or that you tell me why you asked to see me? "
"Oh, the former would be easier, " I said. "You talk. " He laughed in a soft ingratiating fashion.
"You're a remarkable creature, " he said. "I didn't expect you to go down into the earth so soon. Most of us experience the first death much later-after a century, maybe even two. "
"The first death? You mean it's common-to go into the earth the way I did? "