He made a grimace.

“You must! You heard Luther say that knights are becoming scholars. You have reached the age– —”

“No! No!”

“What? You prefer to remain ignorant and illiterate?”

He shrugged his shoulders.

“You think life is sufficient.”

He nodded.

LXVIII: KOTIKOKURA SUCKS A LEMON—WE CROSS THE CHANNEL—KOTIKOKURA LEARNS TO WRITE

KOTIKOKURA, yellower than the lemon he was sucking, bent over the boat’s railing, not precisely for the purpose of watching the tumult of the waves.

“Come, Kotikokura, it is better for us to walk briskly up and down the deck, inhaling the strong air than to shake like melancholy willow trees at the edges of lakes.”

He looked at me, and endeavored, but in vain, to grin. His upper lip shivered a little and the edges of his front teeth glittered like white lights immediately extinguished.

I took his arm and we made long strides—ten forward, ten backward. “Count, Kotikokura—one-two-three-four, and you will forget the crazy tossing of the boat.”

He mumbled, “One—two—three.”

“One—two—three—four—five,” he grumbled.

“The gods invented seasickness to protect the English. Don’t stop counting or your nausea will seize you again.”

“Six—seven—eight—nine—ten.”

“It is more difficult to conquer that corner of the earth than all Europe combined.”

“One—two—three—four—five—”

“One—two—three—”

Kotikokura pulled his arm away and bent over the railing. Then he leaned against me, placing his head wearily upon my shoulder. I caressed it. “Only a while longer, Kotikokura. We who have seen centuries pass can laugh at the discomfort of hours!”

He grinned weakly.

“Hold my arm, Kotikokura, or we may lose each other in this artificial night.”

We made small careful steps, our hands in front of us, as if descending into a dark cellar.

“Are those mountains or houses that we are approaching? Is that a horse ripping his form through the gray veil, or two elephants riding on top of each other? Are those torches or stars moving in space? This is a fairyland, Kotikokura, and the people must be strange dreamers. Indeed, they say that there are great poets and philosophers here.”

The fog thinned and ripped in various places. It crawled out of the branches of the trees; it rose from the hats of people like smoke out of chimneys; it swept the ground like a phantom broom. Some obstinate shreds, laboring under the illusion of weight, clung to a fence or a wall, diminishing, thinning.

Suddenly, the sun—like the standard of a conquering army—rose triumphantly over the peak of the citadel of the world.

The Thames, crowded with barges and small sailboats, flowed tranquilly under the bridge. A few patches of the fog, the size of kerchiefs, still floated on its surface.

We entered a coffee house. The people were drinking jugs of dark beer, discussing the future of the lands discovered by Christopher Columbus. Several boats had recently left England. Wherever Her Majesty’s flag was planted, that was English ground. Some foretold trouble with Spain; others predicted inconceivable wealth from the New World.

“Kotikokura, let us clink cups to our success. Without my gold, Columbus would have been unable to equip his ships.”

Kotikokura clinked.

“If these lands are really another continent and not merely India, man can drown the errors, the stupidities, the cruelties of his ancestors in the sea, and begin anew, Kotikokura! In life’s comedy man must improvise, rhyme at random, strutting about from one part of the stage to the other. The discovery of Columbus enables him to rehearse his part—to improve his acting. For once the gods are merciful! And yet, Kotikokura, I suspect their kindness…”

Kotikokura drank his beer and wiped his mouth.

“To start afresh! That is man’s cry through the ages. Destroy the tree of life, plant a new seed! Poor Bluebeard,—that was the meaning of his gory hocus-pocus. What a horrible seed he planted! Can man tear the roots that bind him to Adam? New lands, Kotikokura—but where are the new people? A New World—but the same race of men!”

We walked out arm in arm.

“Kotikokura, tomorrow we leave London for Oxford, to learn the wisdom of the ages. Your infancy is over. You must learn to read and write.”

Kotikokura grumbled.

“But my friend, even the Queen of this land knows how to read and write.”

“Queen—woman.”

“If necessary, Kotikokura, I shall have to use the birch on you.”

He looked at me, uncertain whether to take me seriously or not.

“Don’t grasp your pen as if it were an implement of murder, Kotikokura. Take it gently—thus. It is only the delicate feather that once flourished upon a goose.”

Kotikokura held the pen between the tips of his forefinger and thumb.

“Nor so daintily, Kotikokura. The most delicate of ladies requires a little pressure. Does not Aristotle exhort us to seek always the middle course?”

He threw the pen on the floor and started to run away. I held his arm tightly. “Kotikokura, for shame! You are worse than a five-year old urchin. What is the meaning of this irritability?”

He grumbled.

“Pick up your pen and start your page again. You shall have no beer today.”

He shrugged his shoulders.

“Pick up your pen!” I ordered.

He glared at me, but obeyed.

I raised my arms in despair. “Oh that the High Priest of Ca-ta-pha should disobey his god! Oh, that in my old age—”

He kissed my hand.

LXIX: I MEET “THE WANDERING JEW”—I AM MALIGNED—A CROSS-EXAMINATION—BOOTS

“BY Jove, he is confounding the Bishop!” exclaimed a young man, his black gown flowing about him like an enraged sea.

“He is an impostor, Arthur, I tell you. He– —”

“Impostor?” A third youth interposed.

“An impostor, I say!” the second insisted.

Several more students gathered about them, vociferating in Latin and in English.

“He is the Wandering Jew as truly as I am Arthur Blackmore.”

I pressed Kotikokura’s arm. “Are they speaking of me, Kotikokura?” I whispered.

He rubbed his nose.

Arthur Blackmore touched my elbow. “Milord, do you not believe with me that he is the Wandering Jew?”

“I regret to say that I have not seen him.”

“What! Is it possible? For the last three days, the university, the whole town indeed, has been in turmoil.”

“Where is the man who claims to be the Wandering Jew?” I asked.

“He will be here shortly. At present, he is in secret conclave with the Bishop. He will be examined publicly today. Will you not come, Milord, and convince yourself?”

“I shall be delighted to witness the trial,” I said.

“Here he is now!”

A man of about fifty, long-bearded, long-haired and sharp-eyed as an eagle, walked between the Bishop and two professors toward the Main Hall.

The Hall, constructed like a chapel, was crowded with students and professors. Upon the platform, sat the Bishop and the two professors, one a young man, fair-haired and blue-eyed, who spoke with a slight Irish brogue, the other a huge middle-aged man whose huge bones bore evidence of his Saxon extraction. His head was almost completely bald. The Bishop had the appearance of a man of much culture and kindliness. His face was rubicund, his hair, such as the shears had left, gray.

The Bishop rose, blessed the congregation, and ordered the Wandering Jew to enter.

Humble, stooping, the latter appeared and faced the three judges. The small hump on his back was unconvincing to me. His shoes were larger than needed. His grizzly beard covered his face too thickly to allow the study of lips and chin. His nose, very thin and hooked, cast a triangular shadow upon his right cheek.