The Journeyer

“So?” said Uncle Mafio, as he reclothed himself. “Perhaps I had been dining on the colored pilaf that day. I do not remember.”

The hakim shook his head, slowly but positively. “I have seen too many other signs, as I said. Your fingernails are opaque. Your hair is brittle and breaks easily. There is only one other confirming sign I have not seen, but you must have it somewhere on your body. A gummatous small sore that refuses to heal.”

Uncle Mafio looked at him as if the hakim had been a sorcerer, and said in awe, “A fly bite, away back in Kashan. A mere fly bite, no more.”

“Show me.”

My uncle rolled up his left sleeve. Near his elbow was an angry and shiny red spot. The hakim leaned to peer at it, saying, “Tell me if I am wrong. Where the fly first bit, the bite healed and a small scar formed, in the natural ma

“You are not wrong,” my uncle said weakly. “What does it mean?”

“It confirms my conclusion diagnostic—that you are suffering from the kala-azar. The black sickness, the evil sickness. It does indeed proceed from the bite of a fly. But that fly is, of course, the incarnation of an evil ji

“Oh, not so much that I ca

“But unhappily it will not for long be not so much. The manifestations will multiply, and worsen. Your brittle hair will break and you will go bald all over. The fever will bring emaciation and asthenia and lassitude, until you have no will to move at all. The pain below your breast bone proceeds from the organ called your spleen. That will hurt even more, and begin to bulge frighteningly outward, as it hardens and loses all function. Meanwhile, the lividity will spread over your skin, and it will darken to black, and it will pouch out into gummata and blebs and furuncles and squamations until your entire body—including your face—resembles one great bunch of black raisins. By then, you will be ardently wishing to die. And die you will, when your splenic functions fail. Without immediate and continuing treatment, you are sure to die.”

“But there is a treatment?”

“Yes. This is it.” Hakim Mimdad produced a small cloth sack. “This medicament consists principally of a fine-powdered metal, a trituration of the metal called stibium. It is a sure vanquisher of the ji

“Well? Only one cure is needed, surely. I will gladly settle for the one.”

“I regret to tell you that the stibium, while it arrests the kala-azar, is itself physically harmful in another particular.” He paused. “Are you sure you would not prefer to continue this consultation in private?”

Uncle Mafio hesitated, glancing about at us, but squared his shoulders and growled, “Whatever it is, tell it.”

“Stibium is a heavy metal. When it is ingested, it settles downward from the stomach into the splanchnic area, working its beneficial effects as it goes, subduing the ji

“So my cod dangles heavier. I am strong enough to carry it.”

“I assume that you are a man who enjoys, er, exercising it. Now that you are afflicted with the black sickness, there is no time to waste. If you do not yet have a lady friend in this locality, I recommend that you hie yourself to the local brothel maintained by the Jew Shimon.”

Uncle Mafio barked a laugh, which perhaps I or my father could better interpret than the Hakim Mimdad. “I fail to see the co

“To indulge your virile capability while you can. Were I you, Mirza Mafio, I should hasten to make all the zina I could. You are doomed either to be horribly disfigured by the kala-azar, and eventually to die of it—or, if you are to be cured and kept alive, you must begin immediately taking the stibium.”

“What do you mean, if? Of course I want to be cured.”

“Think on it. Some would rather die of the black sickness.”

“In the name of God, why? Speak plainly, man!”

“Because the stibium, settling in your scrotum, will instantly start exercising its other and deleterious effect—of petrifying your testicles. Very soon, and for the rest of your life, you will be totally impotent.”

“Gèsu.”

No one else said anything. There was a terrible silence in the room, and it seemed that no one wished to brave the breaking of it. Finally Uncle Mafio spoke again himself, saying ruefully:

“I called you Dotòr Balanzòn, little realizing how truly I spoke. That you would indeed present me with a mordant jest. Giving me such a comical choice: that I die miserably or I live unma

“That is the choice. And the decision ca

“I will be a eunuch?”

“In effect, yes.”

“No capability?”

“None.”

“But … perhaps … dar mafa’ul be-vasilè al-badàm?”

“Nakher. The badàm, the so-called third testicle, also gets petrified.”

“No way at all, then. Capòn mal caponà. But … desire?”

“Nakher. Not even that.”

“Ah, well!” Uncle Mafio surprised us all by sounding as jovial as ever. “Why did you not say that at the first? What matter if I ca

“The patient puts a brave face on it,” murmured the hakim.

“He may honestly mean it,” my father said speculatively. “The most dauntless mariner, after having many ships sink under him, may be thankful when he is finally beached on a placid strand.”

“I hope not!” blurted Nostril. He added hastily, “Only my own opinion, good masters. But no mariner should be grateful for being dismasted. Especially not one of Master Mafìo’s age—which is approximately the same as my own. Excuse me, Hakim Mimdad, but is this grisly kala-azar possibly … infectious?”

“Oh, no. Not unless you also should be bitten by the ji

“Still and all,” Nostril said uneasily, “one feels compelled to … to make sure. If you masters have no commands for me, I too will ask to be excused.”

And off he went, and shortly so did I. Probably the fearful and superstitious slave had not believed the physician’s assurance. I did, but even so … .

When one attends a dying, as I have said before, one of course comes away grieving for the loss of the dead one, but even more—even if only secretly, even if only unconsciously—rejoicing at being oneself still alive. Having just now attended what might be called a partial dying, or a dying by parts, I rejoiced in still possessing those parts, and, like Nostril, I was anxious to verify that I did still possess them. I went straight to Shimon’s establishment.