Constant Fire

12. In which Doctor Volospion gives a tour of his Museum and his Menagerie of Forgotten Faiths

Mavis Ming was desolate.

"Oh, you have betrayed me!"

"Betrayed?" Doctor Volospion laid a hand upon her trembling shoulder. "Nothing of the sort. This is all part of my plan. I beg you to become an actress, Miss Ming. Show, as best you can, some little sympathy for your suitor. It will benefit you in the end."

"You're laying a trap for him, aren't you?"

"I can only say, now, that you will soon be free of him."

"You're certain."

"Certain."

"I'm not sure I could keep it up."

"Trust me. I have proved myself your loyal protector up to now, have I not?"

"Of course. I didn't mean to imply…" She was hasty to give him reassurance.

"Then dress yourself and join us, as soon as you can, for dinner."

"You'll be eating? You never —"

"It is the ceremony which is important."

She nodded. "All right."

He crossed to the door. She said: "He's not really very intelligent, is he?"

"I think not."

"And you're very clever indeed."

"You are kind."

"What I mean is, I'm sure you can trick him, Doctor Volospion, if that's what you mean to do."

"I appreciate your encouragement, Miss Ming." He went out.

Mavis looked to her wardrobe. She dragged from it an evening dress of green and purple silk. She passed to her mirror and looked with displeasure upon her red-rimmed eyes, her bedraggled hair. "Chin up, Mavis," she said, "it'll all be over soon. And it means you can go visiting again. What a relief that'll be! And if I play my part right, they'll have me to thank, as well as Doctor Volospion. I'll get a bit of respect." She settled to her toilet.

It was to her credit that she made the most of herself, in her own eyes. She curled her hair so that it hung in blonde waves upon her shoulders. She applied plenty of mascara, to make her eyes look larger. She was relatively subtle with her rouge and she touched her best perfumed deodorant to all those parts of her body which, in her opinion, might require it (her cosmetics were largely 20th century, created for her by Doctor Volospion at her request, for she considered the cosmetics of her own time to be crude and synthetic by comparison). She arranged an everlasting orchid upon her dress; she donned diamond earrings, a matching necklace, bracelets. "Good enough to dine with the Emperor of Africa," she said to herself, when she was ready.

She left her apartments and began her journey through passages which, in her opinion, Doctor Volospion kept unnecessarily dark, although, as she knew, it was done for the artistic effect he favoured.

At last she reached the great, gloomy hall where Doctor Volospion normally entertained his guests. Hard-faced metal servants already waited on the long table at one end of which sat dignified Doctor Volospion and the pipsqueak Bloom, all got up in the silliest outfit Mavis Ming had ever seen. Strips of ancient neon, blue-white, illuminated this particular part of the castle, though they had been designed to malfunction and so flickered on and off, creating sudden shadows and brilliances which always disturbed Miss Ming. The walls were of undressed stone and bore no decoration save the tall portrait of Doctor Volospion over the massive fireplace in which a small electric fire had been positioned, and the fire was also an antique, designed to simulate burning coal.

Becoming aware of her entrance, both men rose from their seats.

"My madonna!" breathed Bloom.

"Good evening, Miss Ming." Doctor Volospion bowed.

Emmanuel Bloom seemed to be making an effort to contain himself. He sat down again.

"Good evening, gentlemen." She responded to this effort with one of her own. "How nice to see you again, Mr Bloom!"

"Oh!" He lifted a chop to his grease-painted mouth.

Simple food was placed by servants before her. She sat at Doctor Volospion's left. She had no appetite but she made some show of eating, noting that Doctor Volospion did the same. She hoped that Bloom would not subject them to any more of his megalomaniacal monologues. It was still difficult to understand why a man of Doctor Volospion's intelligence indulged Bloom at all, and yet they seemed to converse readily enough.

"You deal, sir, in Ideals," Doctor Volospion was saying, "I in Realities: though I remain fascinated by the trappings by means of which men seek to give credence to their dreamings."

"The trappings are all you can ever know," said the Fireclown, "for you can never experience the ecstasy of Faith. You are too empty."

"You continue to be hard on me, sir, while I try —"

"I speak the truth."

