Child of Fortune Read online

  “It’s vile!” I cried. “It’s disgusting!”

  “Try again and reconsider,” Mart said. “You will find it neither vile nor disgusting, but something both easier to consume and more boring.”

  “Perhaps you have sampled the art of some great chef maestro and marveled at its culinary perfection?” Jooni said. “Such art is a triumph of cuisinary esthetics, nē?”

  “Well you should also appreciate the art behind the creation of the fressen bar,” Dan said. “Somewhere on Edoku there is a chef maestro who has achieved, through the exercise of daunting skill, total culinary antiperfection. The fressen bar is not the result of cuisinary incompetence; au contraire, it is a triumph, a perfectly nutritious meal perfectly shorn of the slightest hint of cuisinary esthetics!”

  “Entirely in keeping with the Edojin’s general regard for Children of Fortune,” Jooni added, and then, as ravenous hunger overcame esthetic reluctance and I glumly gobbled down the rest of my fressen bar, the three of them delivered up a communal lecture which admirably served to apprise me of my current true status in Edoku’s scheme of things and induct me into the demimonde of the Public Service Stations.

  Indeed the latter were the perfect practical incarnation of the former, for the Publics were designed with demonic perfection to supply us with precisely the absolute essentials of animal existence and exactly nothing more. Toilets and bathing facilities. A medical dispensary and other minimal healing services. The strictly functional and esthetically dismal gray smocks for those of us without serviceable clothing on our backs. Entirely tasteless distilled water. And of course the unspeakable but perfectly nutritious fressen bars.

  As for sleeping accommodations, did not Edoku abound in every sort of public parkland to suit any conceivable taste for temperature, climate, hour of the day, season, and even gravity gradient?

  Edoku, according to the social philosophy of the Edojin, was morally obligated to safeguard our protoplasmic existence, but our esthetic and spiritual requirements were the responsibility not of the body politic but of ourselves.

  Moreover, we were assured at every opportunity, the people of Edoku would accuse us not of ingratitude on the basis of wounded civic pride should any of us choose to desert their planet for a venue of more lavish public munificence. Au contraire, as a bona fide of their good will in this regard, Children of Fortune leaving Edoku were gifted with a subsidized 25% discount on electrocoma passage in any and all Void Ships departing the planet.

  Thus did the Publics serve as the salons, restaurants, and bazaars of the Children of Fortune of Edoku, and thus did I become a citizen of the demimonde which existed in the interstices of Great Edoku, if not exactly out of sight of the educated eye, then at least discreetly tucked away in the nooks and crannies.

  When I had been a haut turista with a valid chip of credit and quarters in the hotel Yggdrasil, I had never noticed the small gray buildings screened by shrubbery or built in the obscured bottoms of ravines or hidden in rarely-frequented copses or secreted in alleyways between tall towers. Nor had I regarded the occasional figure dressed in a gray smock as anything but an Edojin with a peculiarly outré sense of style; in fact, among the colorful throngs of birds of paradise, such dull plumage faded into effective invisibility, unless, of course, you were a bird of the same species.

  Similarly, who was to notice that the parks and gardens and woodlands served as regular dormitories for a considerable population of indigents when these same venues were also frequented by the Edojin themselves, who were much given over to lounging on lawns, postprandial al fresco naps, and amatory exercises conducted in dells and bowers?

  Now, however, being barred by pecuniary circumstances from the restaurants, hotels, and entertainment emporiums, and being limited in the range of my wanderings to the ground I could cover afoot, I experienced a perceptual reversal of figure and ground. The extravagant buildings of the urban arrondissements, the pavilions and palaces of pleasure, the hotels and entertainment emporiums, all hardly impinged on the forefront of my conscious attention, for they had now become facets of a society, indeed a reality, from which I was exiled; these now assumed the perceptual role of a background blur, an extravagant kaleidoscopic ground against which I perceived with a vividness and detail sharpened by practical imperatives the quotidian realm of the Children of Fortune which all along had been cunningly hidden in plain sight.

