Chapter III: The Harvest Moon, AD 480
Equo ne credite, Teucri.
Do not trust the horse, Trojans.
* * *
A three-legged stool is a tree-legged stool. Each leg of a stool is not a stool, but rather one part of a stool. Likewise, the top of a stool is just a fraction of the entire unit. All parts of the stool must be connected in order for the stool to function, and so exist as a stool. According to the Buddha, the universe is like a stool: an interconnected collection of parts that are but fragments of one entity.
Thus, each rabbit that Merthen raised in his woodland home was a fuzzy, button-nosed slice of the universe. The rabbit itself was also made of parts, such as muscles, bones, and soft white pelts. Merthen was hoping to sell some of these furs this afternoon. Unfortunately, no one was buying
Merthen pondered the concept of interconnectivity during his trip home from the market. He chewed on the sourdough roll he had earned reading a letter for Pryderi the baker. The correspondence informed the baker about the drowning of his brother in
Merthen heard the jingle of a horse-drawn wagon coming up the road. He gave a quick two-fingered wave to the driver, and the vehicle came to a halt. The wind ceased to blow as well. The leaves on the trees stopped quivering.
* * *
“I have raised your issue with the Goddess Athena,” said the horse.
It appeared to Merthen that this question came from, well… the horse, which he knew to be impossible.
“I beg your pardon?” said Merthen to the driver, who may have been a human, but was at this moment little more than a shabbily dressed statue with cold unblinking eyes.
The mare arched her elongated neck as far back as her harness would permit. “Athena has given me a response. Would you like to hear it?”
Merthen jiggled his beaded rosewood bracelet. “Am I to assume you are a colleague of the Lady Gopi?”
“No. I am Lady Gopi. As you requested, I spoke with the Goddess Athena. She has directed me to continue my investigation. Although she is all-knowing, she wishes to discover what your perceptions are, as you experience them. She is not so much interested in conventional facts. Reality is so mundane. She would prefer to hear your intuitive reactions, as it were.”
“Why should she care? And what if I refuse to cooperate? Will she turn me into a pillar of salt?”
The horse waved her auburn tail. “If you do not wish to provide your testimony, I cannot compel you by force. However, I can wait.”
He crossed his arms. “I can wait as well.”
“As long as I can? Come now, what harm would it do to answer a few questions?”
Merthen reared up his walking staff to thrash her, but then lowered it. “And if I answer your questions, will you leave me in peace?”
“That is my ultimate intention,” said Gopi. “Now then, here is what I wish to know. Last week when you first met that brown-eyed boy, you had a vision. You saw four pairs of rats. What did they signify?”
Merthen studied her pitch black eyes. Through out his life, Merthen had experienced periods of madness. However, he had never generated a delusion quite so complex as this. And that fact that Gopi appeared on two consecutive episodes was unprecedented. Could this be a new, deeper form of insanity?
But then, Merthen harkened back to that late night discussion at
Merthen asked, “Who do you think the rats were, Miss Pony?”
“The rats were dancing in circles, chasing each others’ tails. It was endless, pointless and endemic.” Gopi stomped her front hoof. “I think they represent the extremes that keep an individual from experiencing interbeing.”
Merthen tugged on his beard. “The eight mental agitations,” he said. “One for each rat. I say Lady, are you some kind of Buddhist?”
“Not quite,” Gopi replied. “The question is, are you?”
* * *
Merthen was startled by the noise of the rotating wagon wheel. The horse clopped off saying not a word. The driver bowed politely to Merthen, who nodded in reply, but mostly stared at Gopi, or at least the beast of burden she had most recently inhabited.
The cart rolled away, and Merthen focused himself on the road ahead. At the edge of the commons, he caught a glimpse of the street urchin who had so gleefully annoyed him nearly a fortnight ago.
As before, the brown-eyed boy approached, but this time he did not run. Instead he stepped, with a slow shuffle one might expect from an old crone or a cripple. The child was gaunt and sunburned, his britches stained with diarrhea. There was a scrape on his knee, not large, but pink and swollen.
“Spare some food, Mister?” said the boy in a mechanical monotone. His empty hands were cupped together.
Merthen did not intend to stop. Instead he paused, just long enough to make eye contact with the boy. Then the old man walked off briskly, which was the only way Merthen ever walked. So what if he saw the boy holding incense in his vision? Visions are bunk. No point to dwell on it.
Merthen’s ankle buckled underneath him. His foot had slipped into a rut in the road. Odd that. He repositioned his other foot, and it slipped into the rut as well. It almost seemed as if the rut was slithering sideways, purposely trying to topple him. He tipped back, falling into the soft wet dirt.
The boy wiped his dripping nose. “You tripped,” he said. “Do you always fall down?”
Merthen sat upright, face to face with the boy, and said, “I try not to make a habit of it.”
“I saw you selling apples once. Can I get one?”
“That would be a possibility. Do you have any money?”
“No.”
“Well then, what do you propose to give me for my apple?”
The boy leapt down and crawled on all fours like a bear cub. He snatched up every pebble within his reach.
Using his walking stick for a crutch, Merthen hoisted himself up to his full height, a towering two yards. He dusted off his brown wool cloak, and then observed the child standing at attention, clutching a pile of stones. The boy held them up, as high as he could, with an almost formal seriousness. As children go, he had rather big hands.