"Ah, well. I suppose you do read me aright, Mr Bloom."

"Of course I do. I gave my word only that I should not take Miss Ming from here by force. I did not agree to join in your courtesies, your hypocrisies. What are your manners when seen in the light of the great unchangeable realities of the multiverse?"

"Your belief in the permanence of anything, Mr Bloom, is incredible to me. Everything is transitory. Can the experience of a billion years have taught you nothing?"

"On the contrary, Doctor Volospion." He did not amplify. He chewed at his chop.

"Has experience left you untouched? Were you ever the same?"

"I suppose my character has changed little. I have known the punishments of Prometheus, but I have been that god's persecutor, too — for Bloom has bloomed everywhere, in every guise…"

"More peas?" interrupted Miss Ming.

Emmanuel Bloom shook his head.

"But creed has followed creed, movement followed movement, down all the centuries," continued Doctor Volospion, "and not one important change in any of them, though millions have lost their lives over some slight interpretation. Are men not fools to destroy themselves thus? Questing after impossibilities, golden dreams, romantic fancies, perfectibility…"

"Oh, certainly. Clowns, all of them. Like me."

Doctor Volospion did not know what to make of this.

"You agree?"

"The clown weeps, laughs, knows joy and sorrow. It is not enough to look at his costume and laugh and say — here is mankind revealed. Irony is nothing by itself. Irony is a modifier, not a protection. We live our lives because we have only our lives to live."

"Um," said Doctor Volospion. "I think I should show you my collection. I possess mementoes of a million creeds." He pointed with his thumb at the floor. "Down there."

"I doubt that they will be unfamiliar to me," said Bloom. "What do you hope to prove to me?"

"That you are not original, I suppose."

"And by this means you think you will encourage me to leave your planet without a single pledge fulfilled?"

Doctor Volospion made a gesture. "You read me so well, Mr Bloom."

"I'll inspect this stuff, if you wish. I am curious. I am respectful, too, of all prophets and all objects of devotion, but as to my originality…"

"Well," said Doctor Volospion, "we shall see. If you will allow me to conduct you upon a brief tour of my collection, I shall hope to convince you."

"Miss Ming will accompany us?"

"Oh, I'd love to," said Miss Ming courageously. She hated Doctor Volospion's treasures.

"I think my collection is the greatest in the universe," continued Doctor Volospion. "No better has existed, certainly, in Earth's history. Many missionaries have come this way. Most have made attempts to — um — save us. As you have. They have not been, in the main, as spectacular, I will admit, nor have they claimed as much as you claim. However…" He took a pea upon his fork. There was something in the gesture to make Mavis Ming suspect that he planned something more than a mere tour of his treasures. "… you would agree that your arguments are scarcely subtle. They allow for no nuance."

Now nothing would stop the Fireclown. He rose from the table, his birdlike movements even more exaggerated than usual. He strutted the length of the table. He strutted back again. "A pox on nuance! Seize the substance, beak and claws, and leave the chitterlings for the carrion! Let crows and storks squabble over the scraps, these subtleties — the eagle takes the main carcass, as much or as little as he needs!" He fixed his gaze upon Miss Ming. "Forget your quibbling scruples, madonna! Come with me now. Together we'll leave the planet to its fate. Their souls gutter like dying candles. The whole world reeks of inertia. If they will not have my Ideals, then I shall bestow all my gifts on you!"

Mavis Ming said in strangled tones: "You are very kind, Mr Bloom, but…"

"Perhaps that particular matter can be discussed later," proposed Doctor Volospion tightening his cap about his head and face. "Now, sir, if you will come?"

"Miss Ming, too?"

"Miss Ming."

The trio left the hall, with Miss Ming reluctantly trailing behind. She desperately hoped that Doctor Volospion was not playing one of his games at her expense. He had been so nice to her lately, she thought, that he was evidently mellowing her, yet she hated in herself that slight lingering suspicion of him, that voice which had told her, on more than one occasion, that if someone liked her then that someone could have no taste at all and was therefore not worth knowing.

They descended and they descended, for it was Doctor Volospion's pleasure to bury his collection in the bowels of his castle. Murky corridor followed murky corridor, lit by flambeaux, candles, rush torches, oil-lamps, anything that would give the minimum of heat and cast the maximum number of shadows.

