Moorcock Michael. Constant Fire

   "The reasons are obvious…" began O'Kala, in a rare and philosophical mood, "… for who would wish to discuss such matters, now that we know —?"
   "Quite." My Lady Charlotina waved. An air car was approaching. It was the shape of a great winged man, its bronze head flashing in the red light of the sun, its blind eyes glaring, its twisted mouth roaring as if in agony. The Duke of Queens had modelled his latest car after some image recently discovered by him in one of the rotting cities.
   The car landed nearby and from it trooped many of My Lady Charlotina's most intimate friends. From his saddle behind the head of the winged man the Duke of Queens raised his hand in a salute. He had on an ancient astronaut's jacket, in silver-tipped black fur, puffed pantaloons of mauve and ivory stripes, knee-boots of orange lurex hide, a broad-brimmed hat of panda ears, all sewn together in the most fanciful way.
   "My Lady Charlotina! We saw you and had to greet you. We are on our way to enjoy the new boys Florence Fawkes had made for her latest entertainment. Will you come with us?"
   "Perhaps, but boys…" She lifted the corner of her mouth.
   My Lady Charlotina noted that Doctor Volospion and Mavis Ming were among those pouring from the body of the winged man. She greeted Sweet Orb Mace with a small kiss, laid a sincere hand upon the arm of Bishop Castle, winked at Mistress Christia, and smiled charmingly at Miss Ming.
   "Aha! The beauty for whom Mr Bloom crossed galaxies. Miss Ming, you are the focus of all our envy!"
   "Have you seen Mr Bloom?" asked Miss Ming.
   "Not yet, not yet."
   "Then wait before you envy me," she said.
   Doctor Volospion's cunning eye glittered. "There is nothing more certain to attract the attention of a lady to a gentleman, even in these weary times of ours than the passion of that gentleman for another lady."
   "How perceptive you are, dear Doctor Volospion! It must be admitted. In fact, I believe I already admitted it when I first greeted you."
   Doctor Volospion bowed his head.
   "You are looking at your best," she continued, for it was true. "You are always elegant Doctor Volospion." He had on a long, full-sleeved robe of bottle-green, trimmed with mellow gold, the neck high, to frame his sharp face, a matching tight-fitting cap upon his head, buttoned beneath the pointed chin.
   "You are kind, My Lady Charlotina."
   "Ever truthful, Doctor Volospion." She gave her attention to Miss Ming's white frills. "And this dress. You must feel so much younger in it."
   "Much," agreed Miss Ming. "How clever of you to understand what it was to be like me! How many hundreds of years can it have been?"
   "More than that, Miss Ming. Thousands, almost certainly. I see, at any rate, that your would-be ravisher has yet to come out of his little lair again."
   "He can stay there forever as far as I'm concerned."
   "I have made one or two attempts to rouse him," said Doctor Volospion. "I sought to shift the ship, too, but it is protected now by a singularly intractable force-field. Nothing I possess can dissipate that field."
   "So he does have the power he boasted of, eh?" Bishop Castle in his familiar tall tete which cast a shadow over half the company, looked without much interest at the spaceship.
   "Apparently," said Doctor Volospion.
   "But why doesn't he use it?" The Duke of Queens joined them. "Has he perished in there, do you think. In his own mad flames?"
   "We should have smelled something, at least," said O'Kala Incarnadine.
   "Well," Sweet Orb Mace was now a pretty blonde in a black sari, "you would have smelled something, O'Kala, with your nose."
   O'Kala wrinkled his current one.
   "He's playing cat and mouse with me, that's what I think," said Mavis Ming with a nervous glance at the vessel. "Oh, I'm sorry, O'Kala, I didn't mean to suggest…"
   O'Kala Incarnadine made a toothy grin. "I pity any ordinary cat who met a mouse like me!"
   "He's hoping I'll give in and go to him. That's typical of some men, isn't it? Well I had enough of crawling with Donny Stevens. Never again I told my friend Betty. And never again it was!"
   "But you have been tempted, eh?" My Lady Charlotina became intimate.
   "Not once."
   My Lady Charlotina let disappointment show.
   "I wish," said Mavis Ming, "that he'd either start something or else just go away. It must have been weeks and weeks he's been waiting there! It's getting on my nerves, you know."
   "Of course, it must be, my dear," said Sweet Orb Mace.
   "Well," the Duke of Queens reminded them all, "Florence Fawkes awaits us. Will you come My Lady Charlotina? O'Kala?"
   "I have a project," said My Lady Charlotina, by way of an excuse, "to finish. Of course it is very hard to tell if it is properly finished or not. An invisible city populated with invisible androids. You must come and feel it soon."
   "A lovely notion," said Bishop Castle. "Are the androids of all sexes?"
   "All."
   "And is it possible to —?"
   "Absolutely possible."
   "It would be interesting —"
   "It is."
