Yet does a story as complicated as this deserve a simple ending?
Who is able to answer that? Who is right and who is wrong? Who was good and who evil? Where did darkness end and light begin? Black and white: a fantasy of wish fulfillment, a Christmas story for children, a chimera of moralists. I believe that like every good story, this one, too, must end in gray. Who knows? If you studied the peculiar color of gray for a long, long time, ultimately, perhaps, it might seem beautiful, or at least real.
I dragged myself home in a trance and blacked out in the middle of Tokyo—I mean our new bedroom. The following morning, Gustav caught sight of my numerous injuries and coat, which was matted with blood, had a screaming fit in sheer fright, and chauffeured me at once in his Citroën CX-2000 to the horse doctor. The doctor tortured me even more, reviving ugly associations of Preterius's cruel experiments. The healing process, too, was a dark, painful path that made me draw comparisons more than once to Claudandus's sad fate.
Since then, however, I have recovered splendidly and now enjoy the best of health.
I didn't need to tell Bluebeard and the dopes in the district who the killer really was. It just didn't seem that important to me. I'd like them all to keep good memories of Pascal: hate and revenge were his aims, not mine. Gradually I was able to dispel the suspicions surrounding Father Joker's name, and I also succeeded in rectifying the nasty impression of him that the district residents had been given during our evening meeting. They now believe that he wandered away to another district to spread his doctrine. And so nobody thinks he was the murderer, either, although the inhabitants of the porcelain house will get a malodorous surprise in the spring when it gets warm again.
Who the murderer was will always remain a riddle to the others. But nobody will concern themselves with this question, because there will be no more murders. And someday nobody will think of what happened, will not remember the horror of it. Even murderers die, and with them the mysterious stories that keep us, if only for a short time, in suspense.
Some additional remarks to wind things up.
First, the most alarming news: next month Archibald wants to move into the upstairs apartment; as he so elegantly put it, he went "totally wild for the joint" while renovating. In addition to the fact that I can now look forward to further ear-rending renovation, Gustav and I will have to listen day after day to the stupidest in-and-out-of-fashion drivel of that Zeitgeist terrorist. I know that rascal. He may even get a dog and baptize him "Warhol" or "Pavarotti" or even "Kevin Costner"! So gloomy times are on their way. But if you look at the threat from a humanistic point of view, you might find something positive about it; Gustav will get more human, if superficial, company, and also a real chance to break out of his prison of loneliness.
Someone else has already put an icy spell of loneliness behind him. Employing our best arts of persuasion, Bluebeard and I were able to lure Jesaja out of the catacombs. We also found lodgings for him with an old, eccentric, good-natured bartender in the neighborhood. When he saw blue sky again for the first time after all his years underground he wept for joy and excitement. He has since overcome his initial shyness, mainly toward human beings, but also toward other brothers and sisters. The only things that worry me are that the bar customers will spoil him now and then with alcoholic drinks and that he will be all too willing to let himself get spoiled. The fact alone that a brother drinks would be worth a scientific study, I think. I hope it all works out.
Pascal's wonder race has become noticeably wilder; that is, more and more of the old-news are mating with us "standards" so that the coming generations will once again be the domesticated type. After Pascal's death, it seems they lost all their inhibitions and became eager to enter new terrain. I often see my bewitching girlfriend, Nhozemphtekh, roaming the backyards, and we greet each other politely, even give each other knowing smiles. I'm just waiting for the day when she goes into heat again. Then the sweet intoxication of that magical morning will return, and together we will soar through galaxies of lust—if Kong doesn't beat me to it.
As for wishes like this one, Bluebeard and I have great plans for the future. After all our gruesome experiences, we intend to have an easy and pleasant time of it this coming spring and summer, letting ourselves be borne aloft by the wings of eros.
The sun has already pierced the steel-gray, icy clouds, showing no mercy in melting them away, and shedding the first faint rays of the new year on the computer Gustav bought not long ago. In the last few days, I have been entering into it my memories of the Claudandus case. As might be expected, Gustav lost all interest in the computer after only two days, because even after plowing through six instruction manuals he couldn't figure it out. But there is the lingering hope that when Archie moves into the house he'll give Gustav a hand.
I said that every tale has a sad ending. Well, that's only partly true, because our lives are also a story told by God. We're writing them with God. We and God are, so to speak, coauthors. Our free will and His grace work together, though they are often in continual conflict. So