"You have," said Mr Bloom after some while of this tramping, "an unexceptional imagination, Doctor Volospion."

"I do not concern myself with the lust for variation enjoyed by most of my fellows at the End of Time," remarked the lean man. "I follow but a few simple obsessions. And in that, I think, we share something, Mr Bloom."

"Well —" began the Fireclown.

But then Doctor Volospion had stopped at an iron-bound door. "Here we are!" He flung the door wide. The light from within seemed intense.

The Fireclown strutted, stiff-limbed as ever, into the high vaulted hall. He blinked in the light. He sniffed the warm, heavy air. For almost as far as the eye could see there were rows and rows of cabinets, pedestals, display domes; Doctor Volospion's museum.

"What's this?" inquired Mr Bloom.

"My collection of devotional objects, culled from all ages. From all the planets of the universe." Doctor Volospion was proud.

It was difficult to see if Mr Bloom was impressed, for his clown's paint hid most expression.

Doctor Volospion paused beside a little table. "Only the best have been preserved. I have discarded or destroyed the rest. Here is a history of folly!" He looked down at the table. On it lay a dusty scrap of skin to which clung a few faded feathers. Doctor Volospion plucked it up. "Do you recognize that, Mr Bloom, with all your experience of Time and Space?"

The long neck came forwards to inspect the thing. "The remains of a fowl?" suggested Mr Bloom. "A chicken, perhaps?"

Miss Ming wrinkled her nose and backed away from them. "I never liked this part of the castle. It's creepy. I don't know how —" She pulled herself together.

"Eh?" said Mr Bloom.

Doctor Volospion permitted himself a dark smile. "It is all that remains of Yawk, Saviour of Shakah, founder of a religion which spread through fourteen star-systems and eighty planets and lasted some seven thousand years until it became the subject of a jehad."

"Hm," said Mr Bloom non-committally.

"I had this," confided Doctor Volospion, "from the last living being to retain his faith in Yawk. He regarded himself as the only guardian of the relic, carried it across countless light-years, preaching the gospel of Yawk (and a fine, poetic tale it is), until he reached Earth."

"And then?" Bloom reverently replaced the piece of skin.

"He is now a guest of mine. You will meet him later."

A smile appeared momentarily on Miss Ming's lips. She believed that she had guessed what her host had in mind.

"Aha," murmured the Fireclown. "And what would this be?" He moved on through the hall, pausing beside a cabinet containing an oddly wrought artefact made of something resembling green marble.

"A weapon," said Volospion. "The very gun which slew Marchbanks, the Martyr of Mars, during the revival, in the 25th century (A.D., of course), of the famous Kangaroo Cult which had swept the solar system about a hundred years previously, before it was superseded by some atheistic political doctrine. You know how one is prone to follow the other. Nothing, Mr Bloom, changes very much, either in the fundamentals or the rhetoric of religions and political creeds. I hope I am not depressing you?"

Bloom snorted. "How could you? None of these others has experienced what I have experienced. None has had the knowledge I have gained and, admittedly, half-forgotten. Do not confuse me with these, I warn you, Doctor Volospion, if you wish to continue to converse with me. I could destroy all this in a moment, if I wished, and it would make no difference…"

"You threaten?"

"What?" The little man removed his clown's cap and ran his fingers through the tangles of his auburn hair. "Eh? Threaten? Don't be foolish. I gave my word. I was merely lending emphasis to my statement."

"Besides," said Doctor Volospion smoothly, "you could do little now, I suspect, for there are several force-fields lying between you and your ship now — they protect my museum — and I suspect that your ship is the main source of your power, for all you claim it derives entirely from your mind."

Emmanuel Bloom chuckled. "You have found me out, Doctor Volospion, I see." He seemed undisturbed. "Now, then, what other pathetic monuments to the nobility of the human spirit have you locked up here?"

