Next was sorting out the book’s multiple narratives. In Partial Disgrace begins in the voice of Rufus, then shifts, at times disorientingly, between the accounts of Iulus, Felix, and the Professor. Rufus is clearly meant to return at some point but never does; Iulus, meanwhile, has a habit of talking about events in the future that never happen. Given Charlie’s fervent desire that the book be accessible, a certain amount of streamlining seemed warranted, as long as it preserved the essential thrust of each chapter and section. Like all of Charlie’s work, In Partial Disgrace shows a carefully balanced interplay of ideas, and as much as possible I wanted to preserve that balance, while giving it its fullest expression.
A note about sourcing: late in the editing of this book it was discovered that a small number of passages were borrowed from primary sources without attribution, which is not surprising given that the project was to write the history of an imaginary place based on real places and events. Whether Charlie intended to eventually provide credit is impossible to say — that is, unless some answer turns up in his papers, which hasn’t happened yet. However, the papers are vast and dense, and there may be more to come from them, including further adventures in Cannonia.
The publication of this book was helped by many people, including: Jeremy M. Davies, John O’Brien, Marie Lay, Paul Winner, Lawrence Levy, Norma Hurlburt, Sharon Griffin, and James, Nicolas, and June Howe.
BEN RYDER HOWE
Staten Island, 2012
IN PARTIAL DISGRACE
The Secret Memoirs of the Triple Agent Known as Iulus: A Report to History
Translated, with alterations, additions, and occasional corrections by Frank Rufus Hewitt Adjutant General, U.S. Army (Ret.)
IN THIS BOOK YOU WILL FIND ONLY REAL PEOPLE AND REAL PLACES, BUT NO REAL NAMES
LIST OF PRINCIPAL PERSONALITIES
FRANK RUFUS HEWITT, Adjutant General; U.S. Army, (Ret.) Historian, Counter Intelligence; former operative, and sometime educationist.
CORIOLAN IULUS PZALMANAZAR, Ambassador Without Portfolio for Cannonia, and inadvertently, the last casualty of the last war of the twentieth century, and the first great writer of the twenty-first.
FELIX AUFIDIUS PZALMANAZAR, Hauptzuchtwart Supreme, thinking man’s dandy, historian of the Astingi.
AINÖHA AEGLE APAMEA, Fairest of the Naiad line, Goddess of Fogs, Muse of the Living, Mistress of the Dead.
PRIAM ASCLEPIUS APAMEA, founder of Semper Vero.
ÖSCAR ÖLIVIER ÖZGUR, citizen soldier, loyal retainer, and exemplary gardener.
COUNT MORITZ ACHILLES ZICH, Foreign Minister of Cannonia, patron of the arts, the greatest one-armed pianist of all time, and the most intense admirer of the female sex in Europe.
OPHAR OSME CATSPAW, artist-in-residence at Semper Vero.
SETH SYLVIUS GUBIK, swineherd, prodigy, and future Commisar for Cults and Education.
PSYLANDER SYCHAEUS PÜR, the village doctor.
THE PROFESSOR (ORDINARIUS), Docent fur Nervenkrankheiten, A.D. Universitat Therapeia.
DRUSOC’S MISTRESS, one of the Professor’s love interests.
ZANÄIA, a princess of Cannonia.
CANNONIA, our ineffable tragi-comic protagonist, superior to tragedy.
Venit iam carminus aetas:
Magnus ab intego saeclorum nascitur ordo
Now is come the last age;
the great line of centuries
begins anew
Virgil, Eclogues
IN DARKEST CANNONIA (Rufus)
I fell into that hermit kingdom carelessly, the chute shuddering above me as the shroudlines cut my hands. Below, the rivers rested in their courses, like wine from a broken urn; above, the stars ran backward in the upper air. Cinching up my harness, I drifted trembling toward the signal bonfire and my contact — a man apart, devoted to his mission, whose realm would become my destiny, as ours would be his fate. But buffeted by cruel crosswinds, blows from the powers of the air, I was dragged toward shores of black milk, skipping like a stone through the dark and empty land. Palms turned to the stars, I cursed my gods, mentally settled my affairs, and muttered an incoherent prayer: Give me your hand.
Grinding teeth and bloodied mouth a howl, I made out two horrific shapes hurtling toward me, two spotless dogs drawing near with unimaginable speed. One attacked the chute, deflating the billowing silk beneath his body; the other was in the air above me, all red mustachios, golden eyes, and ivory fangs. Was I to be saved from death by drowning only to be torn apart by devil dogs? We rolled and wallowed, my lapels in the brute’s jaws, until we finally came to rest, his forepaws crossed upon my chest, rearquarters raised up, cropped tail awhirr. And then, wise in his negligence, he ringed my ears with openmouthed kisses.
Their master was soon beside us, a giant of a man in a shepherd’s cloak, a conical fur hat concealing his face, and wielding a staff at least ten feet tall. I prepared myself for the blow. Then the cloak parted like a theater curtain, revealing only a wiry boy’s boy very near my own age, standing upon stilts within the felt greatcloak and unremarkable save for his salient gray eyes, the left one half-closed.
The dog stepped off me to join his mate, who trotted up, a bit of parachute silk in his flues, his red beard full of cockleburrs. They seated themselves on either side of Iulus, barrel-chested, taciturn, with heart-shaped buttocks and slightly webbed feet. A handsome brace of superior spirits, radiating the same unpretentious dignity as their young master, even down to the half-closed eye; sly and unsentimental, neither obsequious nor shy.
Their coat, as their breeding, was like nothing I had ever seen in the animal world. A wiry texture, neither harsh nor loose, dark red bristles folded flat across a softer golden undercoat, changing its cast with every modulation of the moonlight. Their squared-off heads sported trim mustachios and goatees, brownish-pink lips and noses, and their immense ocher eyes were garnished with wispy eyebrows. When they shook their heads, the flapping of their ears sounded like distant machinegunfire, and it was only later that I noticed the detailed conchlike enfoldment of their inner ears, their only vulnerability, designed for the worship of natural sounds. And then, each with a single golden peeper trained on me, the dogs allowed their tongues to carelessly loll from the corner of their mouths, as if to say: “You see! One can be great; and amusing!”
We put away the chute and the shepherd’s disguise in a hollow tree, buried my shortwave and silver dollars, and walked through the night without a word. It seemed our contact could not have been otherwise; we were of that age that requires no password.
I was in a zone of pure existence, which I would not experience again until the tremors of old age. Part of me was still pasted in the sky, part of me ambled along the unsafe earth, illuminated by faint and mocking stars. And part of me was observing all this from an unknown vantage, calm and imperturbable. Yes, give me your hand.