Cat's Pajamas (23 page)

“What about the gold?” asked Harana.

“This way,” said Rodrigo, pointing north. “Gold, silver, gems.”

He took us to “the Jewelry District,” on the Forty-seventh Street near “the Avenue of the Americas.” Again, the youth knew whereof he spoke. Treasure lay on all sides, nearly all of it under the jurisdiction of Jews wearing dreadlocks, grotesque hats, and long black coats. We must not take anything, Rodrigo cautioned us. If we tried to remove the gold, the
policía
would intervene, presumably cutting off our hands and feet in the manner, my Queen, of your Santa Hermandad.

“Are the spices near?” asked Harana.

“Bit of a hike,” said the youth. “You up for it?”

Our party traveled west, then north on the “Broadway” road to “Columbus Circle,” locus of an idol bearing a singularly pleasing countenance, then higher still to the Eighty-first Street, where we found ourselves at the source of the spices. Even from the sidewalk we could smell them: cloves, nutmeg, anise, cinnamon, thyme, ginger, basil-a thousand and one Oriental delights, wafting into our nostrils like the expirations of angels.

Then we saw the name.

Zabar's.

“Jews?” I inquired.

“Jews,” the youth confirmed.

We did not go inside.

Dearest Isabella, could it possibly be that your Second Exodus beat us across the Ocean Sea? Did your ministers by some strange quirk equip the exiled infidels with ships faster even than the
Niña,
the
Pinta,
and the
Santa María?

I am back in my cabin now, scribbling by the light of a full moon, a perfect sphere that sails the sky like a burning pomegranate. The tide is rising in Upper New York Bay, lifting the
Santa María
up and down on her hawser like a ball riding atop the snout of Bronx Zoo seal. The harbor air scrapes my throat, burns my chest, and brings tears to my eyes.

You must advise us, Sovereign Queen. These Spice Islands confound our minds and confuse our souls. Should we confiscate the gold? Lay claim to the silks and spices? Present our credences at City Hall-man? Attempt to convert the stock exchangers? What?

Written aboard the caravel
Santa María
on this 22nd day of September, in the year of Our Lord Jesus Christ 1492.

I, The Admiral

TO YOU, DON CRISTÓBAL COLÓN,
our Admiral of the Ocean Sea, Viceroy and Governor of all the Islands to be found by you on your Great Voyage of Discovery, greetings and grace…

Forgive my tardiness in answering, but we have recently uprooted the Court, the food supplies in Sante Fe having become depleted and its latrines full, with the result that your communiqué of the 22nd went momentarily astray.

What twisted wind, what perverted current has brought you to the city of which you speak? How are we to account for such a mad and upside-down dominion, this Manhattan where Jews prosper, prevail, and place themselves upon thrones? You are not in Asia, Cristóbal.

A consensus has emerged here. My King, my councilors, and my heart all agree. You must not linger another moment in that Satanic place. Leave, friend. We have no use for Manhattan's filthy gold. We do not seek its tarnished silver, tainted gems, rancid spices, rotten silks.

Predictably, Santángel offers a voice of dissent. He wants you to stay on Manhattan and learn how a city without
limpieza de sangre
has accomplished so many marvels. I believe it is the Jew in him talking. No matter. My wish, not his, is your command.

Take the next tide, Admiral. Pull up your anchor, sail south, and don't stop till you've found a world that makes some sense.

Written in our City of Barcelona on this 1st day of October, in the year of Our Lord Jesus Christ 1492.

I, The Queen

TO YOU, ISABELLA,
by the Grace of God Queen of Castile, Leon, Aragón, Granada, Sicily, Sardinia, and the Balearics, greetings and increase of good fortune…

It is my supreme pleasure to report that your royal intuitions were correct. We quit New York within an hour of your letter's arrival, returning to the Ocean Sea and heading due south as you so wisely instructed. Once again the waves became like mountains, and once again we followed them to our destiny. On October twelth, after a journey of six days, an exhilarating cry of
“Tierra!”
issued from my lookout.