Doctor Volospion extended his arms. "What would you see?" He pointed in one direction. "A wheel from Krishna's chariot?" He pointed in another. "A tooth said to belong to the Buddha? One of the original tablets of Moses? Bunter's bottle? The sacred crown of the Kennedys? Hitler's nail? There," he tapped a dome, "you'll find them all in that case. Or over here," a sweep of a green and black arm, "the finger-bones of Karl Marx, the knee-cap of Mao Tse-tung, a mummified testicle belonging to Heffner, the skeleton of Maluk Khan, the tongue of Suhulu. Or what of these? Filp's loin-cloth, Xiombarg's napkin, Teglardin's peach rag. Then there are the coins of Bibb-Nardrop, the silver wands of Er and Er, the towels of Ich — all the way from a world within the Crab Nebula. And most of these, in this section here, are only from the Dawn Age. Farther along are relics from all other ages of this world and the universe. Rags and bones, Mr Bloom. Rags and bones."

"I am moved," said Emmanuel Bloom.

"All that is left," said Doctor Volospion, "of a million mighty causes. And all, at core, that those causes ever were!"

The clown's face was grave as he moved among the cases.

Mavis Ming was shivering. "This place really does depress me," she whispered to her guardian. "I know it's my fault, but I've always hated places like this. They seem ghoulish. Not that I'm criticising, Doctor Volospion, but I've never been able to understand why a man like you could indulge in such a strange hobby. It's all research material, of course. We have to do research, don't we? Well, at least, you do. It's nice that someone does. I mean this is your area of research, isn't it, this particular aspect of the galaxy's past? It's why I'll never make a first-rank historian, I suppose. It's the same, you know, when I lived with Donny Stevens. It was the cold-blooded killing of those sweet little rabbits and monkeys at the lab. I'd simply refuse, you know, to let him or anyone else talk about it when I was around. And with the time machine, too, they sent so many to God knows where before they'd got it working properly. When can I stop this charade, Doctor…?"

Volospion raised a finger to his lips. Bloom was some distance away but had turned, detecting the voice, no doubt, of his loved one.

"Rags and bones," said Doctor Volospion, as if he had been reiterating his opinions to Miss Ming.

"No," called Bloom from where he stood beside a case containing many slightly differently shaped strips of metal, "these were merely the instruments used to focus faith. Witness their variety. Anything would do as a lens to harness the soul's fire. A bit of wood. A stone. A cup. A custard pie. Nothing here means anything without the presence of the beings who believed in their validity. Whether that piece of worm-eaten wood really did come from Christ's cross or not is immaterial. As a symbol…"

"You question the authenticity of my prizes?"

"It is not important…"

Doctor Volospion betrayed agitation. It was genuine. "It is to me, Mr Bloom. I will have nothing in my museum that is not authentic!"

"So you have a faith of your own, after all." Bloom's painted lips formed a smile.

He leaned, a tiny jester, a cockerel, against a force dome.

Doctor Volospion lost none of his composure. "If you mean that I pride myself on my ability to sniff out any fakes, any piece of doubtful origin, then you speak rightly. I have faith in my own taste and judgement. But come, let us move on. It is not the museum that I wish you to inspect, its the menagerie, which is of greater interest, for there…"

"Show me this cup you have. This Holy Grail. I was looking for it."

"Well, if you feel you have the leisure. Certainly. There it is. In the cabinet with Jissard's space-helmet and Panjit's belt."

Emmanuel Bloom trotted rapidly in the direction indicated by Doctor Volospion, weaving his way among the various displays, until he came to the far wall where, behind a slightly quivering energy screen, between the helmet and the belt, stood a pulsing, golden cup, semi-transparent, in which a red liquid swirled.

Bloom's glance at the cup was casual. He made no serious attempt to inspect it. He turned back to Doctor Volospion, who had followed behind.

"Well?" said Volospion.

Bloom laughed. "Your taste and judgement fail you, Doctor Volospion. It is a fake, that Grail."

"How could you know?"

"I assure you that I am right."

Bloom began to leave the case, but Doctor Volospion tugged at his arm. "You would argue that it is merely mythical, wouldn't you? That it never existed. Yet there is proof that it did."

"Oh, I need no proof of the Grail's existence. But if it were the true Grail how could you, of all people, keep it?"

Doctor Volospion frowned. "You are vaguer than usual, Mr Bloom. I keep the cup because it is mine."

"Yours?"