   "Aha!" Bishop Castle tilted his tete. "Then I look forward to visiting you at the earliest chance, My Lady Charlotina. What entertainments you do invent for us!" He bowed, almost toppled by his headgear.
   The Duke of Queens had resumed his saddle. "All aboard!" he cried enthusiastically.
   It was then that there came a squeak from the space vessel below. The airlock opened. All heads turned.
   Emmanuel Bloom's bright blue eyes regarded them. His high-pitched voice drifted up to them.
   "So you have come to me," he said.
   "I?" said the Duke of Queens in astonishment.
   "I have waited," Emmanuel Bloom said, "for you, Miss Ming. So that you may share my joy."
   Miss Ming drew back into the main part of the gathering. "I was only passing…" she began.
   "Come." He extended a stiff hand from the interior of the ship. "Come."
   "Certainly not!" She hid behind Doctor Volospion.
   "So, the one with the jackal eyes holds you still. And against your will, I am sure."
   "Nothing of the sort! Doctor Volospion is my host, that is all."
   "You are too afraid to tell me the truth."
   "She speaks the truth, sir," said Volospion in an off-hand tone. "She is free to come and go from my house as she pleases."
   "Some pathetic enchantment, no doubt, keeps her there. Well, woman, never fear. The moment I know that you need me I shall rescue you, wherever you may be hidden."
   "I don't need rescuing," declared Miss Ming.
   "Oh, but you do. So badly do you need it that you dare not tell yourself!"
   My Lady Charlotina cried: "Excuse me, sir, for intruding, but we were wondering if your plans for the destruction of the world were completely formulated. I, for one, would appreciate a little notice."
   "My meditations are not yet completed," he told her. He still stared at Miss Ming. "Will you come to me now?"
   "Never!"
   "Remember my oath."
   Doctor Volospion stepped forward. "I would remind you, sir, that this lady is under my protection. Should you make any further attempt to annoy her I must warn you that I shall defend her to the death!"
   Miss Ming was taken aback by this sudden about-face. "Oh, Doctor Volospion! How noble!"
   "What's this?" said Bloom, blinking rapidly. "More posturing?"
   "I give fair warning, that is all."
   Doctor Volospion folded his arms across his chest and stared full into the eyes of Emmanuel Bloom.
   Bloom remained unimpressed. "So you do keep her prisoner, as I suspected. She believes she has her liberty, but you know better!"
   "I shall accept no more insults." Doctor Volospion lifted his chin in defiance.
   "This is not mere braggadocio, I can tell. It is calculated. But what do you plan?"
   "Any more of this, sir," said Doctor Volospion in ringing tones, "and I shall have to demand satisfaction of you."
   The Fireclown laughed. "I shall free the woman soon."
   The airlock shut with a click.
   "How extraordinary!" murmured My Lady Charlotina. "How exceptional of you, Doctor Volospion! Miss Ming must feel quite moved by your defence of her."
   "I am, I am." Miss Ming's small eyes were shining. "Doctor Volospion. I never knew…"
   Doctor Volospion strode for the air car. "Let us leave this wretched place."
   Miss Ming tripped behind him. It was as if she had found her True Knight at last.

9. In which the Fireclown brings some small Salvation to the End of Time

   It was, as it happened, My Lady Charlotina who first experienced the fiery wrath of Emmanuel Bloom.
   Tiring (for reasons described elsewhere) of her apartments under Lake Billy the Kid, she had begun a new palace which was to be constructed in an arrangement of clouds above the site of the lake, so that it hovered over the water, reflecting both this and the sun. It was to be primarily white but with some other pale colours here and there, perhaps for flanking towers. She had spent considerable thought upon the palace and it was still by no means complete, for My Lady Charlotina was not one of those who can create a conception whole with the mere twist of a power ring; she must consider, she must alter, she must build piece by piece. Thus, in the clouds over Lake Billy the Kid, there were half-raised towers, towers without tops, domes with spires and domes that were turreted, there were gaps where halls had been, there were whole patches of space representing apartments which, at a whim, she had returned to their original particles.
   Emerging from Lake Billy the Kid, after resting, My Lady Charlotina stood upon the shore, surrounded by comfortable oaks and cypresses, and arranged the mist upon the water into more satisfactory configurations, making it drift so high that it mingled with the clouds on which her new palace was settled, and she was about to eradicate a tower, which offended, now, her sense of symmetry, when there came a loud roaring sound and the whole edifice burst into flame.
   My Lady Charlotina gasped with indignation. Her first thought was that one of her friends had misjudged an experiment and accidentally set fire to her palace, but she soon guessed the true cause of the blaze.
   "The lunatic incendiary!" she cried, and she flung herself into the sky, not to go to her crackling palace (which was beyond salvaging) but to look down upon the world and discover the whereabouts of the Fireclown.
   He was not a mile from the conflagration, standing on top of a great plinth meant to support a statue of himself which the Duke of Queens had never bothered to complete. He wore his black velvet, his bow tie, his shirt with its ruffles. He stood upon the plinth like a parrot upon its pedestal, shifting from side to side and flapping his arms at his sides as he studied his handiwork. He did not see My Lady Charlotina as, in golden gauze, she fluttered down towards him.