The island we found that afternoon bore little resemblance to Manhattan. It had no citadels, subways, beggars, or Chinese inns. We came ashore on a pristine expanse of gleaming white coral, beyond which lay a jungle so lush and green we thought immediately of Eden before the Fall. When the natives appeared, at first simply peering out from among the trees, then walking down to the beach to greet us, we were further reminded of the Golden Age. They were gentle beyond telling, peaceful beyond belief and naked as the day God made them. Unlike Rodrigo back on Manhattan, they eagerly accepted our gifts, placing the red felt caps on their heads, draping the glass necklaces atop their bare bosoms, and jangling the little brass bells like children. They call their world Guanahaní, but we forthwith named it San Salvador after Him whose infinite mercy brought us here.

Have we at last reached Asia? I cannot say. There are many beautiful islands in this part of creation. We have given them all Spanish names—Hispaniola, Santa María la Antigua, Puerto Rico, Trinidad, Santa Cruz—so God will know from which nation this Holy Endeavor proceeds. In every case, the natives have proven as docile and prelapsarian as those on San Salvador. They are ignorant of horse and ox, innocent of wheel, plow, and musket. Beyond the occasional juju clutched in a brown fist or amulet slung about a sunbaked neck, we find no evidence of religion here. Say the word, and Father Hojeda will begin the baptisms.

At the moment I am on Hispaniola, watching a dozen maidens frolic in the clear blue waters of a bay called Acul. As the sun descends, it turns the girls' bare skin the very color of the bronze swords with which we shall keep these people in check. Have I arrived in Paradise, my Queen?

Written aboard the caravel
Santa María
on this 17th day of October, in the year of Our Lord Jesus Christ 1492.

I, The Admiral

TO YOU, DON CRISTÓBAL COLÓN,
our Admiral of the Ocean Sea, Viceroy and Governor of all the Islands to be found by you on your Great Voyage of Discovery, greetings and grace…

Friar Deza says Spain is now “on the threshold of a grand and glorious age.” Father Torquemada thinks we stand “on the verge of a Thousand Year Empire such as the world has never known.”

They may be right. Six days ago, Emanuel I of Portugal asked for the Infanta's hand in marriage, and she dutifully accepted. The day after that, the Islamic King Boabdil surrendered the keys to the Alhambra, and our victory over the Moors became complete. Then, twenty-four hours later, your missive arrived from Hispaniola.

O my Admiral, the belief here is that, if you are not in the Indies, you have come upon something no less valuable for Spain, a great pool of unclaimed souls both ripe for conversion and ready to relieve Castile of all strenuous and unseemly labor. When I read your letter to my councilors, a cheer resounded throughout the castle, and before long we were all drinking the same vintage of Marques de Cacares with which you bargained in Manhattan.

Santángel did not join our celebration. He says Torquemada's Thousand Year Empire will last no more than a few centuries. “In fleeing Manhattan, Spain has made a fatal mistake,” he insists. “By running away to Hispaniola, Don Cristóbal has merely bought the Crown some time.”

Last night a violent and frightening vision afflicted my sleep. Like the Golem of Jewish folklore, the idol of
libertad
had by some miracle come to life, and had by no less a miracle betaken herself to Europe. So heavy were her footfalls that the very mountains of Spain commenced to tremble, then to crack apart, then to collapse upon themselves like ancient Atlantis sinking into the waters beyond the Pillars of Hercules.

What do you make of my dream, Cristóbal? Could it be that Santángel is right, and the best you can do for Spain is buy her some time? Very well. Amen. Empire is the art of the possible.

So baptize those brown natives, dear sailor. Put them to work. Punish those who cling to their fetishes and rites. And buy Spain some time, O my Admiral. Buy her some time.

Written in our City of Barcelona on this 23rd day of October, in the year of Our Lord Jesus Christ 1492.

I, The Queen

D
ARKNESS. THE LIVING ROOM
of Arabella LeGrand, a suburban voodoo queen residing in the fictitious town of Montrose, Pennsylvania. Coffee table, loveseat, bookcase, rug, floor lamp. The bookcase holds a candelabrum, two mixing bowls filled with dirt, and a portable radio from which issues a distressing melody, perhaps something from Mussorgsky's “Pictures at an Exhibition.” A large spoon extrudes from each mixing bowl.