"I had it from a time traveller who had spent his entire life searching for it and who, as it happens, found it in one of our own cities. Unfortunately, the traveller destroyed himself soon after coming to stay with me. They are all mad, such people. But the thing itself is authentic. He had found many fakes before he found the true Grail. He vouched for this one. And he should have known, a man who had dedicated himself to his quest and who was willing to kill himself once that quest was over."

"He probably thought it would bring him back to life," mused the Fireclown. "That is part of the legend, you know. One of the real Grail's minor properties."

"Real? This man's opinion was irrefutable."

"Well, I am glad that he is dead," said Bloom, and then he laughed a strange, deep-throated laugh which had no business coming from that puny frame, "for I should not have liked to have disappointed him."

"Disappointed?" Volospion flushed. "Now —"

"That cup is not even a very good copy of the original, Doctor Volospion."

Doctor Volospion drew himself up and arranged the folds of his robe carefully in front of him. His voice was calm when he next spoke. "How would you know such a thing, Mr Bloom? You claim great knowledge, yet you exhibit no signs of it in your rather foolish behaviour, your pointless pursuits. You dress a fool and you are a fool, say I."

"Possibly. Nonetheless, that Grail is a fake."

"Why do you know?" Doctor Volospion's gaze was not quite as steady as it might have been.

"Because," explained Bloom amicably, "I am, among many other things, the Guardian of the Grail. That is to say, specifically, that I am graced by the presence of the Holy Grail."

"What!" Doctor Volospion was openly contemptuous.

"You probably do not know," Mr Bloom went on, "that only those who are absolutely pure in spirit, who never commit the sin of accidie (moral torpor, if you prefer) may ever see the Grail and only one such as myself may ever receive the sacred trust of Joseph of Arimathaea, the Good Soldier, who carried the Grail to Glastonbury. I have had this trust for several centuries, at least. I am probably the only mortal being left alive who deserves the honour (though, of course, I am not so proud as to be certain of it). My ship is full of such things — relics to rival any of these here — collected in an eternity of wandering the many dimensions of the universe, tumbling through Time, companion to chronons…"

Doctor Volospion's face wore an expression quite different from anything Miss Ming had ever seen. He was deeply serious. His voice contained an unusual vibrancy.

"Oh, don't be taken in by him, Doctor Volospion," she said, giving up any idea of trying to placate the Fireclown. "He's an obvious charlatan."

Bloom bowed. Doctor Volospion did not even hear her.

"How can you prove that your Grail is the original, Mr Bloom?"

"I do not have to prove such a thing. The Grail chooses its own guardian. The Grail will only appear to one whose Faith is Absolute. My Faith is Absolute."

Bloom began to stride towards Mavis Ming. Volospion followed thoughtfully in his wake.

"Oo!" squeaked Miss Ming, seeing her protector distracted and fearing a sudden leap. "Get off!"

"I am not, Miss Ming, on. I promise you no violence, not yet, not until you come to me."

"Oh! You think that I'd —?" She struggled with her own revulsion and the remembrance of her promise to Doctor Volospion.

"You still make a pretence at resistance, I see." Bloom beamed. "Such is female pride. I came here to claim a world and now I willingly renounce that claim if it means that I can possess you, woman, body and soul. You are the most beautiful creature I have ever seen in all the aeons of my wandering. Mavis! Mavis! Music floods my being at the murmur of your exquisite name. Queen Mavis — Maeve, Sorceress Queen, Destroyer of Cuchulain, Beloved of the Sun — ah, you have the power to do it — but you shall not destroy me again, Beautiful Maeve. You shall find me in Fire and in Fire shall we be united!"

It was true that, for the first time, Miss Ming's expression began to soften, but Doctor Volospion came to her aid.

"I am sure Miss Ming is duly flattered," he said. It was evident, with his next statement, that he merely resented the interruption to his line of thought. "But as for the Holy Grail, you do not, I suppose, have it about you?"

"Of course not. It appears only at my prayer."

"You can summon it to you?"

"No. It appears. During my meditations."

"You would not care to meditate now? To prove that yours is the true one."

"I have no urge to meditate." Mr Bloom dismissed the Doctor from his attention and, hands outstretched in that stiff, awkward way of his, moved to embrace Miss Ming, only to pause as he felt Volospion's touch on his arm.