   She paused, to hover a few feet above his head, she waited, watching him, until he became aware of her presence. She listened to him as he spoke to himself.
   "Quite good. A fitting symbol. It will look well in any legends, I think. It is best for the first few miracles to be spectacular and not directed at individuals. I should not leave it too late, however, before rescuing the remains of any residents and resurrecting them."
   She could not contain herself.
   "I, sir, might have been the only resident of that castle in the clouds. Happily I had not arrived at it before you began your fire-raising!"
   His little head jerked here and there. At last he looked up. "So!"
   "The palace was to be my new home, Mr Bloom. It was impolite of you to destroy it."
   "There were no inhabitants?"
   "Not yet."
   "Well, then, I shall be on my way."
   "You make no attempt to apologize?"
   Mr Bloom was amused. "I can scarcely apologize for something so calculating. You ask me to lie? I am the Fireclown. Why should I lie?"
   She was speechless. Mr Bloom began to climb down a ladder he placed against the plinth. "I bid you good morning, madam."
   "Good morning?"
   "Or good afternoon — you keep no proper hours on this planet at all. It is hard to know. That will be changed," he smiled, "in Time."
   "Mr Bloom, your purposes here are quite without point. Are we to be impressed by such displays?" She waved her hand towards the blazing palace. Her clouds had turned brown at the edges. "Time, Mr Bloom, is not what it was. Times, Mr Bloom, have changed since those primitive Dawn Ages when such 'miracles' might have provoked interest, even surprise, in the inhabitants of this world. Watch!" She turned a power ring. The fire vanished. An entire, if uninspired, fairy palace glittered again in the pristine clouds.
   "Hum," said Mr Bloom, still on his ladder. He began to climb back to the top of the plinth. "I see. So Volospion is not the only conjurer here."
   "We all have that power. Or most of us. It is our birthright."
   "Birthright? What of my birthright?"
   "You have one?"
   "It is the world. I explained to Doctor Volospion, madam…" He was aggrieved. "Did he speak to no-one of my mission here?"
   "He told us what you had said, yes."
   "And you are not yet spiritually prepared, it seems. I left you plenty of time for contemplation of your fate. It is the accepted method, where Salvation is to be achieved."
   "We have no need of Salvation, Mr Bloom. We are immortal, we control the universe — what's left of it — we are, most of us, without fear (if I understand the term properly)." My Lady Charlotina was making an untypical effort to meet Emmanuel Bloom halfway. It was probably because she had no strong wish to be at odds with him, since she was curious to know better the man who courted Miss Ming with such determination. "Really, Mr Bloom, you have arrived too late. Even a few hundred years ago, before we heard of the dissolution of the universe, there might have been some enjoyment for all, but not now. Not now, Mr Bloom."
   "Hum." He frowned. He lifted a hand to his face and appeared to peck at his cuff. "But I have no other role, you see. I am a Saviour. It is all I can do."
   "Must you save a whole world? Aren't there a few individuals you could concentrate on?"
   "It hardly seems worthwhile. I am, to be more specific, a World Saviour — a Saver of Worlds. I have ranged the multiverse saving them. From all sorts of things, physical and spiritual. And I always leave the places I have saved spiritually regenerated. Ask any of them. They will all tell you the same. I am loved throughout the teeming dimensions."
   "Then perhaps you could find another world…"
   "No, this is the last. I left it long ago, promising that I would return and save it, as my final action."
   "Well, you are too late."
   "Really, madam, I cannot take your word for it. I am the greatest authority on such matters in the universe, to say the least. I am the Champion Eternal, Hero of a million legends. When Law battles Chaos, I am always called. When civilizations are threatened with total extermination, it is to me that they turn for rescue. And when decadence and despair rule an otherwise secure and prosperous world, it is for Emmanuel Bloom, the Fireclown, Time's Jester, that they yearn. And I come."
   "But we did not call you, we require no rescuing. We are not yearning, I assure you, even a fraction."
   "Miss Ming is yearning."
   "Miss Ming's yearning is hardly spiritual."
   "So you think. I know better."
   "Well, then, I'll grant you that Miss Ming is yearning. But I am not yearning. Doctor Volospion is incapable, I am sure, of yearning. Yearning, all in all, Mr Bloom, is extinct in this Age."
   "Forgotten, hidden, unheeded, but I know it is there. I know. A deep, unadmitted sadness. A demand for Romance. A pining for Ideals."
   "We take up Romance from time to time, and we have an interest, on occasion, in Ideals — but these are passing enthusiasms, Mr Bloom. Even those of us most obsessed with such things show no particular misery when circumstances or changing fashion require that they be dropped."
   "How shallow are those who dwell here now! All, that is, save Mavis Ming."