Two candleholders with red tapers occupy the coffee table, and a woman's shoulder bag lies on the floor. As the action progresses, we'll be invited to imagine three doors in the vicinity, one granting access to the front foyer, one leading to the kitchen, and one opening onto the cellar stairwell.

Enter ARABELLA LeGRAND, dressed in a Gypsy skirt with large pockets. She is a high-spirited woman of strong philosophical convictions and impressive metaphysical capabilities.

Lights up as Arabella switches off the radio and begins igniting the candles. She speaks directly to the audience.

ARABELLA: I'll never forget the first time I brought somebody back from the dead. I could've practiced on any old corpse, but for my trial zombie I picked Lloyd, my late husband. Car crash. Forty-five years old. Poor Lloyd.
(beat)
He wasn't particularly grateful when I resurrected him. In fact, he was annoyed. “Damn it, Arabella, now what?” I could see his point, but I needed somebody to lay the new linoleum in the kitchen.

The moan of a returning zombie briefly distracts her.

ARABELLA:
(cont'd)
Right away, Lloyd wanted a new name. He made me call him Jacques. “Jacques,” “Lloyd,” no matter—it wasn't like I really had him back. My kitchen floor looks great though.

A second moan throws her out of the reverie. She recovers.

ARABELLA:
(cont'd)
Lloyd's gone now. Malnourishment. A zombie can't digest anything except the dirt you removed from his grave when you exhumed him. Eventually you run out, and the corpse drops dead, and you have to go revive somebody else.

A third moan. She can't ignore it.

ARABELLA:
(cont'd)
Maurice? Come on in!

MAURICE shuffles into the living room from the foyer. His face is pale, black circles under his eyes. He holds a weed puller in one hand, a cantaloupe in the other.

MAURICE:
(zero affect)
If I were alive, I'd be feeling mighty hungry now.

Arabella removes a bowl of dirt from the bookcase and proffers it to Maurice. The zombie receives his dinner.

MAURICE: Dirt. Yum.

ARABELLA: Did you finish weeding Mrs. Barlow's vegetable garden?

MAURICE:
(waves weed puller)
The cabbages are almost ripe. The lettuce is ready for picking.
(tosses cantaloupe to Arabella)
She sent you her biggest cantaloupe.

ARABELLA: Tomorrow she hopes you'll pull the worms off her tomatoes.

MAURICE:
(non sequitur)
I miss the desires themselves more than I miss their fulfillment.

Still holding his dirt, Maurice exits toward the kitchen. As before, Arabella speaks directly to the audience.

ARABELLA: When a person has the power to raise the dead, she develops a strong sense of obligation to the living. In the old days, a zombie queen would use her corpses to help out the workers in the sugarcane fields and the tin mines.

Arabella hefts the cantaloupe.

ARABELLA:
(cont'd)
Mary Barlow can barely afford to buy groceries, so I've started sending Maurice over to help her raise a few vegetables. Poor old Horace Bickle used to get up at five every morning to deliver the
Montrose Daily Times.
It took me all day to teach Marguerite his route, but so far we haven't had a single dissatisfied customer.

Maurice returns with his dirt bowl and a canister of whipped cream.

ARABELLA:
(cont'd)
Clarence Tucker used to spend all his spare time licking and stuffing envelopes, so I started lending him Françoise. She's dead, but she has an excellent tongue.

Maurice pulls the cap off the whipped cream canister.

ARABELLA:
(to Maurice)
Whipped cream?

MAURICE: I can't taste it.
(shrugs)
The TV commercial is very persuasive.

Once again Arabella speaks directly to the audience.

ARABELLA: Patty Ambrose's eyesight got so bad she almost lost her job driving the school bus, but now Jean-Louis does it for her. Patty still goes along, riding in the front seat, helping the kids on and off.

Maurice attempts to frost his dirt with whipped cream. The canister delivers nothing but stale air.

MAURICE: Faugh. Empty.

ARABELLA: Listen, Maurice, some people are coming over tonight—the Montrose Public Safety Committee. Be nice to them. They're not sure zombies are a good idea. They might want to ban you.

MAURICE: I can pull eighty weeds in less than an hour, roots and all!