"It is in your ship, then?"

"It visits my ship, yes."

"Visits?"

"Doctor Volospion. I have tried to explain to you clearly enough. The Grail you have is not a mystical artefact, no matter how miraculous it seems to be. The true Holy Grail is a mystical artefact and therefore it comes and goes, according to the spiritual ambience. That is why your so-called Grail is plainly a fake. If it were real, it would not be here!"

"This is mere obfuscation…"

"Doctor Volospion, you are a most obtuse creature."

Miss Ming began to move slowly backwards.

"Mr Bloom I ask only for illumination…"

"I try to bring it. But I have failed with you, as I have failed with everyone but Miss Ming. That is only to be expected of one who is not really alive at all. Can one hold an intelligent conversation with a corpse?"

"You are crudely insulting, Mr Bloom. There is no call…" Doctor Volospion had lost most of his usual self-control.

Mavis Ming, terrified of further conflict in which, somehow she knew she would be the worst sufferer, if her experience were anything to go by, broke in with a nervous yelp:

"Show Mr Bloom your menagerie, Doctor Volospion! The menagerie! The menagerie!"

Doctor Volospion turned glazed and dreaming eyes upon her. "What?"

"The menagerie. There are many entities there that Mr Bloom might wish to converse with."

The Fireclown bent to straighten one of his long shoes and Mavis Ming seized the chance to wink broadly at Doctor Volospion.

"Ah, yes, the menagerie. Mr Bloom?"

"You wish to show me the menagerie?"

"Yes."

"Then lead me to it," said Bloom generously.

Doctor Volospion continued to brood as he advanced before them, through another series of gloomy passages whose gently sloping floors took them still deeper underground. Doctor Volospion had a tendency to favour the subterranean in almost everything.

By the time, however, that they had reached the series of chambers Doctor Volospion chose to call his "crypts", their guide had resumed his normal manner of poised irony.

These halls were far larger than the museum. On either side were reproduced many different environments, in the manner of zoological gardens, in which were incarcerated his collection of creatures culled from countless cultures, some indigenous and others alien to Earth.

Enthusiasm returned to Volospion's voice as he pointed out his prizes while they progressed slowly down the central aisle.

"My Christians and my Hare Krishnans," declaimed the Doctor, "My Moslems and my Marxists, my Jews and my Joypushers, my Dervishes, Buddhists, Hindus, Nature-worshippers, Confucians, Leavisites, Sufis, Shintoists, New Shintoists, Reformed Shintoists, Shinto-Scientologists, Mansonite Water-sharers, Anthroposophists, Flumers, Haythornthwaitists, Fundamentalist Ouspenskyians, Sperm Worshippers, followers of the Five Larger Moon Devils, followers of the Stone that Cannot Be Weighed, followers of the Sword and the Stallion, Awaiters of the Epoch, Mensans, Doo-en Skin Slicers, Crab-bellied Milestriders, Poobem Wrigglers, Tribunites, Callagriphic Diviners, Betelgeusian Grass Sniffers, Aldebaranian Grass Sniffers, Terran Grass Sniffers and Frexian Anti-Grass Sniffers. There are the Racists (Various) — I mix them together in the one environment because it makes for greater interest. The River of Blood was my own idea. It blends very well, I think, into the general landscape." Doctor Volospion was evidently extremely proud of his collection. "They are all, of course, in their normal environments. Every care is taken to see that they are preserved in the best of health and happiness. You will note, Mr Bloom, that the majority are content, so long as they are allowed to speak or perform the occasional small miracle."

The Fireclown's attention seemed elsewhere.

"The sound," said Doctor Volospion, and he touched a power ring, whereupon the air was filled with a babble of voices as prophets prophesied, preachers preached, messiahs announced various millennia, saviours summoned disciples, archbishops proclaimed Armageddon, fakirs mourned materialism, priests prayed, imams intoned, rabbis railed and druids droned. "Enough?"

The Fireclown raised a hand in assent and Doctor Volospion touched the ring again so that much of the noise died away.

"Well, Mr Bloom, do you find these pronouncements essentially distinguishable from your own?"