   "Some think her the shallowest of us all." My Lady Charlotina regretted her spite, for she did not wish to seem malicious in Mr Bloom's eyes.
   "It is often the case," he said, "with those who cannot see beyond flesh and into the soul."
   "I doubt if there are many souls remaining among us," said My Lady Charlotina. "Since we are almost every one of us self-made creatures. There is even some speculation that we are not human at all, but sophisticated androids."
   "It could be the explanation," he mused.
   "I hope you will not be wholly frustrated," she said sympathetically, watching him climb down his ladder. "I can imagine what it is like to possess only one role."
   She settled, like a butterfly, upon the vacated plinth.
   He reached the ground and peered up at her, arms held stiffly, as usual, by his side, red hair flaring. "I assure you, madam," he piped, "that I am not in the least impressed by what you have told me."
   "But I speak the truth."
   "Unlike Volospion, who lies, lies, lies. I agree that you believe, like Miss Ming, that you speak the truth. But I see decadence. And where there is decadence there is misery. And where there is misery then must come the Fireclown, to bring laughter, joy, terror, to banish all anxieties."
   "Your logic is, I fear, obsolete, Mr Bloom. There is no misery here, to speak of. And," she added, "there is no joy. Instead, we have a comfortable balance. It enables us to contemplate our own end with a certain grace."
   "Hum."
   "Surely this equilibrium is what all human morality and philosophy has striven for over the millennia?" she said, seating herself on the edge of the plinth and arranging her gold gauze about her legs. "Would you set the see-saw swinging again?"
   He frowned. "No heights or depths here, eh?"
   "For most of us, no."
   "No Heaven and Hell?"
   "Only those we create for our own amusement."
   "No Terror and no Ecstasy?"
   "Scarcely a scrap."
   "How can you bear it?"
   "It is the ultimate achievement of our race. We enjoy it."
   "Are there none who —?"
   "Those time travellers, space travellers, a few who have induced special anachronistic tendencies in themselves. Yes, there are some who might respond to you. A good few of them are not with us at present, however. The Iron Orchid's little son, Jherek Carnelian, his great love, Amelia Underwood, his mentor, Lord Jagged of Canaria, and perhaps a few others, one loses track. Doctor Volospion? Perhaps, for it is rumoured that he is not of this Age at all. Li Pao and various aliens who have visited us and stayed … Yes, from these you could derive a certain satisfaction. Some would undoubtably welcome you, for one reason or another…"
   "It is usually for one reason or another," said the Fireclown frankly. "Men see me as many things. It is because I am many things."
   "And all of them excellent, I am sure."
   "But I must do what I must do," he said. "It is all I know. For I am Bloom the Destroyer, Bloom the Builder, Bloom the Bringer of Brightness, Bloom who Blooms Forever! And my mission is to save you all."
   "I thought we had at least removed ourselves from generalities, Mr Bloom," she said a little chidingly.
   He turned away, disconsolately so My Lady Charlotina thought.
   "Generalities, madam, are all I deal in. They are my stock-in-trade. It is the gift I bring — to remove petty anxieties, momentary considerations, and to replace them with grandeur, with huge, simple, glorious Ideals."
   "It is not a simple problem," she said. "I can see that."
   "It must be a simple problem!" he complained. "All problems are simple. All!"
   He disappeared into the soft trees surrounding the plinth. She heard his voice muttering for some while, but he made no formal farewell, for he was too much lost in his own concerns. A short time later she saw a distant tree burst into flame and subside almost at once. She saw a rather feeble bolt of lightning crash and split a trunk. Then he was gone away.
   My Lady Charlotina remained on the plinth, for she was enjoying a rare sense of melancholy and was reluctant to let the mood pass.

10. In which the Fireclown attempts to deny any suggestion so far made that he is an Anachronism

   My Lady Charlotina's words had failed, as was soon to be shown, to convince Mr Bloom. Yet there was something pathetic to his acts of destruction, something almost sad about the way he demolished the Duke of Queens' City of Tulips (each dwelling a separate flower) or laid waste Florence Fawkes' delightful little Sodom with all its inhabitants, including Florence Fawkes who was never, by an oversight, resurrected. It was in a half-abstracted mood that he brought a rain of molten lava to disrupt the party which Bishop Castle was giving for moody Werther de Goethe (and which, as it happened, was received with approval by all concerned, since Werther was one of the few to appreciate the Fireclown's point of view and died screaming of repentance and the like — though when he was resurrected almost immediately he did complain that the consistency of the lava was not all that it might have been — too lumpy, he thought). The Fireclown rarely appeared personally on any of these occasions. He seemed to have lost the will to enjoy intercourse with his fellows. Moreover there was scarcely anyone who found him very entertaining after the first demolition or two, largely because his wrath always took exactly the same form. Werther de Goethe sought him out and enthused. He found, he said, Mr Bloom deeply refreshing, and he offered himself as an acolyte. Mr Bloom had informed him that he would let Werther know when acolytes were needed, if at all. Lord Mongrove also visited the Fireclown, hoping for conversation, but the Fireclown told him frankly that his talk was depressing. My Lady Charlotina visited him, too, and came away refusing to tell anyone what had passed between herself and Mr Bloom, though she seemed upset. And when Mistress Christia followed close in the footsteps of her friend and was also rebuffed, Mr Bloom told her sombrely that he waited for one woman and one alone, the beautiful Mavis Ming.
