A Highly Unlikely Scenario, or a Neetsa Pizza Employee's Guide to Saving the World (20 page)

Crammed between the alcoves were stone figures sleeping on stone boxes—tombs, he heard a guide explain to six red-haired Swabians, and the alcoves were shrines, and the glittering pictures made from colored bits were mosaics. The stone figures were enthusiastically embraced by pilgrims; an old man lay outstretched on one, snoring.

What is that tall lady doing? Sally whispered.

She seems to be sweeping dust from a tomb into a travel pocket.

Can't be.

Leonard had to agree: it couldn't.

Between the shrines and tombs, the walls were covered by richly brocaded throw-cloths, and multicolored orbs tinkled mysteriously against one another; they appeared suspended in air, though in fact they hung from candleholders by tendrils of nearly invisible metal threading.

Why do you like this? Sally asked. I thought you liked your White Room. This is nothing like a White Room.

I did, Leonard said. Maybe because I didn't know places like this existed. Look! he said, and pointed at a brazen figure of a seated man holding a key. Pilgrims were queuing to talk to this figure and to kiss its shiny toe.

Milione was right, he said. The world is full of wonders. You have only to look and pay attention.

Milione?

Another long story.

I'm tired of your long stories.

I'll tell you everything when I can, Leonard said.

I'm tired of everything, Sally said. I didn't nap this afternoon like you did, you know.

We'll rest soon.

Do you think we're safe? Sally asked.

I'm sure of it.

Will you look for signs and wonders, just to be sure?

Leonard put his arm around Sally's shoulder but was tsk-tsked by a nun in a sweeping gray habit.

And so they circled the great hall, which was actually transected at the far end by a shorter hall, Sally looking over her shoulder all the while for the man with the loud boots or the Frankish woman who thought they were evil, while Leonard marveled at the gilded candle-holding devices that hung ingeniously from the ceiling.

Leonard counted one hundred columns: eighty-eight in four rows separating the central hall from the four outer aisles, plus an additional twelve around the area where the two halls intersected. Again, he approved the decision, one hundred being ten squared, ten being the tetractys, or sum of the only numbers needed to geometrically define known objects (which is to say 1 + 2 + 3 + 4), but he found perplexing the variety of columns, which were not of uniform size or shape: the two in the front were black, for example, which anyone should know was a mistake.

When they finally returned to their corner, Sally said, Keep looking for signs and wonders, then fell promptly asleep on his shoulder.

Leonard closed his eyes and took a deep breath, and then another, then maybe twenty more, and felt the strangeness and wonder of the world breathing through him in one great circular breath. He remembered Mill's words—you have only to pay attention, to give yourself over to wonder—then opened his eyes and saw, with exquisite precision, clear at the other end of the hall, on a triumphal arch, a mosaic—a mosaic of the building itself, being offered to a scruffy man on a throne, and inside
that building, a mosaic of the mosaic within the building, being offered to a man on a throne, and in that mosaic of the building, a mosaic of the building, and so on. All possible mosaics of the building locked into place, and Leonard saw them as if they were one cubit before him, their infinite edges sharp and clear. He looked away and saw the bloody bandage around a pilgrim's head across the basilica; he smelled the man's fear. He closed his eyes and smelled a hundred smells, each of them distinct: incense coiling from every shrine, the smell of the unwashed, every pilgrim with his or her particular scent, the odor of fish dinners, a dozen species of fish cooked according to the customs of a dozen lands. He heard a cacophony of languages; the shriekings and cryings, in all their echoing discord and variety, were as stirring and majestic as the NP theme song. He felt the innumerable gradations of cool marble against his back, and the pressure of Sally's head against his shoulder: sweet Sally!

The world, he murmured, is so beautiful.

Soon it will be no more, a voice said.

Leonard opened his eyes, slowly. A freakishly tall man, bearded and not wholly substantial, hovered before him, his slippered feet not quite touching the ground. He had a pronounced gap between his smiling teeth and was juggling Hebrew letters in the air.

How's Felix? Leonard asked. He may have been speaking out loud, it was hard to know.

You understand much, the floating man said. Meditation, extratemporal transportation, fasting …

We don't have much food, Leonard admitted. Are you Isaac or Abulafia? he asked.

The man looked hurt.

I am Abulafia, the Messiah. Moshiach? he added when Leonard's face remained blank. The anointed one? Descendant of David? Messenger of peace?

Oh, Leonard said. He wanted to wake Sally—she should see this!—but he no longer felt the weight of her head upon his shoulder—he no longer felt even his shoulder, or his hand, or the marble wall against his back. He wasn't even sure he was breathing.

You're talking kinda normally, he said. Doesn't Isaac translate for you?

Feh! Abulafia said, offended anew. He continued to juggle: an improbable number of letters swirled above his head in complex loops and folderols.

Is Felix okay?

His name is Asher now, and he is fine. I am helping him, he is helping me. You can go home now. Bye! and the man and his swirling letters started to fade away.

I can't leave just yet, Leonard said, and the man returned. I have to see Felix. I have to take him home.

Oh, no. Sorry, the man said, looking up to where he executed a double roundabout juggle that caused the letters to circle each other in both backward and forward motion. That won't be possible. I need him. Big shame! I would have liked to have talked with you about Pythagoras. I met him once, you know, in Tibet. Wonderful man! But now it's time for you to go. Cheerio! and again the man started to fade.

You can't keep him! Leonard said. He's needed at home, we need him at home. He froze the world, you know.

The man returned to focus, looking a trifle put out. His juggle was simple now: just four simultaneous circlings.

