"He had a vision," said Nafai. "On the Desert Road, this morning before dawn, returning from his journey. He saw a pillar of fire on a rock, and Basilica burning, and he thinks it means the destruction of the world, like Earth in the old legend. Mother believes him and he must already be talking to people about it or how else would your satirist know to include this bit in his satire?"
"This is the craziest thing I ever heard of," said Mebbekew.
"I'm not making it up," said Nafai. "I sat there this morning on Mother's portico and-"
"The portico scene! That's ... He wrote how the apothecary-that's supposed to be father^
"What do you think I've been telling you?"
"Bastard," whispered Meb. "That bastard. And he put me on stage as the Oversoul"
Meb turned and rushed toward the masker who played the apothecary. He stood in front of him for a few moments, looking at the mask and the costume. "It's so obvious, I must have the brains of a gnat-but a vision!"
"What are you talking about?" asked the masker.
"Give me that mask," said Mebbekew. "Give it to me!"
"Right, sure, here."
Meb tore it out of the other man's hands and ran up the hill toward the satirist. Nafai ran after him. Meb was waving the mask in front of the satirist's face. "How dare you, Drotik, you pus-hearted old fart!"
"Oh, don't pretend you didn't know, my boy."
"How would I know? I was asleep till rehearsal started. You put me on stage darting my father and it's just coincidence that you didn't happen to mention the fact, yes, I'm sure I believe that"
"Hey, it brings an audience."
"What were you going to do, tell people who I am, after all your promises about keeping me anonymous? What are these masks supposed to mean anyway?" Meb turned to the others, who were clearly baffled by the whole thing. "Listen, people, do you know what this old pimple was going to do? He was going to dart my father and then tell people that it was me playing the Oversoul. He was going to unmask me!"
The satirist was obviously worried by this turn of events. Though most of the maskers' faces were still hidden, they must be angry at the idea of a satirist exposing his maskers' identities. So the satirist had to get things back under control. "Don't waste a thought on this nonsense," he said to the others. "I just fired the boy because he had the audacity to rewrite my lines, and now he wants to wreck the entire show."
The maskers visibly relaxed.
Meb must have realized that he had lost the argument-the maskers wanted to believe the satirist because if they didn't, they'd lose a paying job. "My father isn't the liar," said Meb, "you are."
"Satire is wonderful, isn't it," said Drotik, "until the dart strikes at home."
Meb raised the white-maned apothecary mask over his head, as if he was going to strike the satirist with it. Drotik flung up an arm and shied away. But Meb never meant to hit him. Instead he brought the mask down over his knee, breaking it in half. Then he tossed both pieces into the satirist's lap.
The satirist lowered his arm and met Mebbekew's gaze again. "It'll take ten minutes for my maskmaker to put the beard onto another mask. Or were you trying to make a metaphorical threat?"
"I don't know," said Meb. "Were you trying to get me to metaphorically murder my father?"
The satirist shook his head in disbelief. "It's a dart, boy. Just words. A few laughs."
"A few extra tickets."
"It paid your wages."
"It made you rich." Meb turned his back and walked away. Nafai followed him. Behind them he could hear Drotik sending the script boy to the wall to ask for maskers who thought they could learn a part in three hours.
Mebbekew wouldn't let Nafai catch up with him. He walked faster and faster, until finally they were running full tilt along the streets, up and down the hills. But Mebbekew hadn't the endurance to outlast Nafai, and finally he fetched up against the corner of a house, bowed over, panting, gasping for breath.
Nafai didn't know what to say. He hadn't meant to chase Meb down, only to tell him what he thought-that he'd been terrific, the way he put the satirist in his place, the way he called him a liar to his face and blasted every argument Drotik raised in his own defense. When you broke the mask in half, I wanted to cheer-that's what Nafai meant to tell him.
But when he got close enough to speak, he realized that Meb wasn't just panting for breath. He was crying, not in grief, but in rage, and when Nafai got there Meb started beating a fist against the wall. "How could he do it!" Meb was saying, over and over. "The selfish stupid old son-of-a-bitch!"
"Don't .worry about it," said Nafai, meaning to comfort him. "Drotik isn't worth it."
"Not Drotik, you idiot," Meb answered. "Drotik's exactly what I always thought he was except that now I've lost my job and I'll never get another one, Drotik will spread the word on me that I walked out on a show three hours before lights."
"Then who are you mad at?"
"Father! Who do you think? A vision-I can't believe it, I thought Drotik would tell me that it wasn't Father he was darting, it was somebody else, and what ever gave me the idea it was Wetchik, what kind of cheese-brained fool would come up with the idea that the honorable Wetchik was off getting visions from the amazing unbelievable Oversoul.
"Mother believes him," said Nafai.
"Mother has renewed his contract every year since the year you were conceived, obviously she's got a lot of judgment where he's concerned! Do you believe him? Does anybody who hasn't slept with him?"
"I don't know. I don't even know who knows about it."
"Let me tell you something. Six hours from now the entire city of Basilica will know about it, that's who knows about it. I want to kill him, the flatulent old pincushion!"
"Calm down, you don't mean that-"
"Don't I? Do you think I wouldn't love to push this fist right through his face?" Meb turned around and screamed his next sentence at the passersby on the street. I'll show you some visions, you pebble-headed weed-hauler!"
People were stopped on the street, staring.
"Right," said Nafai, "Father's embarrassing you"
"I didn't ask you to follow me. You're the one who chased after me, so if you don't like being with me you can choke to death on your own snot, that's perfectly all right."
"Let's go home," said Nafai, mostly because he couldn't think of anything else to say.
FIVE - WHEELS
Home certainly wasn't where Nafai wanted to be, not tonight. He had been hoping Father would be somewhere else, so Meb would have a chance to calm down before they talked. But no, of course not, Father wanted to talk to Meb. He had already spent an hour talking with Elemak-Nafai wasn't too broken up about missing that scene-and now he seemed to have the fantasy that he might possibly persuade Meb to believe in his vision.
The yelling started as soon as Mebbekew located Father in the study. Nafai had seen what these arguments were like, and so he quickly retreated to his room. On his way through the courtyard, he caught a glimpse of Issib peering out of his doorway. Another refugee, thought Nafai.
For the first hour or so, all that could be heard was the low murmur of Father's voice, presumably trying to explain about his vision, interrupted every few minutes by Mebbekew's clear, piercing shout making comments that ranged from accusation to derision. Then it finally came out, amid all of Mebbekew's complaints about how Father was humiliating the family, that Meb had been doing a fair job of bringing the family into disrepute by working as a masker. Then it was Father's turn to shout and Mebbekew's to try to explain, which was good for another hour of quarreling before Meb left the house in a rage and Father went out to the stables to tend to the animals until he calmed down.