Sleight of Hand by Peter S. Beagle
Mourra fell asleep before she heard the magician’s answer, but the full moon rose into her open window, and she woke to see it burning itself free of the willow branches that she could almost have touched. Like a firefly in a spiderweb, she thought, remembering the story of the woman whose clothes were made for her by spiders. She sat up and leaned her elbows on the windowsill to see her mother and Schmendrick standing near the old tree. The earliest stars were waking in the deep sky, one by one, and the magician was telling a story.
“No, they used to stick straight up, just as though the tree were reaching for the sky. That is a fact—any willow will tell you that. Listen now. The rain god’s daughter fell in love with a mortal, a human, and they ran away together, for fear of his anger. He could never catch them, because they fled so fast, but they could never rest, either, for he would always find them, no matter where in the world they hid themselves. Because all the trees of the world were afraid of the rain god, and none would give them shelter. Only the willow.”
Sairey laughed softly. “Yes, of course. It would be the willow.”
“The willow felt sorry for them and said it would take them in, which obviously wasn’t much help, not with its branches as wide-apart as they were. So the willow tried and tried—slowly, painfully, so painfully, all night long—”
Like that time I got my finger bent back, playing ball with Findros….
“—but at last it managed to get all its branches turned down, all the way to the ground, touching the ground, and so they hid the rain god’s daughter and her husband, and the rain god never could find them. So then they were safe.”
“The rain god must have been very angry. Gods don’t take that sort of thing well. As I know.”
“Oh, naturally he was furious! So he commanded the willow to stay like that forever, with its branches drooping down, as a warning to all the other trees.” Mourra heard the magician chuckle himself. “And he still makes certain to send rain, constant rain, wherever the willow trees are. But he forgot that the willow likes rain—indeed, loves rain—so he is content in his vengeance, his daughter is happy with her husband, the willow’s deep roots are always damp and happy—”
“And my children have a place for their tea parties. Thank you.” They passed into the moon-traced shadow of the tree, and Mourra lost sight of them for a moment, but she heard her mother say, “I like that story. I will tell it to them.”
Schmendrick said something in response that Mourra could not catch entirely, ending with “….sad story they told me. About the dragon.”
“Dragon?” Sairey’s shadow stood still, turning to face the magician’s shadow. “What dragon?”
“The one who killed their father. I am very sorry.”
Another puzzled silence in the willow-shadow. “They told you—a dragon….?” There was a sound under the words that could have been laughter, and was not.
“It was either black, with horns and things all over it, or it was the color of a thunderstorm, and had silver eyes. Depending on whom you talk to.” The magician's voice was as quiet as the small night breeze in the willow branches. “Was that not so?”
Sairey sighed. ”My husband’s name was Joris. He was killed plowing a field, when a sinkhole opened under his feet without warning and swallowed him up. One of the rocks in the hole broke his skull.” There was a laugh in her voice now, but it hurt Mourra to hear. “That was all there was to his death, and little more to his life as well. No wonder the children made up a brave ending for him.”
No. No, that isn’t how it happened. There was a dragon—there was! Mourra fought back the urge to shut the window and clap her hands over her ears, She leaned against the frame, head bowed, hugging herself, rocking back and forth.
Schmendrick’s voice remained expressionless. “Death is death—loss is loss. Grief is grief. What difference?”
“None, except to children—children nourished on the fairy tales their father so loved to tell them. Findros was too young, but Mourra…. Mourra knows.”
I didn’t make it up! Mourra ground her knuckles painfully into her eyes, warning them against tears. The magician said, somewhere far away, “Have you ever faced her with the truth? I rarely recommend it, but sometimes….”
“Once. Not again.”
“Ah. Quite wise.” Her mother made a sound that Mourra could not translate. Grownup talk, grownup noises. They were clear of the willow shadow now, and Sairey had seated herself in the wooden chair that the children’s father had made for her shortly before his death. Mourra knew from her own experience that Joris had not been a particularly good carpenter: the chair was ruthlessly uncomfortable, however one shifted position; there was no natural headrest; and there were always previously-unnoticed splinters to be dealt with. She could never imagine how her mother could possibly find any ease on the rough planks, but from time to time she would stubbornly sit there herself, as long as she could bear it.
Sairey was saying, “I’m sorry, I have no other chair.”
“As well. I have far to go, and if I sat down it might be a long time before I rose again. Thank you for your kindness. I will not forget.”
Her mother’s answer came slowly. “The pathway back to the main road is elusive at night. You may lose your way.”
“I have no way, as you mean it, and my road is elusive by any light. As I told you, when I encountered your children, they were a little bit lost, yes, but I was much more so. Lost and very weary, and out of stories to tell myself, out of all the games I know to persuade myself that I am what I pretend to be. The children’s company…. helped.”
She wants him to stay, I know she does. My mother wants him to stay.
“Well, you’re a storyteller, no doubt of that.” Sairey was leaning back in the old wooden chair, considering him with her arms folded across her breast. “And you may ask my children if you need reassurance about being a magician. Findros would have taken that silly turtle egg to bed with him if I’d permitted it, the same way you saw Mourra asking to have her flower. They recognize you, those two.”
