Enoch shook his head. It was a crazy way of thinking. But, he told himself, he should not be surprised. It was the kind of thinking he should have expected. He was too hidebound, he thought, too narrow.
“But even if you have to abandon Earth,” he said, “you could go out to Mars and build a station there.”
“You don’t understand,” Ulysses told him. “This station is no more than a toehold. The aim is to wreck the project. If they can force us to abandon one station, then we stand discredited. Then all our judgments come up for review.”
“BUT even if the project should be wrecked,” Enoch pointed out, “there is no surety that any group would gain. It would only throw the question of where the time and energy should be used into an open debate. You say that there are many special-interest factions banding together to carry on the fight against us. Suppose they do win. Then they must turn around and start fighting among themselves.”
“Of course,” Ulysses admitted, “but then each of them has a chance. The way it is they have no chance at all. There is one group on the far side of the galaxy that wants to move out into the thinly populated sections of one particular section of the rim. They still believe in an ancient legend which says that their race arose as the result of immigrants from another galaxy who landed on the rim and worked their way inward over many galactic years. They think that if they can get out to the rim they can turn that legend into history to their greater glory . . . Another group wants to go into a small spiral arm because of an obscure record that many eons ago their ancestors picked up some virtually undecipherable messages which they believed came from that direction. Through the years the story has grown, until today they are convinced a race of intellectual giants will be found in that spiral arm. And there is always pressure to probe deeper into the galactic core. You must realize that we have only started. The galaxy still is largely unexplored. The thousands of races who form Galactic Central still are pioneers.”
“You sound,” said Enoch, “as if you have little hope of maintaining this station.”
“Almost no hope at all,” Ulysses told him. “But so far as you yourself are concerned, there will be an option. You can stay here and live out an ordinary life on Earth or you can be assigned to another station. Galactic Central hopes that you would elect to continue on with us.”
Enoch sat numb and stricken. Bad news! It was worse than that. It was the crashing down of not only his own personal world, but of all the hopes of Earth. With the station gone, Earth once more would be left in the backwaters of the galaxy, with no hope of help, no chance of recognition, no realization of what lay waiting in the galaxy. Standing alone and naked, the human race would go on in its same old path, fumbling its uncertain way toward a blind, mad future.
XVII
THE Hazer was elderly. The golden haze that enveloped him had lost the sparkle of its youthfulness. It was a mellow glow, deep and rich—not the blinding haze of a younger being. He carried himself with a solid dignity and the flaring topknot that was neither hair nor feathers was a saintly white. His face was soft and tender, the softness and the tenderness which in a man might have been expressed in kindly wrinkles.
“I am sorry,” he told Enoch, “that our meeting must be such as this. Although, under any circumstances, I am glad to meet you. I have heard of you. It is not often that a being of an outside planet is the keeper of a station. Because of this, young being, I have been intrigued with you. I have wondered what sort of creature you might turn out to be.”
“You need have no apprehension of him,” Ulysses said, a little sharply. “I will vouch for him. We have been friends for years.”
“Yes, I forgot,” the Hazer said. “You are his discoverer.”
He peered around the room. “Another one,” he said. “I did not know there were two of them. I only knew of one.”
“It’s a friend of Enoch’s,” Ulysses said.
“There has been contact, then: Contact with the planet.”
“No, there has been no contact.”
“Perhaps an indiscretion.”
“Perhaps,” Ulysses said, “but under provocation that I doubt either you or I could have stood against.”
Lucy had risen to her feet and now she came across the room, moving quietly and slowly, as if she might be floating.
The Hazer spoke to her in the common tongue. “I am very glad to meet you.”
“She cannot speak,” Ulysses said. “She has no communication.”
“Compensation,” said the Hazer.
“You think so?” asked Ulysses.
“I am sure of it.”
He walked slowly forward and Lucy waited.
“It—she, the female form, you called it—she is not afraid.”
Ulysses chuckled. “Not even of me,” he said.
The Hazer reached out his hand to her and she stood quietly for a moment, then one hand came up and took the Hazer’s fingers, more like tentacles than fingers, in her grasp.
IT seemed to Enoch that the cloak of golden haze reached out to wrap the Earth girl in its glow. Enoch blinked and the illusion, if it had been illusion, was swept away; only the Hazer had the golden cloak.
And how was it, Enoch wondered, that there was no fear in her, either of Ulysses or the Hazer? Was it because she could see beyond the outward guise to sense their basic humanity? (God help me, I cannot think, even now, except in human terms!) And if that were true, was it because she, herself, was not entirely human?
Lucy dropped the Hazer’s hand and went back to the sofa.
The Hazer said: “Enoch Wallace.”
“Yes.”
“She is of your race?”
“Yes, of course.”
“She is most unlike you. Almost as if there were two races on your planet.”
“There is only one.”
“Are there many others like her?”
“I would not know,” said Enoch.
“Coffee,” said Ulysses to the Hazer. “Would you like some coffee?”
“Coffee?”
