Henderson the Rain King - Saul Bellow [142]
of all the thought that has been done. And he was dragging me along with the power of his personal greatness, because he was so brilliant and had a strong gift of life, manifested in the smoky, bluish trembling of his extra shadow. Because he was bound to have his way. And therefore I lumbered after him without a weapon for protection unless you counted the helmet, unless I could pull down these green pants and bag the animal in them--they might almost have been roomy enough for that. Then he stopped and turned to me, and said, "You were equally on fire when it came to lifting up the Mummah." "That's correct, Your Highness," I said. "But did I know what I was doing? No, I didn't." "But I do." "Well, okay, King," I said. "It's not for me to question it. I'll do whatever you say. But you told me that the Bunam and the other fellow in the white pigment were from the old universe and I assumed you were out of it." "No, no. Do you know how to replace the whole thing? It cannot be done. Even if, on supreme moments, there is no old and is no new, but only an essence which can smile at our arrangement--smile even at being human. That is so full of itself," he said. "Nevertheless a play of life has to be allowed. Arrangements must be made." Here his mind was somewhat beyond me, so I didn't interfere with him, and he said, "To Gmilo, the lion Suffo was his father. To me, grandfather. Gmilo, my father. As, if I am going to be the king of the Wariri, it has to be. Otherwise, how am I the king?" "Okay, I get you," I said. "King," I told him, and I spoke so earnestly it might almost have sounded like a series of threats, "you see these hands? This is your second pair of hands. You see this trunk?" I put my hand on my chest. "It is your reservoir, like. Your Highness, in case anything is going to happen, I want you to understand how I feel." My heart was very much aroused. I began to suffer in the face. In recognition of the fellow's nobleness, I fought to spare him the grossness of my emotions. This was in the shade of the hopo wall, under the embroidery of stiff thorns. The narrow track along the hopo was black and golden, as when grass burns in broad daylight and the heat is visible. "Thank you, Mr. Henderson. I have understood how you feel." After a quiet hesitation, he said, "Should I guess? Death is on your mind?" "It's on my mind, all right." "Oh yes, very much. You are exceptionally given to it." "Over the years, I've gotten involved with it a lot." "Exceptionally. Exceptionally," he said as if he were discussing one of my problems with me. "Sometimes I think it is helpful to think of burial in a relation to the earth's crust. What is the radius? Four thousand five hundred miles more or less, to the core of the earth. No, graves are not deep but insignificant, a mere few feet from the surface and not far from fearing and desiring. More or less the same fear, more or less the same desire for thousands of generations. Child, father, father, child doing the same. Fear the same. Desire the same. Upon the crust, beneath the crust, again and again and again. Well, Henderson, what are the generations for, please explain to me? Only to repeat fear and desire without a change? This cannot be what the thing is for, over and over and over. Any good man will try to break the cycle. There is no issue from that cycle for a man who do not take things into his hands." "Oh, King, wait a minute. Once out of the light, it's enough. Does it have to be four thousand five hundred miles to be the grave? How can you talk like that?" But I understood him all the same. All you hear from guys is desire, desire, desire, knocking its way out of the breast, and fear, striking and striking. Enough already! Time for a word of truth. Time for something notable to be heard. Otherwise, accelerating like a stone, you fall from life to death. Exactly like a stone, straight into deafness, and till the last repeating _I__ _want I want I want__, then striking the earth and entering it forever! As a matter of fact, I thought, out in the African sun from which the hooked