   Upon hearing this, Miss Ming shuddered and suggested that someone destroy the Fireclown before he did any more damage to the world.
   If it had not been for the immense and unshakeable force-field around the Fireclown's ship there is no doubt that some of the denizens at the End of Time would have at least made an attempt to halt the Fireclown's inconveniencing activities. It was a type unfamiliar even to the rotting cities, who did their best to analyse it and produce a formula for coping with it, but failed, forgetting the purpose of half their experiments before they were completed and drawing no conclusions from those they did complete, for the same reason. In most cases they took a childish delight in the more spectacular effects of their experiments and would play with the energies they had created until growing tired and pettish and refusing to help any further.
   The Fireclown had been unable to bring quite the holocaust he had promised, for things were rebuilt as soon as he had destroyed them, he had at least become a large flea upon the flank of society, wrecking carefully planned picnics, entertainments, artistic creations and games, so that precautions had to taken against him which spoiled the general effect intended. Force-fields had to be produced to protect property for the first time in untold thousands of years and even the Duke of Queens, that most charitable of immortals, agreed that his ordinary enjoyment of life was being detrimentally influenced by Mr Bloom, particularly since the destruction of his menagerie, the resurrection of which had greatly discommoded him.
   There came such a twittering of protest as had never been heard at the End of Time and plans were discussed interminably for the ridding of the world of the pest, deputations were sent to his ship and were ignored, polite notes left at his airlock's entrance were either burned on the spot or allowed to drift away on the wind.
   "It is quite ridiculous," said My Lady Charlotina, "that this puny prophet should be allowed to figure so largely in our lives. If only Lord Jagged were here, he would surely find a solution."
   She spoke spitefully, for she knew that Doctor Volospion was in earshot. They were both attending the same reception, given on Sweet Orb Mace's new lawns which surrounded his mansion, modelled on one of the baroque juvenile slaughter houses of the late 200,006 century. From within sounded the most authentic screams, causing all to compliment Sweet Orb Mace on an unprecedented, for her, effort of imagination.
   "Lord Jagged has undoubtably found that his interests are not best served by remaining at the End of Time," said Doctor Volospion from behind her.
   She pretended surprise. "How do you do, Doctor Volospion?" She inspected his costume — another long sleeved robe, this one of maroon and white. "Hm."
   "I am well, My Lady Charlotina."
   "The Fireclown has made no attack upon you, yet? That is strange. Of all of us, it is you whom he actually appears to dislike."
   Doctor Volospion lowered his eyes and smiled. "He would not harm Miss Ming, my guest."
   "Of course!"
   She swept silky skirts of brown and blue about her and made to move on, but Volospion stayed her. "I gather there has been much debate about this Fireclown."
   "Far too much."
   "He would be a marvellous prize for my menagerie."
   "So that is why he mistrusts you!"
   "I think not. It is because my logic defeats him."
   "I did not know."
   "Yes. I have probably had the longest debate of anyone at the End of Time with Bloom. He found that he could not best me in argument. It is sheer revenge, the rest. Or so I suspect."
   "Aha?" My Lady Charlotina turned her fine and scented head so that she could smile pleasantly upon the Duke of Queens, strutting past in living koalas. "Then surely you can conceive a means of halting his activities, Doctor Volospion?"
   "I believe that I have done so, madam."
   She laughed, almost rudely. "But you decide to keep it to yourself."
   "The Fireclown has a certain sensitivity. For all I know he has the means to overhear us."
   "I should not have thought that, temperamentally, he was an ordinary eavesdropper."
   "But I feel, nonetheless, that I should be cautious."
   "So you'll not illuminate me?"
   "To my regret."
   "Well, I wish you luck with your plan, Doctor Volospion." She looked here and there. "Where is your guest, the Fireclown's quarry? Where is Miss Ming?"
   He expressed secret glee. "Not here."
   "Not here? She travels to meet her suitor at last?"
   "No. On the contrary…"
   "Then what?" My Lady Charlotina expressed cool impatience.
   "Wait," said Doctor Volospion. "I protect her, as I promised. I am her True Knight. You heard me called that. Well I am doing my duty, My Lady Charlotina."
   "You are vague, Doctor Volospion."
   "Oh, madam, recall that encounter when we stood upon the cliff above Mr Bloom's ship!"
   She drew her beautiful brows together. "You acted uncharacteristically, as I remember."
   "You thought so."
   "Oh," she was again impatient, "yes, yes…"
   "Mr Bloom noticed, do you think?"
   "He remarked on it, did he not?"
