The Magician's Elephant

Chapter Twenty

But it did happen.

And some small evidence of these marvellous events remains.

High atop the city’s most magnificent cathedral, hidden among the glowering and resentful gargoyles, there is a carving of an elephant being led by a boy. The boy is carrying a girl, and one of his hands is resting on the elephant, while behind the elephant there is a magician and a policeman, a nun and a noblewoman, a manservant, a beggar and a dog, and finally, behind them all, at the end, a small bent man.

Each person has hold of another, each one is connected to the one before him, and all are looking forward, their heads held at such an angle that it seems as if they are looking into a bright light.

If you yourself ever journey to the city of Baltese, and if, once you are there, you question enough people, you will – I know; I do believe – find someone who can lead you, someone able to show you the way to that cathedral, to that truth that Bartok Whynn left carved there, high up in the stone.