DAW 30th Anniversary Science Fiction Part 23

Ian Watson.

Whilst being an astute businessman, Don Wollheim was also politically rather left-wing. Back in 1980, I was Guest of Honor at the British Easter SF Convention and, along with the late lamented John Brunner, I took part in a panel about the British nuclear deterrent. Both John and I were members of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament.

Opinions in the audience became heated, and when I proposed that the convention should vote on a resolution to the British government to abandon our nuclear weapons the hall erupted. One chap rose to his feet and accused me of bringing the office of Guest of Honor into disrepute. Whereupon, seconded by Don, Elsie Wollheim rose to her feet, quivering with rage, to round upon my accuser. Oh, there was political fire in Don and Elsie.

A few years later, Don bought a story by me called "We Remember Babylon" (about the re-creation of Babylon in the Arizona desert) to re-print in his 1985 Annual World's Best SF. This story became a novel ent.i.tled Wh.o.r.es of Babylon, so naturally I sent the novel to Don who had already published my Book of the River trilogy, which went on to become a Science Fiction Book Club selection. Wh.o.r.es of Babylon infuriated Don. "Why," he wrote to me, "should anyone want to read about the recreation of Babylon in all its filth and depravity?" I guess he perceived that my Babylon book did not have market potential as a DAW t.i.tle, for he was indeed a perceptive businessman. Published in Britain, Wh.o.r.es of Babylon became a finalist for the Arthur C. Clarke Award, but no American publisher would touch it.

---IW.

THE BLACK WALL OF JERUSALEM.

Ian Watson.

SHORTLY after I returned to England, the dreams began. Nightly, a four-legged Angel inbright armor bears me upon his back into domains where I witness marvels and atrocities- before we are forced, by a Harpy, by a Buddha-Toad, by a Woman-Whirlwind, to withdraw.

Meanwhile, in Israel, helicopter gunships are rocketing Arab cars and houses-it's the wrong war, the wrong war!

Do I report my dreams to the Knights of the Black Wall back in Jerusalem? Might I be inviting an a.s.sa.s.sin to visit me? I'm definitely a link, a channel. Can the Black Wall appear in my own country, especially if Jerusalem is incinerated in a Middle Eastern holocaust, which heaven forbid. Heaven, indeed! And will those feet in modern times walk upon England's mountains green? And will the Centaur-Angel be on England's pleasant pastures seen?

Beyond our world lurk other potent dimensions, parasitical and expansionist, seeking their place in the true sun.

I am being incoherent.

Some time before the fall of Jerusalem to Saladin in 1187, the Knights Templar expelled from their Order and from the Holy Land a certain Robert de Sourdeval. During the 1920s, workmen renovating the Aqsa Mosque on Temple Mount found hidden in its roof s.p.a.ce a parchment alluding to the expulsion. Sourdeval's crime remained a mystery until a further doc.u.ment was offered to an antique dealer in East Jerusalem in the 1950s and came into the possession of a Polish-American garments millionaire who was pa.s.sionately interested in the "occult" side of history: Kabbalah, Sufism, Masonry, and such.

This doc.u.ment, a copy of a letter written in Latin by Sourdeval to an unknown recipient, is the earliest recorded description of the Black Wall of Jerusalem and of the "demoniacal"

beings beyond it. Two other accounts exist, one in Hebrew by a Rabbi and the other in Arabic by a Sufi, and neither is as lucid.

Why did the Knights Templar expel Sourdeval? That military order of monks were obsessed with Solomon's bygone temple, on the site of which they had established their headquarters, converting the Aqsa Mosque for this purpose. For the Templars, Solomon's Temple was the supreme example of sacred architecture. Its geometrical proportions, as deduced from the Bible, offered a key to the fundamentals of s.p.a.ce and time, as we would say nowadays, and so could reveal the underpinnings of the universe and of life itself. For Sourdeval to insist on the existence-even the fleeting and visionary existence-of a wall anywhere in the vicinity which enshrined creatures more demonic than angelic must have been anathema. His testimony must be suppressed.