   Doctor Volospion brought his hands together at his groin, his maroon and white sleeves swirling. He had an expression upon his pale, ascetic features of extreme self-satisfaction. "Miss Ming," he said, "is safe in my castle. A force-field, quite as strong as the Fireclown's, surrounds it. For her own good, she cannot leave its confines."
   "You have locked her up?"
   "For her own good. She agreed, for she fears the Fireclown greatly. I merely pointed out to her that it was the best way of ensuring that she would never encounter him."
   "In your menagerie?"
   "She is comfortable, secure and, doubtless, happy," said Doctor Volospion.
   "True Knight, say you? Sorcerer, more accurately!" My Lady Charlotina for the first time showed admiration of Doctor Volospion's cunning. "I see! Excellent!"
   Doctor Volospion's thin smile was almost joyous. His cold eyes sparkled. "I shall show you, I think, that I am no mere shadow of Jagged."
   "Did anyone suggest…?"
   "If anyone did suggest such a thing, he shall be proved in error."
   She pursed her lips and looked at first one of her feet and then the other. "If the plan works…"
   "It will work. The art of conflict is to turn the antagonist's own strengths against him and to draw out his weaknesses."
   "It is one interpretation of the art. There have been so many, down all these millions of days."
   "You shall see, madam."
   "The Fireclown knows what you have done?"
   "He has already accused me of it."
   "Well, you shall have the gratitude of each of us if you succeed, Doctor Volospion."
   "It is all I wish."
   The ground shook. They both turned, to see a magnificent pink pachyderm lumbering towards them. The beast bore a swaying howdah in which were seated both Abu Thaleb and Argonheart Po.
   Abu Thaleb, in quilted silks of rose and sable, leaned down to greet them. "My Lady Charlotina! I see music! And my old friend, Volospion. It has been so long…"
   "I will leave you to this reunion," murmured My Lady Charlotina, and with a curtsy to the Commissar of Bengal she departed.
   "Have you been all this time in your castle, Volospion?" asked Abu Thaleb. "We have not met since that time when we were all three together, Argonheart, you and I, when Mr Bloom's ship had first landed. I have looked for you at many a gathering."
   "My attention, for my sins, has been much taken up with our current problem," said Doctor Volospion.
   "Ah, if only there were a solution," rumbled Argonheart Po. "We should have realized, when my dinosaurs were incinerated…"
   "It was the moment to act, of course," agreed Doctor Volospion. His neck grew stiff with craning and he lowered his head.
   "It needs only Miss Ming," said Abu Thaleb, lowering himself over the side of the howdah and beginning to descend by means of a golden rope-ladder the side of his great beast, "to complete the original quartet."
   "She cannot be with us. She remains in safety in my castle."
   "Probably wise." Abu Thaleb reached the ground. He signed for Argonheart Po that his way was now clear. The monstrous chef heaved his bulk gingerly to the edge and put a tentative foot upon a golden rung. Doctor Volospion watched with some fascination as the corpulent figure, swathed in white, came down the pink expanse.
   "It is my duty to protect the lady from any danger," Doctor Volospion said with a certain semblance of piety.
   "She must be very much pleased by your thoughtfulness. She is so lacking in inner tranquillity that the trappings of security, physical and tactile, must mean much to her."
   "I think so."
   "Of course," said Abu Thaleb doubtfully, "this will confirm Mr Bloom's suspicions of you. Are you sure —?"
   "I shall have to bear those suspicions, as a gentleman. I do my duty. If my actions are misinterpreted, particularly by Mr Bloom, that is no fault of mine."
   "Naturally." Abu Thaleb dismissed his elephant. "But if Mr Bloom were to take it into his head to — um — rescue Miss Ming?"
   "I am prepared."
   Argonheart Po grunted. "You are looking paler than ever, Doctor Volospion. You should eat more."
   "More? I do not eat at all."
   "There is more to eating than merely sustaining the flesh," said Argonheart Po pointedly. "If it comes to that, none of us needs to eat, there are so many quicker ways of absorbing energy, but there is a certain instinctive relish to such old-fashioned activities which it is as well to enjoy. After all, we are all human. Well, most of us."
   Abu Thaleb was upset by what seemed to him to be one friend's criticism of another. "Argonheart, my dear, we all have preferences. Doctor Volospion enjoys rather more intellectual pastimes than do we. We must respect his tastes."
   Argonheart Po was quick to apologize. "I did not mean to infer…"
   "I detected no inference," said Doctor Volospion with an extravagant wave of his hand. "My interests, as you must know, are specialized. I study ancient faiths and have little time for anything else. It is perhaps because I would wish to believe in something supernatural. However, in all my studies I have yet to find something which cannot be explained or dismissed either as natural or as delusion. I do, admittedly, possess one or two miraculous artefacts which would seem to possess qualities not easily defined by science, but I fear it is only a lack of knowledge on my part, and that these, too, will be shown to be the products of man's ingenuity."