  I might not know which fanciful building contained a restaurant or taverna nor the modes of cuisine and drink to be found within as I wandered aimlessly about a relatively circumscribed territory, but within a few days I knew the precise location of every Public therein. The entertainments to be had for a price within this vecino might be a matter of complete indifference, but soon enough I became a knowledgeable connoisseur of the gardens, woods, and parklands. I knew where one might find a luxuriant lawn under warm midnight skies with just enough gravity to keep a sleeping body from drifting, or where one might nap on a forest floor at twilight, or bake one’s bones on a noonday beach beside a lake, or secure a bower by a cooling stream in a land where dawn remained perpetually imminent.

  In short, I was a typical Child of Fortune of Edoku: fresh from home, out of funds, on the planet only a short time, subsisting on fressen bars, sleeping al fresco, and frequenting the Publics as much to pass the time as to utilize the practical facilities.

  For in truth, most of us had little to do with ourselves in this stage of our evolution as Children of Fortune but wander aimlessly about the landscape and public venues, sleep, engage in desultory amorous dalliance, or gather in the Public Service Stations to exchange tales, lore, and gossip.

  Most of which involved stratagems whereby we might somehow obtain sufficient ruegelt to either regain access to the restaurants, hotels, entertainment emporiums, and particularly to the Rapide, or to quit Edoku for a less financially demanding planet. That, and methods whereby we might gain entré to the elite circles of Public Service Station Society—those wiser, older, and more experienced Children of Fortune who had neither gone home in surrender nor chosen to work their way off the planet, but who had carved out their niches in the social ecology of Edoku itself by organizing themselves into small tribes for the communal purpose of securing ruegelt from the throngs of the city.

  While these lordly urchins consumed fressen bars only when they were down on their luck, the ruegelt in their pockets could not purchase freedom from the need to void their bowels and bladders, and so they too were required to pay regular visits to the Publics, though by and large they deigned not to mingle with the likes of us.

  But we saw them often enough, and for the most part they were quite distinguishable from greeners like ourselves. For one thing, they were never seen to take a fressen bar; even when the necessity did arise, so it was said, they would patiently seek out a Public that was empty for a moment and then scoop up as many as they could carry to consume secretly in their hidden burrows. Nor was this tale difficult to credit in light of the general hauteur with which they carried themselves in our lowly presence. Then too they were generally older and wore either cheapjack versions of extravagant Edojin modes or Public smocks painted with grandiose tribal ensigns, and carried out their necessary business among us with a swiftness and indifference to social niceties that led us to declare that they would have given up excretion entirely in order to preserve their dignity in our eyes if only they could.

  Among the true elite of Edoku, however, dignity was not exactly their stock in trade. There were four tribes working the parklands and streets of the vecino for ruegelt and it was easy enough to observe their techniques, though any attempt to ape them by someone not formally inducted into the guild, we were obliquely given to understand, would result in a sound thrashing.

  The largest of these local tribes was the Sparkies, some fifteen or twenty strong, who frequented the busy streets and particularly the parklands, peddling tidbits of finger food. While the Edojin could easily purchase more artful fare at any
of a hundred restaurants, the Sparkies catered to their immediate whims on the spot, and, moreover, many of the Edojin found it drôle to grant their custom to these urchins upon occasion. Similarly did the Tinkers depend upon the aura of quaintness clinging to the repute of the crafts of Children of Fortune in the eyes of the Edojin, for the quality and design of the rude jewelry, paintings, items of personal adornment, and assorted geegaws that they hawked was such that they could hardly have had much trade on the basis of intrinsic worth alone.

  As for the Buccaneers, who numbered no more than a dozen, their commerce depended upon certain peculiarities of the ambiguous Edojin legal philosophy which even to this day I find difficult to comprehend. While certain items of trade—mainly psychochemicals with unpleasant or even dangerous side effects—were legally proscribed to the extent that no transaction involving same could be recorded on a chip, Edoku was entirely indifferent to what changed hands outside the electronic bourse for ruegelt.