Merthen’s heart fluttered, but not in a normal way. Was he hallucinating again? He usually perspired when he did. He ran his fingers across his brow. It was dry and cool.
Merthen recalled a fable Brother Tinh Tu told him decades ago. A beggar boy once saw noblemen giving alms to the Buddha, and decided to do likewise. But all the boy had to offer was a fist-full of gravel. Upon receiving this humble gift, the Buddha smiled. Because of that boy’s noble actions, he was eventually reborn as Ashoka the Great, Emperor of all
Merthen jiggled the eighteen rosewood beads on his bracelet and considered the afternoon’s events. Could this boy be a future emperor? Could he be a Buddha-to-be? But then again, what child lacks this potential? Perhaps, this boy was just a boy; this grey sky was just a grey sky; and this pile of stones was just a pile of stones.
“Be mindful,” said Merthen, “you have too much to bear. I would recommend you lay your burden down. Tell me boy, what do they call you?”
“My name is Uther.” Uther set the rubble down by the tip of Merthen’s boot.
“And your parents? What are their names?”
“You mean mommy?” Uther pushed a lock of his hair from his eyes. His fingernails were filthy.
“Yes, what is her name? Where is she?”
“Her name is Mommy. She is in heaven with baby Jesus. She fell asleep on the floor, and Miss Gwenllian yelled at me. She hit me with a spoon.”
“Do you have any other family? Is there anyone who cares for you or brings you food?”
A single tear rolled down Uther’s cheek. It dripped down his chin and splattered onto his toes. They were caked in dry blood.
Merthen looked down at Uther’s feet. “Rats,” said the old man, “they bit you in your sleep, eh?”
The boy fidgeted. “Aye.”
Merthen extracted an apple from his deep cloak pocket. “I am about to do something that may be potentially daft. Eat this.”
The boy unceremoniously jammed the red-skinned fruit into his mouth.
“Now, when I was a sprout,” said Merthen, “it was my misfortune to be imprisoned in a cage on board a Visigoth slave ship. Each night bilge rats would assemble to gnaw on my toes. My feet still bear the marks of their predation.”
“Were you scared?”
“Apoplectic. And let me tell you, boy, that potent anxiety has scarred me deeper than any surgeon’s blade. I have meditated on it for decades. Up until now, I was under the impression that I had become free from its harrowing grip. But perhaps simply freeing oneself from one’s own suffering is not sufficient. Perhaps, I need to do more.” He stared at the boy. “I would wager you have been wounded as well.”
Uther wiped away his tear. He showed off his devoured apple core. “I am finished.”
Merthen stirred the end of his walking stick into the cluster of stones Uther had collected. “That rubble you swept up. Why did you offer it to me?”
“I was hungry.”
Merthen breathed in, and then he breathed out; a simple action, which served as the foundation of all meditation. Indeed, this was the technique the Buddha used to achieve interbeing. When discussing the value of the breath, Brother Tinh Tu used to say, As long as you have air in your lungs, you can meditate. And as long as you can meditate, you can become as fully awake as the Buddha.
Merthen asked the boy, “Do you know who I am?”
“You draw with a feather.”
“An apt description. I have been schooled as a monastic. Do you know what it means to be educated, boy?”
“No.” A chuck of apple had fallen onto the ground. The boy snapped it up and popped it in his mouth.
Merthen knelt onto one knee. “Boy, my Christian name is Ambrosius. My friends call me Merthen. Can you say that? How is your diction?”
“Merthen. Mister Merthen.”
“Excellent. Might I submit a proposal to you? I am in need of a domesticus to assist me in gleaning my orchards. Should you accept, I shall train you to be a monastic like me. You will be provided with suitable clothing, a dry chamber for sleeping, and an ample supply of victuals.”
The boy scrunched up his nose.
“Food,” said Merthen. “I will give you a cot and food if you work for me.”
“Aye, I will do it.” The boy licked some of the sweet juice still on his lips. “It is better than hay.”
“Hay? Do you mean to tell me you have been eating hay?”
“No. I sleep in it. It stinks. I would rather sleep where it is dry.”
“Well, there shall be no more of that. No domesticus of mine sleeps in hay.”
“Who is he?”
“That is you. You shall be my domesticus.” Merthen brushed a couple of lice from off Uther’s scalp and crushed them underfoot.
“But my name is Uther, not Domesticus.”
“You misunderstand me. Domesticus is your title. It means you are my helper. Here, take this.” He gave the boy his furs to carry.
“You need my help?”
Merthen straightened his spine. “Evidently, the universe has deemed it so.” He tapped his finger on the top of Uther’s skull like a woodpecker pecking on a stump. “It is time we journeyed off to my sangha. It will be dark soon.”
“What is a sangha?”
“It is a compound in the wilderness where people who are in search of interbeing gather to live in community.”
“How many people live there?” asked the boy. “Do you have a wife? Do you have any children?”
“I have never taken a spouse, as I am unable to sire offspring. Even if I could, I am grossly unqualified to be a father. It requires more stability than one such as I could provide.”
“Does that mean you live all alone?” said Uther.
“If one discounts the bugs, birds, and varmints who frequent my premises, your deduction is correct.” Merthen took a step towards the western hills. “Indeed boy, it is just me.”
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