I'm running ahead of myself. . . .

I was a lecturer in Art History with a particular interest in apocalyptic art, Altdorfer and such. Philip Wilson was also a poet with a minor reputation-the emphasis should be on was. I dreamed of blowing people out of the water one day with something major and sustained, of the caliber of William Blake. Yet as another William-Butler Yeats-put it, "I sought a theme and sought for it in vain." So far, I had been penning clever poems mainly inspired by artists'

visions. Did I have no unique vision of my own, and could this be due to my own lack of any faith? Yeats managed to find his themes and visions. Might Jerusalem-the bubbling cauldron of religions, the real Jerusalem rather than Blake's resounding verses-prompt me with somethingsuitable and major?

I had a sabbatical term due, and no ties. Trish had walked out on me, and by then I was glad of this. At first her pa.s.sionate enthusiasms and loathings had been stimulating, but after a while these came to seem like a series of self-indulgent fads, a sort of self-generated hysteria in which I was supposed to concur fully or be abused by her for lack of commitment or spirit.

Ultimately I came to realize that Trish didn't care a hoot about my poetry, in other words, my real inner self. Fortunately, we had no kids to make a separation messy. Trish was always too busy for children, and then she became too busy for me. Yes, I would go to Jerusalem for a week in October, stay longer if I felt inspired. Irish was in a hatred-of-property phase and had swanned off to an ashram in India to be spiritual. She might return to demand a share of the house and my income, but for the moment I had funds and freedom.

The driver of the limousine who whisked me from Lod Airport-I sat up front for a better view-proved to have emigrated from London ten years earlier and was proudly Israeli.

Deeply tanned, he wore shorts.

As he turned on to the only true motorway in Israel, linking Tel Aviv with Jerusalem, he used his mobile to phone ahead in Hebrew to the YMCA hotel where I had reserved a room.

Shalom, shalom.

"They are expecting you, and I have a booking for return to the airport."

I was glad of the air-conditioning in his limo. The brilliance, and the heat! The broad highway traversed what to my eyes appeared to be a barren wilderness seared by fierce sunshine. After we started climbing through reddish-brown foothills, by the sides of the road, battered metal boxes the size of rubbish skips began appearing.

Those, said the ex-Londoner, were relics of the 1948 War of Independence, the wreckage of homemade armored cars which ran an Arab blockade so that we could bring food to besieged Jerusalem-he had not arrived until decades later, nevertheless he was deeply part of this.

Ran the blockade? Oh, no, those boxes had crawled up this incline where our own car now surged smoothly while devils-or at least Arabs-poured fire and brimstone from ambush.

"Many of us died in these convoys. And we're dying still-a car bomb here, a school bus machine-gunned there. And the world's media savage us whenever we aren't whiter than white and don't turn the other cheek, you know what I mean? But we carry on. What are we supposed to do? Jump in the sea?"

I nodded awkwardly.

"Mostly life is quite normal here, so you need not worry about safety."

He sounded like a spokesman for the ministry of tourism, or immigration. I wondered whether he kept a gun in the glove pocket of the limo.

These thoughts pa.s.sed from my mind as, high and still distant, shining white outcrops of apartment blocks appeared. The sheer brightness of the buildings coming into view as we continued higher and higher! All made of the local stone by law, mark you; even a Hilton Hotel must comply. No wonder people thought of Jerusalem as a celestial city here on Earth. Yourose up and up, beholding a succession of white bastions or ramparts of suburbs, like Dante's h.e.l.l of circles inverted and transformed from negative darkness into luminosity. Those Jews of 1948 in their grim, slow ovens had been conducting an a.s.sault, almost, upon heaven itself-betokened by the blinding sky-so as to restore the reign of angels, to raise those up again to pinnacles, thrones, and dominations; and now the angels indeed had dominion, armed with nuclear weapons. I was mixing up my theology a bit, but as my driver would say, know what I mean?