“As a trickster, nothing more. What I did to amuse them—to distract them from their fear—any half-competent parlor entertainer could have done. In truth, I am amazed that I managed those common little flummeries as well as I did. It is not always so.”
In the moonlight Mourra could see her mother lightly touch Schmendrick’s arm, then draw her hand back quickly. “But they tell me you knew their names without being told—and mine as well. True?”
“Mmm. Yes, well. A very small charm, much less difficult than people imagine. A beginner’s practice spell, really—I get it right perhaps half the time. Perhaps a little less.”
“So? But Mourra’s flower?” When he did not reply she pressed further. “Mourra’s flower that you said would never fade. Surely, anyone who could manage such a thing….” She left the words hanging in the air.
“Ah,” the magician said. “Mourra. Yes.” He chuckled dryly. “Well, if that bloody flower does die, I won’t know about it, will I?”
“Oh, I think you will,” Mourra’s mother said. “And I think that flower may very well survive.”
“Then it will be her doing, the magic of that child’s will, and none of mine.” Schmendrick’s voice had risen sharply. “No, I didn’t put it in her hair…. but I didn’t find it in her head, either. Or perhaps I did, and never knew. I never know why any attempt at enchantment succeeds or dissolves in my hands. I search for patterns, for signs, guideposts, masters, for anything to tell me who I am—what I am, wizard or carnival cardsharp, either one. I could live if I knew!”
At the window Mourra clutched her flower, understanding nothing of his words but the sorrow and loneliness under them. The magician chuckled suddenly, mimicking himself. “‘I could live….’ Now, that’s funny. That is funny.” He turned and bowed to her mother, not at all mockingly, but with a kind of slow, formal courtesy. “Well. Thank you for that excellent dinner, and for…. for the loan of your
He had been turning the funny many-pointed hat in his hands all the while they spoke. Now he set it on his head, bowed a second time, more briskly, and turned away. Even from her window, even in the dimness, Mourra could see him straighten his thin shoulders under the ragged cloak, as though settling a peddler’s pack. Then he set off, and the moon-shadows swallowed him quickly.
Sairey said after him, “I will tell you a story.” Her voice was soft but very clear in the still night.
Mourra could only tell that he had halted and turned by the angle of the funny hat. Her mother said, “You are a magician who cannot believe in his own gift. I am a widow with two children. I do not imagine that I will ever marry again, since I have no intention of ever giving another hostage to a sky that can snatch love away from me so randomly, so absurdly, so completely. So I believe in nothing—nothing—except looking at my sleeping Mourra, my Findros who always curls up into such a tight little ball, twice and three times during the night.” Sairey’s voice was now as tight and thin as her lips became when she was truly angry. Mourra put her fingers to her own mouth and bit down hard on them.
Schmendrick did not respond. Sairey said, “So I tell myself stories, just as you do, to comfort myself, to endure—simply to get through to another morning. And there is one story in particular that has always meant something to me. Different things at different times, perhaps, but something always. Sit down where you are, magician, in the soft grass, and listen.”
The night had grown so dark that Mourra could not even be certain whether Schmendrick was still there, until, after a moment, she saw the pointy hat slowly lower itself. Sairey began, “There was a woman once who fell in love with the Man in the Moon—yes, a moon story of my own. This woman loved the face she imagined she saw—everyone sees something different in the moon, you know—and she let it be known that if that man should ever choose to walk on this earth, she would marry him instantly. As to whether or not he would have her, she never questioned that, no matter that she had always been a plain woman, even rather drab and dowdy. She knew beyond any doubt that the Man in the Moon would come for her in time.”
“And so he did.” The tall man’s voice was almost without inflection.
“Well, somebody did. Because one evening a strange man came to her door.”
The pointy hat nodded. “And naturally told her that he was the Man in the Moon.”
“That was not necessary. She merely looked at him and knew, as happens sometimes. To anyone with any doubts, she pointed out that there was no longer a man visible up there—which was true, because, for whatever reason, there had come a season of clouds and mist hiding the surface of the moon, and there was nothing at all to be seen but a few dark craters. It was plain for anyone to see that the Man in the Moon had at last come down to claim her.”
“Which, of course, he had not done at all—merely taken advantage of a lonely woman’s foolish fantasy. I told you and your children better tales.”
“Perhaps because we were not forever interrupting you, ordering the story this way and that. Listen to me now, pay for your dinner. Like herself, this lady’s lover was no great beauty, at least on earth, being rather short and decidedly gray-complected, with no grace that any of her friends ever noticed. Nevertheless, by all accounts he was kind to her, and she appeared to be blissful in his company. She listened enraptured to his own stories of his palace in the moon, and sighed in wonder as he described the beauty of shooting stars, comets and constellations seen from the far side no human ever sees. Who knows anything about anyone else’s happiness, after all?”
“Go on, then,” the magician said when she fell silent. “What became of them?”
