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the archive(s):
issue no. 1:
My Deal with the Devil / Isaac Betesh
It was the time of year that all the trees are just starting to glow. Darkness had set for the last time of the year that evening, with the promise of nearly all-day sunlight for the next week. It was only a matter of an hour or so before the sun would rise for the annual "One-hundred-hour Day."
I was walking down the bromine paved streets of central city, whistling as I went and playing one of those mental games you play when there's not much else to do. At that time, a young miner came up to me and asked if I had some spare dough. "Dough" wasn't really anything specific in our colloquial speech‹it basically meant anything I had on me that I had no use for and probably never would.
The usual reaction would be to hand the boy a shoelace or a leather strap you happened to have on you, or even a dime sometimes, if you were feeling real generous. I reached into my pocket and pulled out something I hadn't previously known was there. It was a pocketknife and there was no way I was giving it away, even if I had no idea how it got there. Besides, if I could possibly use it, it wasn't exactly called "dough," and dough, after all, was all he had asked for. So I returned it to my pocket for later use and told him I was sorry, but I was in almost as bad a predicament as he at the time and could afford to give him nothing.
The usual reaction would be to keep walking and maybe spit a few paces later, well outside of my reach. But instead, he actually spoke to me again.
"That knife you got there could be worth somethin' to me, man. It won't ever be worth a thing to you."
And that was the wrong response from a miner boy. I slapped him over the head, which I had the right to do, as one of the educated free laborers, someone who really belonged in the town, someone who was here because the politicians knew he was smart enough to vote and deserved to live in the city and not in one of the mining camps. So I told him, politely, which surprised me, that from here on in I was determined to use that knife, that I would protect it more and consider it of more value than anything else I owned.
Given the circumstances, I wasn't too surprised with what happened to me on the way home. It wasn't exactly a glorious display of magnificence and splendor pouring down on the road in front of me, which is kind of what I was hoping for. Instead, the Devil just walked over to me, told me who he was, and offered me a deal. He didn't really prove he was the Devil and he didn't look like him either. And, like I said, he didn't make a big deal about coming down to earth. He looked more like a suburban man who had just gotten off the El-rail, come to town to do his weekly shopping. He was wearing a black robe with a hood, and I imagined, at first, traces of a brand name along the sleeve, but I guess that was just a wild fancy. I had never seen the Devil before, let alone spoken to him. His voice was vaguely familiar though, so I really had no reason to doubt him.
"Listen, man," he said, "I've got a good deal for you. And if you turn it down now, you'll never get the chance again."
He didn't have to ask me twice. I nearly signed the contract without even asking him what it said. But I resisted that temptation, and told him I wouldn't sign it without at least his word that it was a good deal for me with no hidden expenses, financial or otherwise.
"Look, man," he said when he finally yielded, "here's the deal: you transfer all your property to my ownership. Then, you walk out of town, down the road towards the mines. Walk about a mile. There, you'll find a beautiful young maiden waiting for you. She'll lead you through a hidden entrance into a vast underground station and put you on a train bound southward. When you get there (should be near dawn around then)‹"
At this I interrupted him. "But dawn is in hardly another hour. And after that, the sun won't set for another few days, it being the beginning of summer now. You don't mean I'll be there that soon. I'd hardly be that far down the road by then. But you don't mean it'll be the next dawn, do you? You wouldn't have me be on that train for a week, would you? And miss the start of summer?"
"Fool," he said, "down south, the sun sets earlier in the summer. It sets later in the winter. It's that simple." The thought sounded heavily complicated to me, and utterly ridiculous as well, but I didn't want to risk losing the deal he had offered, so I kept listening. "Anyway, man, by the time you get there, word of your arrival will have preceded you. They'll be waiting for you at the platform, to escort you in a chariot covered with velvet, to your new home in the underground city where I come from. There, you'll never have to work again. You can eat anything you want, whenever you want. Won't have to worry about a thing. It'll be like the Garden of Eden. Angels to bake your bread. Angels to tailor you new clothes daily. Angels to do everything. And all the beautiful women you could imagine (and, between me and you, man, that's by far the best part of the deal)."
"Sounds like a great deal for me," I chuckled. "Where do I sign?"
He indicated the proper place. But before I signed, I just had to haggle a drop. "When I give you everything I own, can I keep just two things?" I asked him diplomatically.
"Sure," he said, "if I approve of them. What are they?"
"The pocketknife in my pocket, and the clothes I'm wearing. Just until I get to the underground city. Once I'm there, you can have even those."
"Man," he said, "I'm offering you a great deal already. How can you bring up little things like that?" But when I persisted, he saw how important it was to me, so he continued, "Okay, man, I'll tell you what: you can keep the knife, and you can keep your shoes and briefs until you get to the station. Then, you give them the shoes before you get on the train. You can keep the briefs forever if you want. They're not exactly too important to me anyway."
So I pricked my finger with my pocketknife, signed my name with my own blood, and began walking down the road towards the highway, gloating over my good fortune.
I got almost a mile down the road, figuring my beautiful maiden was just around the next corner, when I turned back. I had finally realized my mistake. If I took this deal, I would never see the sun again, and that was just too much to part with, no matter how many angels you put in my fields or how many maidens in my chamber. So there I was, with nothing but a pocketknife. And as I slept on the road that night, the thought occurred to me, during that moment in between being fully awake and falling asleep, when the mind is open to all sorts of ridiculous suggestions, that the Devil was about the same height and weight as the insolent boy on the road, and after all, I had never gotten a good view of the Devil's face. But then, how would a young miner boy, who a moment ago was so desperate for even a shoelace, be able to offer me such a great deal? Though that question eased my nerves, I had answered it by the time I had woken up the next morning. In fact, the question was itself an answer to why he had been so insistent that I give them my shoes before getting on the train. And since I had turned around before getting to the station, he had never gotten the shoelace he had asked for after all. Between that and the pocketknife, he had lost to me on two accounts. And I, the educated townsman, had once again proved my intellectual superiority over the working class.
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