ARABELLA: They say they're concerned about sanitation issues, but I'll tell you what
really
bothers them. They're furious because I won't loan my zombies to wealthy people.

MAURICE: Ah.

ARABELLA: If I start letting the rich have zombies, the poor won't get their fair share.

MAURICE: Metaphysical socialism.

ARABELLA: Exactly.

MAURICE: Dialectical immaterialism.

ARABELLA: Indeed.

MAURICE: Voodoo economics.

Still holding his dirt, Maurice starts toward the kitchen in quest of a new whipped cream canister.

MAURICE:
(cont'd)
Such a dreamer you are, Arabella. Try being a corpse some time. It will make you a realist.

Exit Maurice. Arabella addresses the audience.

ARABELLA: The situation's getting out of hand. I've received insider tips from stockbrokers, new cars from bank presidents, diamond necklaces from brain surgeons. They think it would be so chic having a zombie around the mansion—cleaning the swimming pool, serving the canapés, tending the roses, walking the yorkie. I won't squander the dead that way.

Someone knocks on the front door.

ARABELLA:
(cont'd)
It's open!

Enter SUSAN WINGROVE, the mayor of Montrose, a middle-aged, no-nonsense politico whose conscience routinely informs her that she has selected the wrong line of work.

ARABELLA:
(cont'd)
Hello, Mayor Wingrove.

SUSAN: Ms. LeGrand.
(shakes Arabella's hand)
Are the others here yet?

ARABELLA: NO.

SUSAN:
(mildly conspiratorial)
I came a little early on purpose. I'm hoping I might speak with Herman privately. In his new… condition.

ARABELLA:
(to Susan)
You mustn't expect too much.

SUSAN: He was a good husband. A little stuffy, but good. Made his own breakfast, built us a patio—he even managed my last campaign. Poor Herman.

ARABELLA: A skiing accident, right?

SUSAN: Broke his neck.

ARABELLA: He'll want you to call him Gaston.

SUSAN: What?
(American pronunciation) Gaston?

ARABELLA:
(French pronunciation) Gaston.
Call him
Gaston.

SUSAN: Gaston.

Maurice returns from the kitchen, bearing his dirt and a new canister of whipped cream. He sits on the loveseat, sprays some whipped cream into the bowl, and begins spooning the dirt into his mouth.

SUSAN:
(indicating Maurice)
That one looks familiar.

ARABELLA: Maurice used to work at the supermarket.

MAURICE: Paper, or plastic?

Finding a slug in his food, Maurice attempts to mimic revulsion.

MAURICE:
(cont'd)
Oh, yuck. A slug.

He pulls the slug free, dangles it in the air—and suddenly eats it.

MAURICE:
(cont'd)
Yum. I mean yuck.

ARABELLA: His name was Eddie Watkins. Lung cancer.

SUSAN: Oh, dear.

MAURICE:
(shoving bowl toward Susan)
Would you like some dirt?

SUSAN: NO, thank you.

ARABELLA: Time for bed, Maurice.

MAURICE:
(rising, to Susan)
Would you like to see my coffin?

SUSAN: Not right now.
(to Arabella)
We might want to interview Maurice later. Will it be hard to wake him up?

ARABELLA:
(shaking head)
Zombies can't sleep—but, they do need their rest.

MAURICE: Once you've experienced ontological oblivion, insomnia doesn't seem so bad.

ARABELLA:
(to zombie)
Big day tomorrow, Maurice, deworming all those tomatoes.

MAURICE: May I read in bed?

ARABELLA:
(assenting)
Lights out by 9:30.

A moan signals the return of another zombie.

ARABELLA:
(cont'd)
Come in, Gaston!

Maurice removes Heidegger's
Being and Time
from the bookcase and, still gripping his dinner, exits toward the cellar stairs.

ARABELLA:
(cont'd)
Now that you've seen what they're like, do you still want to…?

SUSAN: I'm not going to enjoy it, but… yes, I want to meet him.

Susan's resurrected husband, now called GASTON, enters from the foyer: pale face, black eyes, shambling gait. He wears ragged clothes and a torn felt hat.