The YMCA hotel was much grander than its name implied. Located directly opposite the very sw.a.n.ky King David Hotel, the elegant 1930s building boasted a tall bell tower resembling some stone s.p.a.ce rocket poised to launch itself. Palm tree and soaring cedars graced a garden, white domed Byzantine wings on either side. The arcaded reception lobby was like a Turkish palace. I arranged to join a few other guests next day for a guided tour of the city to get my bearings.

By now it was evening. After depositing my bags I took a copy of the Jerusalem Post to a table on the terrace where I ordered lamb chops and a beer-the Goldstar proved to be decently malty. I read how a woman corporal had been stabbed to death by an Arab in the Jordan valley, and how the Defense Force had dynamited some Arab houses, and how a member of the Knesset's car had been fire-bombed by an underground extremist Jewish group because of a squabble about the location of a grave. The political situation seemed set to explode in a few more months, but meanwhile rich tourists were still debussing across the road.

Next morning I met up with the guide, Alon, a burly laid-back fellow approaching middle age. Perched on his balding head, a small kippa skullcap gave useful sun protection. My fellow excur-sioners were a blond Swedish couple, the Svensens, their rather plain and shy teenage daughter, and Mrs. Dimet, an American widow, a short, urgent birdlike lady with frizzy hair.

Alon impressed on us that we should each buy a bottle of water before we set off to avoid dehydration, then he discreetly inquired into our religious affiliations so that he could guide us most beneficially.

I said I was agnostic; and the Swedes were atheists, the parents being historians at Umea University.

"It is dark there half of the year," explained Mrs. Svensen. "We came for the history, and for the light. Natural light, not religious light."

"What else could I be but Jewish?" Mrs. Dimet said. "When G.o.d spoke to Abraham, radiation illuminated all people in the world-but most people lost the light. It is a miracle that I am here in Israel at last! Although I think the Hasidim are a bit crazy. G.o.d has to be joking when you wear Polish fur hats and long black coats in this heat."

So none of us were Christians. Judiciously, Alon said, "Usually when I take people round I simply say, 'Here is where Jesus was crucified.' Today I will say, 'Here is where Jesus was said to be crucified.' " He inclined toward Mrs. Dimet. "You are right about the Ultra-Orthodox being crazy. Those fanatics refuse to pay taxes or serve in the army. Some even refuse to speak Hebrew because they think Hebrew is sacred. Yet their political power givesthem all sorts of privileges." He lowered his voice. "There could be civil war here, Jew against Jew. Just as happened when the Romans besieged Jerusalem two thousand years ago!

Jew fighting Jew fratricidally within the walls at the very same time as resisting the legions outside!" For Romans, read Arabs. Such a specter deeply upset this otherwise easygoing man.

The Svensen Parents frowned sympathetically.

And so we set off in Alon's black stretch Mercedes. Landmarks more landmarks, then we parked near the Wailing Wall. Hundreds of orthodox Jews of a.s.sorted sects wearing nineeenth century winter clothing breezed down a sloping plaza in the blazing sunshine to pray at the wall while bobbing their fur-hatted heads repeatedly. Seemingly, the variously attired subdivisions of the ultrafaithful all bitterly resented one another. Handsome young men of the Defense Force, dark-skinned and with gleaming teeth, automatic rifles slung around their shoulders, kept an eye on the comings and goings.

"If you like," said Alon, "you can write a prayer on a piece of paper and put it in a crack in the wall. No one will object."

On the contrary, the devout would completely ignore us, just as they ignored one another. I thought about this and decided why not? Tearing a page from my notebook, I scribbled, "May I have a theme please?" I folded the paper several times, walked to the wall, and inserted my appeal amongst many others. On my return, the Svensens eyed me curiously.

