“Well?” Will demanded, and despite himself, Seven was caught between exasperation and appreciation: There Will stood, arrogant and sassy, and looking like a young god himself; filled right now with fresh determination. But determination to do what? Because in the next moment, Will said, “I’m probably going to commit suicide the first chance I get, so you really shouldn’t refuse me any favors or you’ll be sorry later. And I want to visit the Virgin Mary. If that’s within your province, of course.”

Seven sighed. Will’s last remark made a certain kind of unfortunate sense. “I can’t guarantee what will happen,” Seven said nervously. “I wish you’d change your mind.”

“Not on your life. Not on your life. Not on your life.” Will started chanting the words over and over, and Seven wished wholeheartedly that Cyprus hadn’t given him quite so much energy.

“Have it your way,” Seven said. Will could have sworn that no transition had occurred, but now he and Seven were travelers.

Chapter Nineteen

The Virgin Mary’s Tale and an Ego for Buddha

Seven and Will were dressed like humble pilgrims. The street (if such it was) appeared to belong to ancient Jerusalem. Donkeys brayed. Tradesmen went about their business. Mary’s small house was set in a bit from the numerous stalls at which vendors sold their wares. The house was actually the strangest combination of a manger, barn, and small sitting room. Outside, two palm trees stood at either side of the entrance. Incongruously enough, there was a small green lawn, and in the center of it were various small statuettes making up a tabloid of the nativity, with Mary, Joseph, and the baby Jesus. Alongside was a plaster image of Christ as a boy of about twelve, and to the right, a huge cross on which a statue of the adult Christ hung, with blood that looked real enough running from his wounds down into a small pond, which drained into the ground. By each palm tree knelt a statue of an angel carrying a sword.

Will just stared. “This isn’t real, you know,” he said to Oversoul Seven. “And this street just started from no place. If you walked to either end, it would probably just disappear.” He shrugged to show that he wasn’t impressed, yet there was something terribly impressive about the mixture of junky artifacts and real, braying donkeys; and the cheap-looking plaster-of-Paris angels had the craziest intensity, as if their grotesqueness gave them a life of their own.

Seven just said, “Now, let me handle this, please. And be polite for a change, if you can.” He knocked at the door.

Will said, “I can’t believe it; knocking at the door of the Virgin Mary. Even for a dream or a drug trip, it’s just too much.”