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oaths.
"Or you can stay outside."
The city was surrounded by houses that had grown up under the wall. There were gardens with
cypresses and banks of flowers, blue and white, yellow and mauve and red. The houses had roofs of
dragon-colored tiles. The wall stood over them, and it had, as reported, tiled pictures on it of chariots
drawn by racing horses, of lions, trees of fruit, and so on. The narrow road ended at a narrow gate,
where two soldiers stood to perfect attention, like dolls.
Out of the city came an enormous noise. There seemed to be every sound on earth taking place at once.
Tanaquil heard wheels rumbling, engines that toiled, buckets that rattled, and water that swilled; she
detected cattle lowing and dogs barking, while trumpets crowed, doors slammed, birds flew, men and
women quarrelled and laughed and sang. She was taken aback. Well, what did you expect?
The peeve was gazing at the city's noises in disbelief, attempting to snuff out all its smells, including that of
the sea.
"Lots of bones and meat and biscuits here," said Tanaquil.
She sauntered toward the gateway, and all at once the two soldiers came alive.
They clashed over the entrance to the city their crossed spears.
"Halt."
Tanaquil halted. What now?
"State your business in Sea City."
"I'm visiting my aunt."
"You will produce her letter inviting you."
"I don't have it."
"Without such a letter or other confirmation, you can't enter the city."
"My aunt will be furious," said Tanaquil.
The soldiers did not seem distressed by this news. They said nothing, their faces were blank, and the
spears remained locked.
"What are the grounds for entering?" said Tanaquil.
"An invitation in writing from a citizen. A summons by the Prince or other dignitary. The bringing of
merchandise into the city. The desire to practice a legitimate business there. One word of warning,"
added the soldier. "Don't say you mend things. We hear that feeble excuse about twice a day."
"I see. I didn't understand." It seemed to her she had never made a plan so swiftly. "I'm an entertainer. I
do magic tricks."
"This may be allowable. The bazaar supports entertainers. But you'll have to give proof."
"You mean you want to watch me perform? That's rather awkward. You see, I was robbed in the desert.
They took everything   my donkey, my bag of tricks "
"How can you carry on your business in the city then?"
"I do have one thing left," said Tanaquil. "You see this peeve? Just an ordinary desert creature. But by a
clever illusion, I can make it appear to talk."
The soldiers turned their mask-like faces on her.
Tanaquil abruptly tugged the peeve's lead.
The peeve kicked. It parted its jaws. "Rrr!" it went.
Tanaquil coughed. "Sorry. Dust in my throat. Try again "
She toed the peeve quite mildly in the side.
It spat. "Bad," said the peeve. "Won't. Don't like it. Go desert." And spinning in the sash it managed a
short dash and pulled Tanaquil over. As she and the peeve tumbled on the hard paving, she heard the
soldiers split their masks, giving off guffaws.
"That's a riot," one choked. "Can you do it again?"
"Once is enough for now," said Tanaquil.
"Bite!" cried the peeve, chomping on the sash. "Wup!"
"Yes, that's really terrific!"
The peeve swore, and the soldiers almost had a fit. They uncrossed their spears and clapped Tanaquil
much too heartily on the back as she dragged the squalling peeve into the city. "Good luck, boy. That's a
marvelous turn you've got there. We'll tell all the lads."
6
Every exaggerated fantasy Tanaquil had ever had of the city was outstripped by the facts. Even Jaive had
never demonstrated, in the magic mirror, anything like this. It was like being inside an enormous clock of
countless parts and pieces. It seemed at once jumbled and precise, random and ordained. Just like the
sound it made, which was a mix of a thousand sounds, so its shape was formed out of all shapes
imaginable lines, angles, bumps, cones, rounds and its basic colors of brown, yellow and white, were
also fired by the noon sun into blooms of paint, fierce blinks of metal, and cracked indigo shadows.
Tanaquil did not try to take it in, she simply marched in to it, staring about her wildly, overwhelmed.
While the peeve accompanied her in noisy bewilderment the million scents of the city had entirely taken
up its attention, it growled and whined, snuffled, grunted, and sometimes squeaked. Now and then it ran
sideways after something or other, and Tanaquil, her concentration scattered, was tugged against the
brickwork or into the mouths of lean alleyways. She thought of undoing the leash and allowing the peeve
to rush off on its own. Perhaps she would never see it again something dreadful might happen to it. It
knew the desert and was as surprised here as she was.
At first, near the gate, there had been few people, only the small groups you might come on in a village,
women in doorways or at a well, or some men going by with spades over their shoulders. Then the
streets, winding into and around each other between the walls and under the arches, opened on a broad
white avenue. Palm trees of great height grew along the avenue, and there were marble troughs of water,
to one of which three polished-looking horses had been led to drink. The sides of the avenue swarmed
with people of every description, and at the windows and doorways and on the balconies of the buildings
along the road, were crowds thick as grapes on a bunch. Flights of steps went up too high to see, from
the avenue, what was at the top, and up and down them strode and ran the citizens, sometimes colliding.
Tree branches curled against the sky from gardens on rooftops. Stained-glass windows flashed as they
were constantly pushed wide or closed. The road boomed with voices, and with the vehicles that went
both ways along it, chariots and carts, silken boxes carried on the shoulders of trotting men, and one
stately camel under a burden of green bananas.
Tanaquil stalked up the road, pushing through the human swarm as she had noted everybody else was
doing. The peeve, on a very short leash, kept close to her now, its muttering lost in the general uproar.
Soon wonderful shops began to open in the buildings. She saw shelves of cakes like jewels and trays of
jewels like flowers and sheaves of flowers like lances and, in an armorer's, lances like nothing but
themselves.
She wanted to look at everything, to laugh and to shout. She felt taller than anyone in the crowd. Also
she was dizzy. There was too much, and she was drunk on it, as the peeve had got sozzled on smells.
The end of the avenue was an even further astonishment. It expanded into a marketplace, a bazaar,
where every single public activity known to the world seemed to go on.
Two pink marble lions guarded the entrance, and Tanaquil and the peeve rested against the plinth of one
of these while porters, carts, and the banana camel trundled by.
Tanaquil attempted to view the things of the market individually, but it was impossible. Her eyes slid from
the baskets of peaches to the bales of wool to the pen of curly sheep, to the juggler with his fire-work
knives and the fortune-teller's tent with the wrong sorcerous signs embroidered over it, and on.
The market went downhill and was terraced to prevent everything tipping over. But Tanaquil's gaze
tipped all the way down, and there below, in a rainbow frill of objects and actions, bluer than the sky, [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]