But the Fireclown was again studying Mavis Ming who was, in turn, looking extremely self-conscious. She was blushing through her rouge. She pretended to take an interest in the sermon being delivered by a snail-like being from some remote world near the galaxy's centre.

"What?"

Bloom cocked an ear in Volospion's direction. "Distinguishable? Oh, of course. Of course. I respect all the views being expressed. They are, I would agree, a little familiar, some of them. But these poor creatures lack either my power or my experience. I would guess, too, that they lack my courage. Or my purity of purpose. Why do you keep them locked up here?"

Doctor Volospion ignored the final sentence. "Many would differ with you, I think."

"Quite so. But you cease to entertain me, Doctor Volospion. I have decided to take Miss Ming, my Madonna, back to my ship now. The visit has been fairly interesting. More interesting than I believed it would be. Are you coming, Miss Ming?"

Miss Ming hesitated. She glanced at Doctor Volospion. "Well, I —"

"Do not consult this corpse," Mr Bloom told her. "I shall be your mentor. It is my duty and destiny to remove you from this environment at once, to bring you to the knowledge of your own divinity!"

Mavis Ming breathed heavily, still flushed. Her eyes darted from Bloom to Volospion. "I don't think you'll be removing either me or yourself from this castle, Mr Bloom." She smiled openly now at Doctor Volospion and her eyes were full of hope and terror. They asked a hundred questions. She seemed close to panic and was poised to flee.

Emmanuel Bloom gave a snort of impatience. "Miss Ming, my love, you are mine." His high, fluting voice continued to trill, but it was plain that she no longer heard his words. His birdlike hands touched hers. She screamed.

"Doctor Volospion!"

Doctor Volospion was fully himself. "It is hardly gentlemanly, as I have pointed out, to force your attentions upon a lady, Mr Bloom. I would remind you of your word."

"I keep it. I use no violence."

Doctor Volospion now appeared to be relishing the drama. The fingers of his left hand hovered over the fingers of his right, on which were most of his power rings.

The Fireclown's hands remained on Miss Ming's. "He's really strong!" she cried. "I can't get free, Doctor Volospion. Oo…" It seemed that an almost euphoric weakness suffused her body now. She was panting, incapable of thought; her lips were dry, her tongue was dry, and the only word she could form was a whispered "No".

Doctor Volospion seemed ignorant of the degree of tension in the menagerie. Many of the prophets, both human and alien, had stopped their monologues and now pressed forward to watch the struggle.

Doctor Volospion said firmly: "Mr Bloom, since you remain here as my guest, I would ask you to recall…"

The blue eyes became shrewd even as they stared into Mavis Ming's. "Your guest? No longer. We leave. Do you come, Mavis mine?"

"I — I —" It was as if she wished to say yes to him, yet she continued to pull back as best she could.

"Mr Bloom, you have had your opportunity to leave this planet. You refused to take it. Well, now you have no choice. You shall stay for ever (which is not, we think, that long)."

Mr Bloom raised a knowing head. "What?"

"You have told us, yourself, that you are unique, sir." Doctor Volospion was triumphant. "You prize yourself so highly, I must accept your valuation."

"Eh?"

"From henceforth, Sir Prophet, you will grace my menagerie. Here you will stay — my finest acquisition."

"What? My power!" Did Mr Bloom show genuine surprise? His gestures became melodramatic to a degree.

Doctor Volospion was too full of victory to detect play-acting, if play-acting there was. "Here you may preach to your heart's content. You will find the competition stimulating, I am certain."

Bloom received this intelligence calmly. "My power is greater than yours," he said.

"I led you to think that it was, so that you would feel confident when I suggested a tour of my collection. Twelve force-screens of unimaginable strength now lie between you and your ship, cutting you off from the source of your energy. Do you think you could have shattered my first force-field if I had not allowed it?"

"It seemed singularly easy," agreed the Fireclown. "But you seem still unclear as to the nature of my own power. It does not derive from a physical source, as yours does, though you are right in assuming it comes from my ship. It is spiritual inspiration which allows me to work my miracles. The source of that inspiration lies in the ship."

"This so-called Grail of yours?"

Bloom fell silent.

"Well, call on it, then," said Doctor Volospion.