It doesn't matter. The world's going to end, Felix will help me. It's a two-man job. So take care now, you hear!

He has to come home.

The spirit-man floated closer, perhaps to impress Leonard with his prodigious height. The letters left his hands and rose to the timbered ceiling, there to loop and spin.

I think you'll find, Mr. Leonard, that Asher prefers to stay with me. So you can go now. Goodbye!

He won't stay with you! Leonard said. He won't. I'll find you. I'll find you and bring him home.

Oh, no! the Abulafia spirit-man said, floating now just inches above Leonard, forcing him to look straight up in the air. The letters were circling his head so fiercely his face could barely be seen. You have to stay away! Why do you think I've come to you? People are already watching us because of you. You were seen, by the Inquisition. You'll bring danger to everyone, Asher included. And get away from this church—there are Orsini everywhere! Okay, it was nice meeting you. Bye!

Before Leonard could ask what an Orsini was, the floating man and his letters had fizzled away.

But one of them dropped. One of the letters Abulafia had been juggling, it popped out of formation just as the spirit-man
dissolved and landed on the marble floor, the coolness of which Leonard could again feel, together with the sweetness of Sally's head upon his shoulder.

The letter smoked a little about the edges, and vibrated. Leonard, not sure what to do, reached for it and put it in his underarm pocket, where the vibration soothed him, so much that despite his intention to protect Sally from Orsini and men with big boots, he went quite thoroughly to sleep.

I had something of a vision last night, Leonard explained when Sally woke him. A slight vibration under his arm reminded him that Abulafia's letter was still in his pocket. I saw Abulafia. He said they saw us, the Inquisition, that man with the boots, he saw us—I guess when we were running away.

Sally put her hand to her cheek.

That's not possible! What can he have seen? Just the back of us, just the back of two ordinary pilgrims …

She put her hand on Leonard's afro.

They saw this, she said softly. They think you're wearing crayon-colored sleeping togs, that's okay, but they also saw your hair.

My hair? Leonard said, already feeling the loss.

I can take out my headbeads, but you were running behind me, what they saw is you. We'll have to cut your hair.

The glorious equanimity Leonard had felt the night before, his exaltation over the fecund majesty of the world, was gone; his lower lip trembled.

I can do that, he said.

You're very brave, Sally said. I don't suppose we'll find hair-shears here. You'll have to borrow a knife from those folks over there, the ones who are carving that enormous, delicious-looking loaf of bread. The one with the intoxicating aroma and the oil dripping all over it.

I'm hungry too, Leonard said.

Try not to be conspicuous, Sally said.

Leonard laughed at the idea that any one person in this vast hall of rushing, ecstatic, limping, crying, snoring, shrieking, feasting, singing citizenry might ever be singly conspicuous.

Leonard introduced himself.

The bread-eating family turned out to be Cumbrian.

Ahreet, marra! the elder exclaimed, holding out his hand. Oust fetal? Werst t' frae?

Was this the best Isaac could do? Leonard couldn't understand a word. When he didn't respond, the elder explained to his family, T'boyo's an offcomer, and they nodded knowingly.

Leonard offered multiple gestures. The Cumbrian family gladly lent Leonard their knife, though the youngest and strongest accompanied him to the nearest tomb, where, affecting
an ague, Leonard twitched and moaned and cut off his curls, depositing them at the foot of the reclining figure, much to the approbation of a pair of black-robed Sicilian sisters.

The youngest and strongest ran his hand approvingly over Leonard's partially shorn head.

Slape! he said, and Leonard smiled uncertainly.

He gave his thanks to the Cumbrian family. They pointed at their food.

Scran? they asked. Snig? Skemmy? Kets?

Leonard's gaze lingered possibly rather long on their bread, for they gave him one-quarter of it with their blessings.

As he walked off, he heard the youngest and strongest, his hand in his hair, explain to the others: Biddies! he said.

You look like a Survivalist, Sally said, also running her fingers through Leonard's unevenly cropped hair. I like it!

Leonard would willingly have hacked off all his hair on meeting Sally had he known it would please her. And yet, he pondered, such a gesture would have been evidence of neither wealth nor position, nor would it have involved pretty compliments. How puzzling! Milione had been wise about many things, but maybe he didn't know about women.

Or maybe Sally wasn't like most women. Being a paragon, this was, in fact, likely.

I like your new hairstyle, he said.

Sally had removed her headbeads and given them to a Cumbrian child, who was already arranging them in colored polygons on the ground.

They finished their breakfast and stood to go.

Today would have to be the day.

They departed the basilica, Leonard taking just one moment to admire the colored window, flower shaped, high above the door, through which entered the most brilliant blue light, and another moment, in the courtyard, to gaze at the gold-backed mosaics—more men wearing gowns—on the church's facade. He was about to point Sally's attention to the tower they'd seen the night before—in daylight he could see that its top was gilded with silver and gold—but Sally sighed. Her expression was downcast, her demeanor despondent.

You feeling any better? Leonard asked.

I'm fine. Why do you ask? Do I seem not fine? I feel fine.

Leonard didn't want to argue with her, so he said, You didn't seem fine last night. Last night you seemed kind of blue.

Sally was about to deny it but didn't. Instead she leaned against one of the fountain's red columns and looked intently at her leather slippers.

This is your world, she said. Not mine. I like things to be clear; I don't like signs and wonders. I don't like being in a world where I don't know the rules, where you have visions I can't see, and some invisible guy named Isaac tells us what to do. Back home, I know how things work: give me a task, and I'll find the best way to do it. Here I do my best and nearly get us killed!