  Indeed, even the legal attitude towards the smallest of the local tribes, the Wayfaring Strangers, who were straightforward pickpockets and pilferers, was difficult for an auslander to fathom, Any miscreant caught in the act of a simple theft would be deprived of everything in his possession including the clothes on his back by an impromptu posse, but no further sanction would be taken. On the other hand, anyone apprehended for applying violence of any sort in the commission of a theft would be subject to a session of physiologically benign but nevertheless temporarily agonizing torture.

  While it was only too obvious that the only feasible means of escaping indigency was to gain entry to one of these tribes, the truth is that I had little desire to do so, for I did not relish the thought of spending my time cooking or peddling, I had absolutely no skill when it came to crafting trinkets, and I had too much pride, not to say moral scruples, to descend to thievery.

  To the endless scheming and theorizing on means and methods of gaining entré to a tribe and critical discussions of the comparative merits of the Tinkers, Buccaneers, Sparkies, and Wayfaring Strangers which were current in the society of the local Publics, I was therefore rather loftily indifferent.

  Until, that is, I learned of the Gypsy Jokers.

  I was lounging about the Public in the bottom of the miniature canyon which marked the border between noonday woods and desert night, nibbling absently on a fressen bar, when two of these legendary creatures made their appearance.

  Two boys entered the Public, and without a glance or word to anyone, made straight for the toilets. The one wearing yellow and green divided blouson from trousers with a strange sash I thought must have been quite ancient, for it was so thoroughly patched with scores, or even hundreds, of irregular scraps of wildly assorted cloths that none of the original material was visible. The one dressed in red and blue striping wore a beret of the same sort of patchwork.

  But as soon as the toilet doors were closed behind them, the whole place began to buzz with bemused if not astonished excitement.

  “Gypsy Jokers, nē?” exclaimed Jooni, who was sitting at table beside me but directed her remark across the table at Rand, a boy known for his devotion to the lore of the tribes, and in truth for a certain pedantry on the subject.

  Rand nodded solemnly. “You can tell by the Cloth of Many Colors; all the Gypsy Jokers are said to wear some item made of it. It is said that Pater Pan wears a great cloak of it, though some say a coat, and other versions have him dressed in a whole suit of patchwork, the so-called Traje de Luces.”

  “But isn’t their camp a long way from here—”

  “What are the Gypsy Jokers, bitte, who is this Pater Pan, and what is this excitement?” I demanded of Rand.

  He gave me a somewhat patronizing look, but of course was only too willing to enlighten my abysmal ignorance out of his vast store of knowledge. “The Gypsy Jokers are a tribe, naturellement, it is said one of the largest on Edoku, and surely the richest, for they ply many trades, all of them with great success.”

  At this, my interest was definitely piqued. “What sorts of trades?”

  “Crafts, cuisine, all the ordinaire, but also, most lucratively, ruespieling, street theater, circus, tantric performance, the various arts of entertainment. It is said that they have their own village somewhere, an Edoku for Children of Fortune, as it were. Or more precisely, for those fortunates they deign to admit to their tribe.”

  “Indeed?” I said with no little enthusiasm. For the first time, I considered using my wiles to gain admission to a tribe, for the vie of a Gypsy Joker seemed far more promising than that of a Tinker or a Sparkie. “And this Pater Pan?”

  “You have not heard the tales of Pater Pan?” Rand exclaimed in what seemed like sincere astonishment. “He is their domo, it is said. The wisest, oldest, and most outré Child of Fortune in all Edoku, it is said, if not in the worlds of men. A mage of all possible arts of accumulating ruegelt, it is said…”

  He paused and shrugged, as if for once he could not entirely credit the veracity of the lore he was about to convey. “Other things are said…that Pater Pan is a thousand years old…that Pater Pan was once an Arkie…that he was born on Earth before the Age of Space began…that he has been a Rom and a Hippie and a Ronin…that he is the eternal spirit of the Child of Fortune of which the present incarnation is merely an avatar…”

  At this extravagance, I curled my lips and snorted. For as everyone knew, the Arkies passed with the First Starfaring Age, no human has ever lived to be four hundred, and reincarnation is nothing more than a literary metaphor.

