The Isles of Number

The Isles of Number

By Tanaka




In a village near the field a practiced shaman counted out the dead man's gear and breathed the Spirit numbers. That same day's birth-feast, he counted out the rings and horns and drums and breathed the Living numbers. He mumbled once his bride and he, their wedding night, had counted everything and breathed the Silent numbers.

Among the Few, who come to market in the rain, but rarely, KW' is "one," their KW' in milder tone is "two," their higher KW' a gasp that says "too much." Perplexed mission-folk write home: "They're quite, God's truth, incapable of counting further." Incorrect. They can -- they wisely don't, except when waiting lonely for the dawn, confirming what they've always known about the world and why it's home.

This does not explain the recent rating assigned them by the Humanities Board.

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Offshore, on island 37, "one" is rendered [little-finger-left- hand] (a too-quick syllable in their tongue). "Two" is [finger- beyond-little-finger-left-hand]. The counting fills the hand, flows up the arm and up and down one's front and sides. If the quantity is such, it follows through again, so second cycle's [left-knee] is valued above first cycle's [right-testicle].

Women assent to this math-contexted [testicle], for many carry about them one or more in gold, earned in rites of passage.

I misunderstood the system and assumed to get an honest reckoning one did more than gesture vaguely; so when I stripped, I caused a stir in the marketplace where I'd gone to barter off coffee beans for the boss. Came gasps and giggles, and a man on the crowd's edge nudged his chum, "I told you."

An old man elbowed through the crowd with an old East India Company blanket and wrapped it around me.

"I see you've studied our traditions," he said. "It is good a stranger cares. But long years have passed since we first gave your travelers our testimony. Now memory alone reveals the members and their worth."

He weighed me with his eyes, then continued:

"You look surprised (perhaps it is the chill). Yet all who speak words and fashion tools are Tokama's babes and suck--" He hesitated; I might have been one of the Puritan missionaries. "-- and drink from her bottomless cup."

I nodded.

"We share your skills, Commerce our father, Calculation our mother, Number our cradle. Our pulse revives each time Tokama hints two and two are four, reminds us why we're in this very marketplace, this very isle, agrees with what we've always known about the world and why she chose it as our home."

More of the proof I'd sought. The meekest non-math observation, "Rain soon, maybe" or "Most apples are red" tastes like who- knows-Whom telling you how to live your life. Even "Thy will be done" sounds like an order.

My thought took but a thin slice of time. The old man continued, encouraged by my nod. "I see you understand. But for those of us slow-witted (you have them too, I suspect), who flee the study-lodge like geese -- "

He uncovered his doll, in faithful detail and articulated, a living (no, but seemed so for a moment) abacus. The doll was female, for it would dis-image a man to compute upon a male doll, which only a woman was permitted. It allowed a young unmarried woman rare moments with what passed as a man's body. In time, she'd learn what might seem to please the wooden doll, who neither winced or cried, might well injure the real man she eventually married; at the least, stir responses un-hinted by the dead wood.

How young men practiced on their female dolls was never discussed. Few needed the practice, for boys were assumed better oarsmen in the sea of mathematics. (Scores at the bishop's mission school are classified.)

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Further off, inconsistent, lay island 19. Here the counting stayed among the fingers, the body's bulk unrecognized, the toes for infinity.

At the welcome given us, our Dr. Ohm faced the isle's Informant, thanked him for his difficult theorem proofs, and made the usual patronizing challenge: "We ask now 6 times 8."

A sudden hush. Dr. Ohm recovered: "Rather, 8 by 6."

The Informant glanced about. Of his Twelve, eleven nodded. The Twelfth, a tall woman so swathed in batik silks -- gifts from where? from whom? -- I could see but her eyes and hands and a lonely forehead curl peeping out, sat elegantly and merely half-lowered her lids a lingering instant as her dark eyes flashed.

The Informant faced us again, and turned down three fingers on one hand (8 - 5 = 3), one finger on the other (6 - 5 = l). Dr. Ohm gasped; it had come out right despite its simplicity, perhaps because of it.

Bidding the Informant keep his hands in position, Dr. Ohm drew us close to whisper the explanation: Add the turned-down fingers (3 on one hand, l on the other, thus 4) and multiply the standing fingers (2 on one hand, 4 on the other, thus 8) and the result is 4 tens plus 8 ones, thus 48. In simpler terms,

ab = [(a-5) + (b-5)] l0 + (l0-a) (l0-b).

This does not explain the recent rating assigned them by the Humanities Board.

THE END

Copyright 1998 by A.Y. Tanaka

A.Y. Tanaka lives and writes in Kealakekua, Hi.

E-mail: tankay@hgea.org

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