Gaston takes the second dirt meal from the bookcase, flops down on the loveseat, and speaks. His voice is toneless, but we still detect a note of exasperation.

GASTON: God, what a day! “Gaston, read us a story.” “Gaston, tie my shoes.” “Gaston, give me a horsy-back ride.”

Gaston spoons dirt into his mouth.

ARABELLA:
(to Susan)
Gaston baby-sits for Mrs. Fishbine every day, so she can work the cash register at Home Depot.

GASTON: “Gaston, I have to go potty.” “Gaston, we want to see
Toy Story.”

SUSAN: Hello, Herman.
(American pronunciation)
Gaston.

GASTON:
(French)
Gaston.

SUSAN:
(French)
Gaston.

Gingerly, she joins him on the loveseat.

GASTON: Susan? Is that you?

SUSAN: Uh-huh.

ARABELLA: I'll leave you two alone.

Still holding cantaloupe, Arabella exits toward the kitchen.

GASTON: So… how's life?

SUSAN: I'm doing okay.

GASTON: “Doing okay.” That's
good,
isn't it?

SUSAN: Our daughter's about to graduate from Villanova.

GASTON:
(straining to feel)
Well,
well. (beat)
You appear to be
quite healthy,
Susan.

SUSAN: I feel great. They found a lump in my breast last month, but it was benign.

GASTON: My, my.
(proffers bowl)
Would you like some dirt?

SUSAN: I just had dinner.
(earnest)
Tell me what it's like.

GASTON: Dirt?

SUSAN: Death.

GASTON: A phenomenologist might put it this way, “There is nothing that being dead is like.”

SUSAN:
(feigning comprehension)
I see.

GASTON:
(indicating candle)
I can tell you this candle is red, but I don't experience the redness.
(touches Susan's cheek)
I know your cheek is soft, but the softness doesn't register. My reality is devoid of sensation. All qualia are absent. I think this suggests that consciousness is not supervenient on the physical, but reflects an as yet undiscovered property of the universe, wouldn't you agree?

SUSAN:
(perplexed)
Yes.
(beat)
But do you feel
exploited,
Herman?

GASTON: Gaston.

SUSAN: Gaston.

GASTON: Exploited?

SUSAN: Some people think zombies should be outlawed in Montrose. Last week the Borough Council appointed a Public Safety Committee. We're meeting with Ms. LeGrand tonight: me… and Reverend Larkin… and—

GASTON: Reverend Larkin? Yuck.
(mimicry)
“Now
you too
can be part of our wonderful new expedition to find the Holy Grail. Just send your hard-earned cash to Radio Station WQRX.”

SUSAN:
(chagrined)
He gives the Committee a certain moral authority. Whatever we decide, the Borough Council will go along with it.

GASTON: “It is easier for a poor man to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich camel to enter the Kingdom of Heaven.”
(to Susan)
Who
else
is coming over? Richard Nixon?

Susan blanches slightly: Ben Grigsby is not a comfortable topic.

SUSAN: The County Health Inspector. You know, Ben Grigs—

GASTON: Ben Grigsby? That chucklehead got reelected? He stuffed the ballot box all over again?

SUSAN: Ben never stuffed the ballot box. That was just a rumor…

GASTON: Maybe I wasn't the ideal campaign manager, Susan, but I never recruited any voters for you in Greenbriar Cemetery.

SUSAN: …and the second time around, there was no controversy at all. Ben earned every vote he got.
(uncertain)
I'm sure of it.

GASTON: You mean the people actually
wanted
him? That's even worse! If I was alive, I'd be glad I didn't live to see it.

SUSAN:
(confused)
Yes.
(beat)
Ben believes he can prove that zombies are a public health hazard.

GASTON: I'll be honest, Susan: I used to worry that you and Ben had a thing for each other—back when you were both on that Sewer Study Task Force. Imagine that.

SUSAN:
(forced sincerity)
Imagine that.

GASTON: You were so
dedicated
to that task force.

SUSAN: Montrose has a lot sewers.

GASTON: You know something? Ben's wife had the same suspicions I did.

SUSAN: How … suspicious of her.
(the subject must change)
So your preference would be for Ms. LeGrand to stay in business, right?

GASTON: The dead have no preferences.