   Argonheart Po smiled. "If, one day, you will let me, I shall produce a culinary miracle for you and defy you to detect all the flavours and textures I shall put into it."
   "One day, perhaps, I should be honoured, mighty King of the Kitchen."
   And to Abu Thaleb's relief, the two parted amicably.
   Doctor Volospion, alone for the moment, glanced about him. He seemed unusually content. A little sigh of pleasure passed between his normally tight-pressed lips. He could, on occasion, produce in himself a semblance of gaiety and now there was a lightness to his step as he moved to greet Mistress Christia, the Everlasting Concubine, changing his costume as he went, to brilliant damson doublet and hose, curling shoes, a hat with a high crown and an elongated peak which could be doffed to brush the turf with a flourish as he bowed low. "Beautiful Christia, Queen of my Heart, how I have longed for this opportunity to see you alone!"
   Mistress Christia wore ringlets today of light red-gold, a translucent gown of sea-green antique rayon, bracelets of live lizards, their tails held between their tiny forepaws.
   "Oh, Doctor Volospion, how you flatter me! I have heard that you keep the most sought-after beauty in the world imprisoned in one of your gloomy towers!"
   "You have heard? Already? It is true." He pretended shame. "I cannot help it. I am sworn to do so."
   "Is it fitting, then, that you dally with me — for my reputation —"
   "Is enviable," he said.
   She kissed his chilly cheek. "But I know you to be heartless."
   "It is you, Mistress Christia, who gives me a heart."
   "But you will lay it at another's feet, I know. It is my fate, always."
   His attention was distracted, all at once. Sweet Orb Mace's juvenile slaughter house was blazing. And a look of joy crossed Doctor Volospion's face.
   Mistress Christia was bemused. "You seem pleased at this? Poor Sweet Orb Mace and his lovely little house."
   "Oh, no, no, that is not it, at all." He moved like a moth for the flames, his face lit by them. And then fire licked his body again and he was naked. There came a chorus from all around. Everyone was likewise unclad.
   From out of the inferno stepped Emmanuel Bloom. He wore a black and white Pierrot costume.
   "I have come," he trilled amiably, "to be worshipped. I strip you naked. Thus I will strip your souls." He looked at their bare bodies and seemed rather confounded by some of the sights.
   Fussing, a number of the guests were already replenishing themselves. Costumes blossomed on flesh again.
   "No matter," said the Fireclown, "I have made my moral point."
   With a caress Doctor Volospion brought rippling velvet to his body, dark reds and greens glowed upon him. "Shall you never tire of these demonstrations?" he asked.
   Emmanuel Bloom shrugged. "Why should I? It is my way of preaching to you. There are many excellent precedents for the method. A miracle and a parable or two work, as it were, wonders."
   "You have converted no-one, sir," said My Lady Charlotina, in a huge china bell decorated with little flowers. Her voice tended to echo.
   The Fireclown agreed with her. "It is taking longer than I expected, madam. But I am persistent, by nature. And patient, in my way."
   "Well, sir, we lose patience," said Abu Thaleb. "I regret to say it, but it is true." He turned for confirmation to his friends. All nodded. "You see?"
   "Is consensus truth?" the Fireclown wished to know. "Agree what you like between yourselves, for it will not alter what is so."
   "It could be said that that which all are agreed upon is truth," mildly proposed Argonheart Po, who saw the chance of a metaphysical spat. "Do we not make the truth from the stuff of Chaos?"
   "If the will is strong enough, perhaps," said Emmanuel Bloom. "But your wills are nothing. Mine is immeasurably powerful. You use gadgetry for your miracles. Do you see me using anything else but the power of my mind?"
   "Your ship's force-field…" suggested Doctor Volospion.
   "That, too, is controlled by my mind."
   Doctor Volospion seemed unhappy with this information.
   "And where is my soul mate?" inquired Mr Bloom. "Where is my consort? Where are you hiding her, Volospion? Eh, manikin? Speak!" He glared up at his smiling adversary.
   "She is protected," said Volospion, "from you."
   "Protected? She needs no protection from Emmanuel Bloom. So, you imprison her."
   "For her own safety," said My Lady Charlotina. "It is what Miss Ming wants."
   "She is deluded." The Fireclown displayed irritation. "Deluded by this conjuror and his jesuitry. Give her up to me. I demand it. If I can save no other soul in this whole world, I shall save hers, I swear!"
   "Never," said Doctor Volospion, "would I give another human creature into your keeping. How could I justify my conscience?"
   "Conscience! Pah!"
   "She is secure," My Lady Charlotina glanced once at Doctor Volospion, "is she not? Locked in your deepest dungeon?"
   "Well…" Doctor Volospion's shrug was modest.
   "Ah, I cannot bear it! Know this, creeping jackal, sniggering quasi-priest, that I shall release her. I shall rescue her from any prison you may conceive. Why do you do this? Do you bargain with me?"
   "Bargain?" said Doctor Volospion. "What have you that I should wish to bargain?"