Every scrap of bombast had disappeared from Bloom. It was as if he discarded a useless weapon, or rather a piece of armour which had proved defective. "There is no entity more free in all the teeming multiverse than the Fireclown." His unblinking eyes stared into Miss Ming's again. "You cannot imprison me, sir."

"Imprison?" Doctor Volospion derided the idea with a gesture. "You shall have everything you desire. Your favourite environment shall be re-created for you. If necessary, it is possible to supply the impression of distance, movement. Regard the state as well earned retirement, Mr Bloom."

The avian head turned on the long neck, the paint around the mouth formed an expression of some gravity (albeit exaggerated). Mr Bloom did not relax his grip upon Miss Ming's hands.

"Your satire palls, Doctor Volospion. It is the sort that easily grows stale, for it lacks love; it is inspired by self-hatred. You are typical of those faithless priests of the fifth millennium who were once your comrades in vice."

Doctor Volospion showed shock. "How could you possibly know my origins? The secret…"

"There are no secrets from the Sun," said the Fireclown. "The Sun knows All. Old He may be, but His memory is clearer than those of your poor, senescent cities."

"Do not seek to confound me, sir, with airy generalities of that sort. How do you know?"

"I have eyes," said Bloom, "which have seen all things. One gesture reveals a society to me — two words reveal an individual. A conversation betrays every origin."

"This Grail of yours? It helps you?"

The Fireclown ignored him. "The eagle floats on currents of light, high above the world, and the light is recollection, the light is history. I know you, Doctor Volospion, and I know you for a villain, just as I know Mavis Ming as a goddess — chained and gagged, perverted and alone, but still a goddess."

Doctor Volospion's laugh was cruel. "All you do, Mr Bloom, is to reveal yourself as a buffoon! Not even your insane Faith can make an angel of Miss Ming!"

Mavis Ming was not resentful. "I've got my good points," she said, "but I'm no Gloria Gutzmann. And I try too hard, I guess, and people don't like that. I can be neurotic, probably. After all that affair with Snuffles didn't do anyone any good in the end, though I was trying to do Dafnish Armatuce a favour."

She babbled on, scarcely conscious of her words, while the adversaries, pausing in their conflict, watched her.

"But then, maybe I was acting selfishly, after all. Well, it's all water under the bridge, isn't it? What's done is done. Who can blame anybody, at the end of the day?"

Mr Bloom's voice became a caressing murmur. He stroked her hands. "Fear not, Miss Ming. I am the Flame of Life. I carry a torch that will resurrect the spirit, and I carry a source to drive out devils. I need no armour, save my faith, my knowledge, my understanding. I am the Sun's soldier, keeper of His mysteries. Give yourself to me and become fully yourself, alive and free."

Mavis Ming began to cry. The Fireclown's vivid mask smiled in a grotesque of sympathy.

"Come with me now," said Bloom.

"I would remind you that you are powerless to leave," said Doctor Volospion.

The Fireclown dropped her hands and turned so that his back was to her. His little frame twitched and trembled, his red-gold mass of hair might have been the bristling crest of some exotic fowl, his little hands clenched and unclenched at his sides, like claws, as his beautiful, musical voice filled that dreadful menagerie.

"Ah, Volospion, I should destroy you — but one cannot destroy the dead!"

Doctor Volospion was apparently unmoved. "Possibly, Mr Bloom, but the dead can imprison the living, can they not? If that is so, I possess the advantage which men like myself have always possessed over men such as you."

The Fireclown wheeled to grasp Miss Ming. She cried out:

"Stop him, Doctor Volospion, for Christ's sake!"

And at last Doctor Volospion's long hand touched a power ring and the Fireclown was surrounded by bars of blue, pulsing energy.

"Ha!" The clown capered this way and that, trying to free himself and then, as if reconciled, sat down on the floor, crossing his little legs, his blue eyes blinking up at them as if in sudden bewilderment.

Doctor Volospion smiled.

"Eagle, is it? Phoenix? I must admit that I see only a caged sparrow."

Emmanuel Bloom paid him no heed. He addressed Mavis Ming.

"Free me," he said. "It will mean your own freedom."

Mavis Ming giggled.