Mrs. Dimet had fled to the women's section to do some praying. Hidden above and beyond the great section of boundary wall was Temple Mount, which alas we would not be able to visit. Occupied as the Mount had been ever since the victories of Islam by highly sacred Moslem shrines, it was a volatile place. A fortnight ago a Canadian John the Baptist armed with a knife had started preaching inside the Aqsa Mosque. Riots and tear gas and shots ensued; security was being rea.s.sessed. While Mrs. Dimet was absent, Alon regaled us with how an extreme Jewish nationalist faction aimed to erase all trace of the Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock and to rebuild Solomon's Temple in all its glory, whereupon the reign of G.o.d could commence.

"First they need ritually to slaughter an all-red heifer and burn it. They are breeding one specially."

"What is a heifer?" asked Mrs. Svensen.

"A young virgin cow."

"Why do those people want to burn a cow?"

"From its ashes they make a paste to sanctify the new foundations. The heifer has to be perfectly red."

"A well-red cow," observed Svensen drolly.

Confusingly, the Red Heifer Brigade was not among the squab- bling ranks of the Ultra Orthodox. Those Ultras would not lift a finger to rebuild the Temple because the Messiah would do it for them-everybody else must do everything for them.

From the Wailing Wall we walked to the Via Dolorosa, no great distance. How close and condensed everything was, all cheek by jowl.

In the courtyard-c.u.m-playground of an Arab primary school, brown-robed Dominicans were gathering for their weekly procession up the flagstoned way trodden by Christ on his wayto be crucified.

"Actually, the city surface was three meters lower in the First Century . . ."

Today being a Friday, no Arab schoolkids were present as a dapper monk proclaimed the Stations of the Cross in Italian, microphone in hand and boom box slung over his shoulder. A rotund Asian colleague recited each Station in orotund English. An Arab would lead the march, sporting a red fez ordained by the Ottomans as the symbol of authority to clear a path, otherwise trouble might ensue. Soldiers observed as we set off.

I was astonished at how tightly confined the route was-a cramped bazaar of souvenir vendors and food shops. A loping Arab lugging a small barrow of watermelons barely managed to career past a military jeep. Nevertheless, here came a band of American women, the vanguard bearing on their shoulders a half-sized replica cross like a battering ram. Equally brusque with purpose was a devout party of Slavs. After prayers at some tiny nearby mosque, an Imam was leading his flock of twenty or so the opposite way down the Via, while a party of French pilgrims were kneeling to adore a plaque marking one of the Stations. Insufficiently backed up, these rival devotees became a target for rage. Crablike, the Imam advanced, grimacing and flailing his arms, although not actually hitting anyone. "Kack Christians!" he snarled, or something excremental. Lost in devotion, the pilgrims remained oblivious.

Presently the Via dog-legged as though a seismic fault line had shifted it sideways, then it became roofed over and we were in an indoor souk. When we reached the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, congestion and jostling of creeds was even more extreme. Orthodox Greeks guarded the claustrophobic pink marble "tomb" of Christ while Copts jealously possessed one stone at the rear, onto which they had grafted a lean-to shrine. An enclosed tooth of shaved-down rock was the whole of Golgotha Hill; hardly any distance away was the site of the Resurrection. The noise in the church, the noise.

"This place is bedlam," said Mrs. Svensen.

"Most of the human race is demented," her husband declared. "Faiths and ideologies are a history of madness. Here it all comes together."

Mrs. Dimet chirped enthusiastically, "The Law of Return lets everyone Jewish come home, Ethiopians, Yemenis, me, if I choose. First there's the Diaspora, the scattering, and now like a miracle there's the incoming. It's a blessing."

"We are talking about different things," said Svensen.

Alon pursued his lips. "According to Muhammad, the entire Earth stretched forth from Jerusalem, and from Jerusalem it will be rolled up eventually like a scroll. Because Jerusalem is the axis of the world."