“He only came to her by night, of course, just as the moon would, and she thought it perfectly proper that there were always one or two nights in the month when he did not come at all. And it must be said that his attentions made a wonderful difference in her appearance, for her hair and her skin and her manner alike all took on a certain shimmer very like that of the moon itself, and as time passed people began to say that she walked in moonlight, such was the radiance of her joy. It can happen so, even with foolish fantasies.”
Resting her chin on her folded arms in the window, Mourra thought, yes, that was how she looked when Papa was here—shimmery. I remember. I do.
As though she had heard her, Sairey went on, “Her man suited this woman very well, in the moon or out of it, and so she lived contentedly for quite a long time. And the world jogged along serviceably with no Man in the Moon—especially since many folk see no Man there at all, but a Woman, or even a Fox. And they went on together as well, those two.”
Schmendrick said, “I can see sorrow coming. I can smell it on the wind. This story is going to end badly.”
“Stories never end. We end. If we could but live long enough, we would see how all tales go on and on past the telling. Now there came a night when the woman could tell that her lover was not falling restfully asleep in her arms, as he had always done, nights without number, even though he left her before each dawn. So she said to him, ‘Beloved, what troubles you? Tell me, and I will help if I can.’ For loving had made her sensible of others’ griefs and fears—which also happens, as I am sure you know.”
“I have been…. told so. Go on.”
“And the Man in the Moon—if that indeed is what he was—answered her, ‘My dearest Earthwoman, one love of my endless lunar life, the time has come for me to return to my lonely home. It is home to me no longer—this, our bed, this is my true home—but the moon is my fate, the moon is where I am ordained to be. If I stay away even one day further, it will fall from the sky, likely causing the world’s end. Tonight must be our last together, for the very planet’s sake.’”
“What nonsense!” The magician was surprisingly indignant. “The scoundrel was just seeking to be rid of that poor woman!”
“Was he, then?” Sairey’s voice was as slow, and even tentative, as though she were telling the story for the first time. “Yet when she said to him, ‘May I not go with you, as I have been ready to go from the night we met?’ he replied, ‘I had not dared to ask you. I do not ask it now. You will be lonely for the Earth, and there will be no returning. I cannot take such advantage of you.’”
Schmendrick snorted contemptuously. “One of the oldest ruses in the world to discard a woman. Your Mourra would never be taken in so easily.”
“Perhaps not. She is a very perceptive child. But this woman answered, ‘I was lonely for the Earth until you came. You may be from the moon, but you are my planet—you are my Earth. I know this as an animal knows its home, if it knows nothing else of the universe. Take me with you.’
“‘My palace is a little cold,’ said her lover. ‘Bright, but cold. I should warn you of this.’
“‘Then we will warm it together,’ answered the woman. ‘Where did I leave my good shoes?’”
“And in what town, what miserable inn, what hovel, did he finally abandon her?” Schmendrick was on his feet now. “Or did they find her body in some river? On some dungheap?” He was shaking his head, half in anger, half in amusement. “Go ahead—tell me the wretched rest of it.”
“All I can tell you,” came the quiet answer, “is that on that same night there came a total eclipse of the moon, and when it passed, both the woman and the man were gone, and were never seen again. Nor was any trace of them ever found.”
As the magician drew breath to respond, she added, “I am sorry if my story displeases you. I told it for a reason.”
“Of course you did. To make the point that whether or not her lover was actually the Man in the Moon, the real magic was in her belief—it was belief that kept her blissful and shimmering, and what else matters, after all? Understood, but my fairy tale is a little different, and I have already known too many who flourished on the belief of others. Thank you once more for the meal and the delightful children. And so good night and farewell, mistress.”
<
Over his shoulder, the magician answered her, “Oh, I know that.”
Sairey said, “I did not tell you that tale in praise of blind belief. I meant you to understand that it was her faith in herself—not in him, not for a moment—that made whatever magic there was. I’ve no least idea whether or not she ever credited a word that man told her, but what I am sure of is that she knew—not believed, she knew, always—that she was a woman for whom the Man in the Moon would certainly come down to Earth.” Her voice sounded strangely breathless to Mourra’s ears, as though she had been running. She said, “Magic is not what you think it is, magician.”
She had also risen to her feet, and was standing with her back fiercely straight and her hands on her hips. Schmendrick had stopped walking, but had not turned again. “All I know,” he said, “all I have ever known, is that there is just enough magic in me to do me no good.” He drew a deep breath and held himself as erect as she. “Your children found me in a tree, where I was looking for a certain branch, one strong enough to take my weight. I thought I had at last found the right one, but it broke and I fell at their feet. Do you understand me now?”
Mourra heard a strange sound in her mother’s throat: a muffled click, as of a soft lock closing. The magician said, “I had been searching for some while. It is not as simple a matter as one might suppose. Not just any tree or branch will do for a man with my…. blessings.”
From her window, Mourra saw her mother’s lips move, but no sound came out. Schmendrick continued, “But then, of course, I was obliged to see your Findros and Mourra safely home—which I accomplished no more skillfully than I had that other. Not my finest showing, all in all.”