“A most delicious brew. Earth’s one great accomplishment.”
“I am not acquainted with it,” said the Hazer. “I don’t believe I will.”
He turned ponderously to Enoch.
“You know why I am here?” he asked. “It is a matter I regret, but I must . . .”
“If you’d rather,” Enoch said, “we can consider that the protest has been made. I would so stipulate.”
“Why not?” Ulysses said. “There is no need, it seems to me, to have the three of us go through a somewhat painful scene.”
The Hazer hesitated.
“If you feel you must,” said Enoch.
“No,” the Hazer said. “I am satisfied if an unspoken protest be generously accepted.”
“Accepted,” Enoch said, “on just one condition. That I satisfy myself that the charge is not unfounded. I must go out and see.”
“You do not believe me?”
“It is not a matter of belief. It is something that can be checked. I cannot accept either for myself or for my planet until I have done that much.”
“Enoch,” Ulysses said, “the Vegan has been gracious. Not only now, but before this happened. His race presses the charge most reluctantly. They suffered much to protect the Earth and you.”
“And the feeling is that I would be ungracious if I did not accept the protest and the charge on the Vegan statement.”
“I am sorry, Enoch,” said Ulysses. “That is what I mean.”
ENOCH shook his head. “For years I’ve tried to understand and to conform to the ethics and ideas of all the people who have come through this station. I’ve pushed my own human instincts and training to one side. I’ve tried to understand other viewpoints and to evaluate other ways of thinking, many of which did violence to my own. I am glad of all of it, for it has given me a chance to go beyond the narrowness of Earth. I think I gained something from it all. But none of this touched Earth; only myself was invol
ved. This business touches Earth and I must approach it from an Earthman’s viewpoint. In this particular instance I am not simply the keeper of a galactic station.”
Neither of them said a word. Enoch stood waiting and still there was nothing said.
Finally he turned and headed for the door.
“I’ll be back,” he told them.
He spoke the phrase and the door started to slide open.
“If you’ll have me,” said Hazer, quietly, “I’d like to go with you.”
“Fine,” said Enoch. “Come ahead.”
It was dark outside and Enoch lit the lantern. The Hazer watched him closely.
“Fossil fuel,” Enoch told him. “It burns at the tip of a saturated wick.”
The Hazer said, in horror: “But surely you have better.”
“Much better now. I am just old-fashioned.”
He led the way outside, the lantern throwing a small pool of light. The Hazer followed.
“It is a wild planet,” said the Hazer.
“Wild here. There are parts of it are tame.”
“My own planet is controlled,” the Hazer said. “Every foot of it is planned.”
“I know. I have talked to many Vegans. They described the planet to me.”
They headed for the barn.
“You want to go back?” asked Enoch.
“No,” said the Hazer. “I find it exhilarating. Those are wild plants over there?”
“We call them trees,” said Enoch.
“The wind blows as it wishes?”
“That’s right,” said Enoch. “We do not as yet control the weather.”
The spade stood just inside the barn door and Enoch picked it up. He headed for the orchard.
“You know, of course,” the Hazer said, “the body will be gone.”
“I’m prepared to find it gone.”
“Then why?” the Hazer asked.
“Because I must be sure. You can’t understand that, can you?”
“You said back there in the station,” the Hazer said, “that you tried to understand the rest of us. Perhaps, for a change, at least one of us should try understanding you.”
ENOCH led the way down the path through the orchard. They came to the rude fence enclosing the burial plot. The sagging gate stood open. Enoch went through it and the Hazer followed.
“This is where you buried him?”
“This is my family plot. My mother and my father are here and I put him with them.”
He handed the lantern to the Vegan and, armed with the spade, walked up to the grave. He thrust the spade into the ground.
“Would you hold the lantern a little closer, please?”
The Hazer moved up a step or two.
Enoch dropped to his knees and brushed away the leaves that had fallen on the ground. Underneath them was the soft, fresh earth that had been newly turned. There was a depression and a small hole at the bottom of the depression. As he brushed at the earth, he could hear the clods of displaced dirt falling through the hole and striking on something that was not the soil.
The Hazer had moved the lantern again and he could not see. But he did not need to see. He knew there was no use of digging; he knew what he would find. He should have kept a watch. He should not have put up the stone to attract attention. But Galactic Central had said “as if he were your own,” and that was the way he’d done it.
He felt the damp of the earth soaking through his trousers.
“No one told me,” said the Hazer softly.
“Told you what?”
“The memorial. And what is written on it. I was not aware that you knew our language.”
“I learned it long ago. There were scrolls I wished to read. I’m afraid it’s not too good.”
“Two misspelled words,” the Hazer told him, “and one little awkwardness. But those are things which do not matter. What matters, very much, is that when you wrote you thought as one of us.”
Enoch rose and reached out for the lantern.
“Let’s go back,” he said sharply. “I know now who did this. I have to hunt him out.”