  On the other hand, the real Pater Pan, if such in fact existed, must be a fellow of no little puissance to inspire such a mythos, the Gypsy Jokers were real enough for two of them to be relieving themselves in these very premises, and I might be willing to credit Rand’s tale of the tribe’s riches.

  “And where might the encampment of the Gypsy Jokers be found?” I inquired, already beginning to consider practical steps to become one of their number.

  Rand shrugged. “Quién sabe? Certainly not nearby enough for me to have ever spoken with someone apprised of the location.”

  Jooni laughed. “You are thinking of becoming a Gypsy Joker, Moussa?” she said japingly.

  “I thought I might explore the true nature of the vie and allow this Pater Pan to recruit me if I deemed it suitable,” I japed back. But as soon as the words passed my lips, I realized that I might not be joking. Legend or not, this Pater Pan, if he existed, was a male animal, nē, almost certainly possessed of the usual phallic equipment, and just as certainly not uninterested in the pleasurable employment of same. And while I had little confidence in the puissance of either my wiles as an erstwhile femme fatale of Nouvelle Orlean or the as-yet-untested pouvoir of the ring of tantric amplification I wore on my finger when it came to persuading the sophisticated Edojin to part with ruegelt in exchange for my amatory services, surely I possessed at least a certain unsporting advantage when it came to winning the favor of some egoistic tribal guru by the gratis granting of same.

  Moreover, while this chain of logic might lack a certain mathematical inevitability in terms of proceeding remorselessly from initial premise to desired conclusion, the fact that at present I had no other quest to pursue or avenue of escape from indigency was suddenly all too apparent. In short, why not? I had nothing to lose in the venture save the present sequence of idle hours and of that I had certainly had a surfeit.

  “Come, come, Rand,” I demanded. “Surely, with your vast store of knowledge, you must have some clue as to the vicinity of the Gypsy Jokers’ territory?”

  But for once Rand fell silent.

  “Why not merely inquire of them?” Jooni said archly, nodding her head in the direction of the two Gypsy Jokers who had now emerged from the toilet stalls and were making their way past us to the egress.

  “Indeed, porqué no?” I shot back, rising to my feet, flush with a certain indignation, courageous with rediscovered pride. Vraiment, I knew full well that it was consider
ed gross lèse majesté for such as myself to approach even members of a lowly tribe such as the Wayfaring Strangers, but when all was said and done, was I not still Moussa Shasta Leonardo of Nouvelle Orlean, and were not even these lordly Gypsy Jokers no more than puffed-up street urchins?

  “A moment, bitte,” I said, stepping into their path and effectively blocking them. I was favored with a matched pair of sneers and a lofty cocking of eyebrows.

  “I wish to inquire as to the location of your tribe’s encampment…” I continued in a tone far more polite than their boorish manners justified.

  “Porqué?” the one in the beret at last deigned to utter.

  “For the purpose of traveling thither.”

  This was greeted with snorts of derision and an attempt to sidle by me. For a moment I was tempted to Touch one or the other in the solar plexus so as to remove some of the excess wind from their sails, but I had not yet used the ring, and besides, such a public embarrassment of these Gypsy Jokers would not be exactly politic. Any riposte must be confined to the verbal level.

  “I can see from your churlishness that you are entirely unaware of my identity,” I told them haughtily. This at least had the desired effect of stopping them in their tracks. “Fear not,” I went on, “this innocent ignorance will to some extent stand in mitigation when I relate this incident to Pater Pan.” I now had them exchanging glances of some uncertainty.

  “You be an intimate of Pater Pan?” said the one with the patchwork sash.

  “Precisely spoken!” I told him. “I am his favored inamorata, having wandered from his embrace in a fit of pique, but now willing to relent and grant him my favors once more.” Since this was exactly my intent, the only falsehood lay in a certain bending of the temporal sequence, and was this not Edoku, where the procession of days and hours occurred with just such a relativistic nonlinearity?