He had found a race of humans that he could tolerate, and they welcomed him into many clans, even though he was a Lost One, a most-feared being in all small, tight societies. He was a man who survived outside the tribe and the family, a man turned loose and wild. But this one had understanding and silence and was dedicated to motionlessness; all qualities which the plain’s tribes cherished. He was allowed to photograph the great chiefs and their medicine men. Eventually, they would let him see and photograph the Ghost Dance. He sent back to England prints of lonely desolation, stunning landscapes of untouched, gigantic purity and pictures of powerful, noble men, who looked into the camera without seeing themselves. Many he sent back to the wise surgeon, to demonstrate his improvement and to reiterate his gratitude; his instinct told him that the man high in the Oriel window at London Bridge would understand.
Muybridge began to feel himself healed; his growing confidence stood upright in the hollow lava beds of the flat plains of the Tule Lake. He turned his box on the Modoc War, shovelling up images of the vanquished lands and their shivering occupants. The enemy paid him well, so he became the official photographer for the U.S. Army; the stillness could wait while his plates were filled with the pumice of defeat and exile. At the end of it all, he gathered his new fame and his obsessively accumulated wages, and travelled back to the city lights and the crisp linen of San Francisco, to embark on the joys of marriage, parenthood and murder.
Ishmael had only Ghertrude to talk to now. Since their adventure together, Mutter had avoided him entirely; no matter how hard he tried to initiate conversation, the old man refused to be drawn. He barely made eye contact, and when he did it was baleful and suspicious. Ishmael thought it a dramatic and surly way to behave over such a small breaking of the rules. However, he would not be diverted by a servant’s bad humour. He had noticed the market square changing over the last two days, its simple frame being decorated between its daily functions. Something was being prepared. He cornered Ghertrude when she arrived to change his bed linen.
Her visits had become less frequent recently, and she seemed remote and uninterested in his questions. She had certainly lost her appetite for mating, having nothing new to show or explain to him. He still possessed an active interest in the subject, but when he suggested that they might try other ways of doing it, she became defensive and limp. Not wishing to disturb his comfortable position within the house, he chose to let his desires go untended.
Besides, his need to be outside again and explore the city in detail was of greater importance. She had told him of the perils, explained that a rarity such as he would be in danger from the mob. She told him the story of a small, ornate bird she had owned as a child. Its plumage was vermilion, with a trim of yellow. Its voice was exquisite, and she often put it in her window so that it might sing to the sun. Local, indigenous birds would flock to the areas nearby to listen to it and admire its splendid colours. One day she sat, with the bird tamely on her finger, talking to the brightness of its attention. She did not notice the window’s slight opening and, as the curtain swayed, the bird smelt the air and flew to freedom. In horror, she ran to the window and watched it flutter and swoop in poor, close circles. She called to it and it turned in her direction; she saw the excitement in its eyes, just before it was torn to pieces by the same grey flock that had watched it before.
That would be his fate, she had explained. His exotic originality would be seen as a threat, they would call him a monster. But he knew he was superior to the double eyes, and he had proved it. She did not know this, and the time to tell her had not yet dawned.
‘Ghertrude?’ he said, as she worked with her back to him, ‘why are the streets below being decorated?’
‘Oh!’ she exclaimed happily, ‘that’s for the carnival!’
‘And what is ‘carnival’ in this place?’ he asked.
‘Well, every year, the people have a party to thank the forest for its gifts. It lasts for three days and nights, everybody stops work, and the streets are alive with music, food and dancing. Everything is decorated, even the cathedral. The people dress in costumes that they have spent all year making. Lords and ladies mix with peasants and rogues, not knowing each other’s rank or status.’
‘How is that possible, when everybody recognises each other here?’
‘Because of the masks!’ she whooped, carried away in the joyful momentum.
‘Masks?’ he queried.
‘Yes! Fanciful, mysterious masks of every description, angels and demons, animals and mons-’
‘Monsters?’ he ventured slowly.
She had become suddenly quiet and unsure of where to look.
‘Could it be,’ he pressed, ‘that on such an occasion, a ‘rarity’ might hide its strangeness, that an exotic bird might conceal its beauty, and that a monster would be safe amongst so many others?’
And so it came to pass that the beast went the ball.
They stood just inside the gate of 4 Kühler Brunnen. They made a fine pair, plumed and bejewelled, masked and covered, loose and sensuous silks flashing provocatively beneath their cloaks.
‘Will it be like the story you read me, the one you liked so much? With the clock and the coloured rooms, the one that gave me nightmules?’ he asked.
‘Nightmares,’ she corrected. ‘Yes, but not so solemn. It will be much ruder. Everybody is drunk and behaves badly.’
‘How badly?’ he asked, apprehensively.
‘Behind a mask you can be anybody, do anything. No one is found guilty, no one is innocent; there are more children sired during these three days than the rest of the year. And no one looks too closely for family resemblance, nine months later, when the babes are born.’
‘And nobody is ever unmasked?’
‘Never!’ she said, with more certitude than she felt. It was true that one felt a certain freedom under the protection of disguise, and she had committed petty crimes and minor malices before under the mask. But she had never possessed the nerve to engage in open debauchery. Until now.
They peeped through the gap and plucked at the springboard of their nerves, readying to be jettisoned into the whirling throng of dreams that bustled and shoved in the streets outside. The noise was colossal. Hurdy-gurdies and pipers roamed the streets, confusing the vast steam organ that played from the heart of the market square. There were fireworks and pistol shots, trumpets and singing, screaming and laughter.
Suddenly, the gate was open and they were gone. Mutter locked it hard behind them and spat on to the wet cobblestones.
My gentle years are over. A long-forgotten hunger has been rekindled by my unexpected adventure, and I feel its energy course hungrily through my body. The murderer across the water has awoken a coiled reaction – I can taste his blood, even at this distance. Why anyone would find cause to shoot at me remains a mystery. My dealings with other humans are decades past, and all before that is erased. Only my wife keeps the memories in her flesh and moisture, both of which live in my bow. We will find the assassin and dig the answers out of him; my foes in this unfamiliar and treacherous world will not remain hidden.
I will rest, and make an evening camp. In the coming morning, I will make new arrows, and use them to sign my passage and sweep all enemies aside. The man in the water will be in no hurry to meet me again, and the next time he does, the first shot will be mine.