The Old City, jam-packed with superimposed architecture, rival faiths, and races, seemed to be teetering on the brink of critical ma.s.s. If only the core of Jerusalem could be unfolded into a dozen different dimensions at right angles to each other. Otherwise, it seemed to me, the whole inflated universe might indeed fall inward to some ultimate jostling superheated crunch right here-prior to an apocalyptic explosion from which a new cosmos might erupt, bright as a nuclear fireball, scattering illumination as G.o.d supposedly once had done. I understood how a visitor such as that Canadian screwball could succ.u.mb to delusions and imagine himself to be uniquely transfigured. Such a place this was, such a place.

Just then I noticed a Hispanic-looking young woman darting glances this way and that.

Glossy black hair wild and wavy under a minimal headscarf, olive skin, bold yet haunted eyes.She reminded me of Trish, in the way that a negative suggests a print, her dark ant.i.thesis, ardent, obsessive. This woman wore a long-sleeved cream calico dress and tan leather sandals. As I was admiring her, she b.u.t.tonholed a young Greek Orthodox priest.

After listening for a few seconds he frowned impatiently and strode away, and I lost sight of her, too.

Only to spot her once more while the six of us had stopped for lunch outside a cafe near the Citadel.

Sun furnaced from a cloudless sky, reflecting off stone the color of bees' wax. Were we in the Christian or the Armenian quarter just here? Natives of Jerusalem would know to the exact inch. At the next table a couple of paunchy, hairy Greeks in black pillbox hats sipped cinnamon coffee. Pale omelettes arrived for us tourists, humus with pita bread for Alon.

He grinned at us. "In Israel we do not eat humus, we wipe it." As he proceeded to demonstrate.

A scrawny tabby kitten hunched nearby, staring at us. In pity, Mrs. Dimet pulled some sc.r.a.ps of smoked salmon from her omelette and threw them to the starveling which growled as it bolted down the bits of fish.

Another guide was leading a party through the square. Suddenly, the same Hispanic girl detached herself from the group and headed toward us, eyeing Alon's badge which proclaimed his proficiency in English, German, and Yiddish.

"Excuse me, are you a guide?" American accent, but second language from the sound of it.

"Yes," he conceded, "but I am already hired."

"Please tell me just one thing-can you say where the Black Wall is?"

If this was the first I ever heard of the Black Wall, likewise for Alon!

"I do not know any Black Wall."

"You must!"

Alon shook his head. He looked away. Distractedly, the woman hurried to catch up with her party.

"What was she?" asked Mrs Dimet.

"Some charismatic, perhaps."

"What would the Black Wall be?" I asked.

"I have no idea. Maybe she is confusing with the Kaaba in Mecca." He pondered.

"In Arabic black also means wise. A wise Wall? Maybe she means the Western, ah, the Wailing Wall. We guides need to be careful of such people. This city fosters frenzy in some visitors."

At that moment an unmistakable King David ambled by, colorfully robed and crowned and carrying a little harp.

"Is he a madman, too?" whispered Mrs. Dimet.

"No, he is an Australian. He poses for photos. He has been here for years."

After a tour of the Citadel, Alon drove us to a high promenade from which we could at least gaze from a distance at the golden Dome of the Rock and the Mount of Olives cluttered with gravestones. The sun baked the earth and white buildings as we drank from our waterbottles. Next came a drive to the Yad Vashem holocaust shrine where Mrs. Dimet wept while the simulated stars of the universe twinkled in subterranean darkness, each the soul of a n.a.z.i victim, and a recorded voice endlessly intoned the names of dead children.

The Hispanic woman's wall might be no more than a few painted stones in the Old City, currently obscured by a poster concerning a different genocide, the Armenian one. So much here was exalted by words and names when the reality was much smaller, the River Jordan for instance being more like a big ditch, according to Alon.

As I sat nursing a beer on the terrace of the YMCA hotel that evening, the same woman appeared-so she was staying here, too. Spying me, she came over.

"Excuse me, you were with the guide who would not answer me because I had not hired him. After I went, what did he tell you?"

"Why don't you sit down?"