   "What do you wish from me?" The Fireclown had become agitated. "Tell me!"
   "Nothing. You have heard my reasons for keeping Miss Ming safe from your threats…"
   "Threats? When did I threaten?"
   "You have frightened the poor woman. She is not very intelligent. She has scant self-confidence…"
   "I offer her all of that and more. It is promises, not threats, I make! Bah!" The Fireclown set the lawn to smouldering and, as a consequence, many of the guests to dancing. At length everyone withdrew a few feet into the air, though still disturbed by rich smoke. Only the Fireclown remained on the ground, careless of the heat. "I can give that woman everything. You take from her what little pride she still has. I can give her beauty and love and eternal life…"
   "The secret of eternal life, Mr Bloom, is already known to us," said My Lady Charlotina from above. She had some difficulty in seeing him through the smoke, which grew steadily thicker.
   "This? It is a state of eternal death. You have no true enthusiasms any longer. The secret of eternal life, madam, is enthusiasm, nothing more or less."
   "Enough?" said a distant Argonheart Po. "To sustain us physically?"
   "To relish everything to the full, for its own sake, that's the answer." Mr Bloom's black and white Pierrot costume was almost invisible now in the boiling smoke. "Away with your charms and potions, your Shangri-Las, your Planets of Youth, of frozen cells and brain transfers! — many's the entity I've seen last little more than a thousand years before boredom shrivels up his soul and kills him."
   "Kills him?" Argonheart's voice was even fainter.
   "Oh, his body may live. But one way or another, boredom kills him!"
   "Your ideas remain somewhat out of date," said My Lady Charlotina. "Immortality is no longer a matter of potions, enchantments or surgery…"
   "I speak of the soul, madam."
   "Then you speak of nothing at all," said Doctor Volospion.
   There was no reply.
   The Fireclown was gone.

11. In which Doctor Volospion is subjected to a siege and attempts to Parley

   Miss Ming was neither chained nor bound, neither did she languish in a dungeon, but she did confine herself, at Doctor Volospion's request, to her own apartments, furnished by him to her exact requirements, and at first she was content to accept this security, but as time passed she came to pine for human company, for even Doctor Volospion hardly ever visited her, and her only intercourse was with mechanical servants. When she did encounter her dark-minded host she would beg for news of Bloom, praying that by now he would have abandoned his plans and left the planet.
   She saw Doctor Volospion soon after the party at Sweet Orb Mace's, where the house and lawn had been burned.
   "He is still, I fear, here," Volospion informed her, seating himself on a pink, quilted pouf. "His determination to save the world has weakened just a little, I would say."
   "So he will go soon?"
   "His determination to win your hand, Miss Ming, is if anything stronger than ever."
   "So he remains…" She sank upon a satin cushion.
   "Everyone shares your dismay. Indeed I have been deputized to rid the world of the madman, in an informal way, and I have racked my brains to conceive a plan, but none comes. Can you think of anything?"
   "Me? Little Mavis? I'm very honoured, Doctor Volospion, but…" She played with the neck of her blue lace negligee. "If you have failed, how can I help?"
   "I thought you might have a better understanding of your suitor's mentality. He loves you very much. He told me so again, at the party. He accused me of keeping you here against your will."
   She uttered her familiar tinkling laugh. "Against my will? What does he intend to do, but carry me off!" She shuddered.
   "Quite."
   "I still can't believe he was serious," she said. "Can you?"
   "He is deeply serious. He is a man of much experience, that we know. He has considerable learning and his powers are impressive. As a lover, you could know worse, Miss Ming."
   "He's repulsive."
   Doctor Volospion rose from the pouf. "As you say. Well — why, what is that beyond the window?"
   The window to which he pointed was large but filled with small panels of thick glass, obscured, moreover, by the frothy blue curtains on either side of it, reminiscent of the ornaments on a baby's cradle, the ribbons being pink and yellow.
   It seemed that a small nova flared above the dour landscape of brooding trees and rocks surrounding Castle Volospion. The light approached them and then began to fall, just short of the force-field which protected the whole vast building (or series of buildings, as they actually were). Its colour changed from white to glowing red and it became identifiable as Emmanuel Bloom's baroque spacecraft.
   "Oh, no!" wailed Miss Ming.
   "Rest assured," said Doctor Volospion. "My force-field, like his own, is impregnable. He cannot enter."
   The vessel landed, destroying a tree or two as it did so and turning rocks to a pool of black glass.
   Miss Ming fled hastily to the window and drew the curtains. "There! This is torment, Doctor Volospion. I'm so unhappy!" She began to weep.
   "I will do what I can," he said, "to dissuade him, but I can make no promises. He is so dedicated."
   "You'll go to see him?" she snuffled. Her blue eyes begged. "You'll make him go away?"
   "As I said —"
   "Oh! Can't you kill him? Can't you?"
   "Kill? What a waste that would be of such an authentic messiah…"