THE treetops far above moaned in the rising wind. Ahead, the great clump of canoe birch showed whitely in the dim glow of the lantern’s light. The birch clump, Enoch knew, grew on the lip of a small cliff that dropped twenty feet or more and here one turned to the right to get around it and continue down the hillside.
Enoch turned slightly and glanced at Lucy, following close behind. She smiled at him. He gestured to indicate that they must turn to the right, that she must follow closely. Although it wasn’t necessary; she knew the hillside better than he himself.
He turned along the edge of the cliff, came to the break and clambered down to reach the slope below. Off to the left he could hear the swiftly-running creek that tumbled down the ravine from the spring below the field.
The hillside plunged more steeply now and he led a way that angled across it.
Even in the darkness he could recognize the white oak that twisted at a crazy angle above the hill; the small grove of massive red oaks that grew out of a dome of tumbled rock, so placed that no axeman had even tried to cut them down; the tiny swamp, filled with cattails, that fitted itself snugly into a little terrace carved into the hillside.
Far below he caught the gleam of window light.
They came to a rude fence of poles and crawled through it. Now the ground became more level. Somewhere a dog barked in the dark and another joined him. More joined in, and the pack came sweeping up toward them. They arrived in a rush of feet, veered around Enoch and the lantern to launch themselves at Lucy—suddenly transformed, at the sight of her, into a welcoming committee rather than a company of guards. Enoch led the way across a vegetable garden carefully following a path between the rows. Then they were in the yard and the house stood before them, a tumbledown, sagging structure, its kitchen windows glowing with lamplight.
THE door opened. Ma Fisher stood framed against the light, a great, tall, bony woman clothed in something that was more sack than dress.
She stared at Enoch, half frightened, half belligerent. Then back of him she saw the girl. “Lucy!” she cried.
The girl came forward with a rush and her mother caught her in her arms.
Enoch set his lantern on the ground, tucked the rifle underneath his arm and stepped across the threshold.
The family had been at supper, seated about a great round table set in the center of the kitchen.
An ornate oil lamp stood in the center of the table. Hank had risen to his feet, but his three sons and the stranger still were seated.
“So you brung her back,” said Hank.
“I found her,” Enoch said.
“We quit hunting for her just a while ago,” Hank told him. “We was going out again.”
“You remember what you told me this afternoon?” asked Enoch.
“I told you a lot of things.”
“You told me that I had the devil in me. Raise your hand against that girl once more and I promise you I’ll show you just how much devil there is in me.”
“You can’t bluff me,” Hank blustered.
But the man was frightened. It showed in the limpness of his face, the tightness of his body.
“I mean it,” Enoch said. “Just try me out and see.”
The two men stood for a moment, facing one another, then Hank sat down.
“Would you join us in some victuals?” he inquired.
Enoch shook his head.
He looked at the stranger. “Are you the ginseng man?” he asked.
The man nodded. “That is what they call me.”
“I want to talk with you. Outside.”
Claude Lewis stood up.
“You don’t have to go,” said Hank. “He can’t make you go. He can talk to you right here.”
“I don’t mind,” said Lewis. “In fact, I want to talk with him. You’re Enoch Wallace, aren’t you?”
“That’s who he is,” said Hank. “S
hould of died of old age fifty years ago. But look at him. He’s got the devil in him. I tell you, him and the devil has a deal.”
“Hank,” Lewis said, “shut up.” Lewis came around the table and went out the door.
“Good night,” Enoch said to the rest of them.
“Mr. Wallace,” said Ma Fisher, “thanks for bringing back my girl. Hank won’t hit her again, I can promise you. I’ll see to that.” Enoch went outside and shut the door. He picked up the lantern. Lewis was out in the yard. Enoch went to him.
“Let’s walk off a ways,” he said.
THEY stopped at the edge of the garden and turned to face one another.
“You been watching me,” said Enoch.
Lewis nodded.
“Official? Or just snooping?”
“Official, I’m afraid. My name is Claude Lewis. There is no reason I shouldn’t tell you. I’m CIA.”
“I’m not a traitor or a spy,” Enoch said.
“No one thinks you are. We’re just watching you. You can imagine why, I expect.”
“You know about the cemetery?”
Lewis nodded.
“You took something from a grave.”
“Yes,” said Lewis. “The one with the funny headstone.”
“Where is it?”
“You mean the body. It’s in Washington.”
“You shouldn’t have taken it,” Enoch said, grimly. “You’ve caused a lot of trouble. You have to get it back as quickly as you can.”
“It will take a little time,” said Lewis. “They’ll have to fly it out. Twenty-four hours, maybe.”
“That’s the fastest you can ; make it?”
“I might do a little better.”
“Do the very best you can. It’s important that you get that body back.”
“I will, Wallace. I didn’t know it would be important.”
“And, Lewis.”
“Yes.”
“Don’t try to play it smart. Don’t add any frills. Just do what I tell you. I’m trying to be reasonable because that’s the only thing to be. But you try one smart move . . .”
He reached out a hand and grabbed Lewis’ shirt front, twisting the fabric tight. “You understand me, Lewis?”
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