The Languages of Pao

by Jack Vance

  “Someday I will return to Pao. Perhaps soon, who knows? You will come back with me.”

  She made no comment. Beran was exasperated. “Don’t you believe me?”

  In a muffled voice she said, “If you were truly Paonese, you would know what I believe.”

  Beran fell silent. At last he said, “Regardless of what I may be, I see you do not believe me to be Paonese!”

  She burst out furiously, “What difference does it make? Why should you take pride in such a claim? The Paonese are spineless mud-worms — they allow the tyrant Bustamonte to molest them, despoil them, kill them, and never do they raise a hand in protest! They take refuge like sheep in a wind, rumps to the threat. Some flee to a new continent, others …” she darted him a cool glance “… take refuge on a distant planet. I am not proud to be Paonese!”

  Beran somberly rose to his feet looking blindly away from the girl. Seeing himself in his mind’s-eye he grimaced: what a paltry figure he cut! There was nothing to say in his own defense; to plead ignorance and helplessness would be an ignoble bleating. Beran heaved a deep sigh, began to dress himself.

  He felt a touch on his arm. Gitan Netsko, kneeling on the bed, smiled uncertainly at him. “Forgive me — I know you meant no harm.”

  Beran shook his head, feeling a thousand years old. “I meant no harm, that is true … But so is everything else you said … There are so many truths — how can anyone make up his mind?”

  “I know nothing of these many truths,” said the girl. “I know only how I feel, and I know that if I were able I would kill Bustamonte the Tyrant!”

  As early as Breakness custom allowed, Beran presented himself at the house of Palafox. One of the sons-in-residence admitted him, inquired his business, which question Beran evaded. There was a delay of several minutes, while Beran waited nervously in a bleak little ante-room near the top of the house.

  Beran’s instinct warned him to circumspection, to a preliminary testing of the ground — but he knew, with a sinking feeling at the pit of his stomach, that he lacked the necessary finesse.

  At last he was summoned and conducted far down the escalator, into a wood-paneled morning room, where Palafox, in a somber blue robe, sat eating bits of hot pickled fruit. He regarded Beran without change of expression, nodded almost imperceptibly. Beran made the customary gesture of respect and spoke in the most serious voice he could muster: “Lord Palafox, I have come to an important decision.”

  Palafox looked at him blankly. “Why should you not? You have reached the age of responsibility, and none of your decisions should be frivolous.”

  Beran said doggedly, “I want to return to Pao.”

  Palafox made no immediate response, but it was clear that Beran’s request struck no sympathetic fire. Then he said in his driest voice, “I am astonished at your lack of wisdom.”

  Again the subtle diversion, the channeling of opposing energy into complicated paths. But the device was wasted on Beran. He plowed ahead. “I have been thinking about Bustamonte’s program, and I am worried. It may bring benefits — but I feel there is something abnormal and unnatural at work.”

  Palafox’s mouth compressed. “Assuming the correctness of your sensations — what could you do to counter this tendency?”

  Beran spoke eagerly, “I am the true Panarch, am I not? Is not Bustamonte merely Ayudor-Senior? If I appear before him, he must obey me.”

  “In theory. How will you assert your identity? Suppose he claims you to be a madman, an impostor?”

  Beran stood silently; it was a point which he had not considered.

  Palafox continued relentlessly. “You would be subaqueated, your life would be quenched. What would you have achieved?”

  Beran tightened his lips. “Perhaps I would not announce myself to Bustamonte. If I came down on one of the islands — Ferai or Viamne …”

  “Very well. Suppose you convinced a certain number of persons of your identity, Bustamonte would still resist. You might precipitate disturbances — even civil war. If you consider Bustamonte’s actions ruthless, consider your own intentions in this light.”

  Beran smiled, at last sure of his ground. “You do not understand the Paonese. There would be no war. Bustamonte would merely find himself without authority.”

  Palafox did not relish the correction of Beran’s views. “And if Bustamonte learns of your coming, and meets the ship with a squad of neutraloids, what then?”

  “How would he know?”

  Palafox ate a bit of spiced apple. He spoke deliberately. “I would tell him.”

  Beran was astounded — but perhaps only at the top of his mind. “Then you oppose me?”

  Palafox smiled his faint smile. “Not unless you act against my interests — which at this time coincide with those of Bustamonte.”

  “What are your interests, then?” cried Beran. “What do you hope to achieve?”

  “On Breakness,” said Palafox softly, “those are questions which one never asks.”

  Beran was silent a moment. Then he turned away, exclaiming bitterly, “Why did you bring me here? Why did you sponsor me at the Institute?”

  Palafox, the basic conflict now defined, relaxed and sat at his ease. “Where is the mystery? The able strategist provides himself as many tools and procedures as possible. Your function was to serve as a lever against Bustamonte, if the need should arise.”

  “And now I am of no further use to you?”

  Palafox shrugged. “I am no seer — I cannot read the future. But my plans for Pao …”

  “Your plans for Pao!” Beran interjected.

  “… develop smoothly. My best estimate is that you are no longer an asset, for now you threaten to impede the smooth flow of events. It is best, therefore, that our basic relationship is clear. I am by no means your enemy, but neither do our interests coincide. You have no cause for complaint. Without my help you would be dead. I have provided you sustenance, shelter, an unexcelled education. I will continue to sponsor your career unless you take action against me. There is no more to say.”

  Beran rose to his feet, bowed in formal respect. He turned to depart, hesitated, looked back. Meeting the black eyes, wide and burning, he felt shock. This was not the notably rational Dominie Palafox, intelligent, highly-modified, second in prestige only to Lord Dominie Vampellte; this man was strange and wild, and radiated a mental force over and beyond the logic of normality.

  Beran returned to his cubicle, where he found Gitan Netsko sitting on the stone window-ledge, chin on knees, arms clasped around her ankles.

  She looked up as he came in, and in spite of his depression, Beran felt a pleasurable, if wistful, thrill of ownership. She was charming, he thought: a typical Paonese of the Vinelands, slender and clear-skinned with fine bones and precisely-modeled features. Her expression was unreadable; he had no hint as to how she regarded him, but this was how it went on Pao, where the intimate relationships of youth were traditionally shrouded in indirection and ambiguity. A lift of an eyebrow could indicate raging passion; a hesitancy, a lowered pitch of the voice absolute aversion … Abruptly Beran said, “Palafox will not permit my return to Pao.”

  “No? And so then?”

  He walked to the window, looked somberly across the mist-streaming chasm. “So then — I will depart without his permission … As soon as opportunity offers.”

  She surveyed him skeptically. “And if you return — what is the use of that?”

  Beran shook his head dubiously. “I don’t know exactly. I would hope to restore order, bring about a return to the old ways.”

  She laughed sadly, without scorn. “It is a fine ambition. I hope I shall see it.”

  “I hope you shall, too.”

  “But I am puzzled. How will you effect all this?”

  “I don’t know. In the simplest case I will merely issue the orders.” Observing her expression, Beran exclaimed, “You must understand, I am the true Panarch. My uncle Bustamonte is an assassin — he killed my father, Aiello.”
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  Her eyes widened and she leapt to her feet and stared at him for an instant in stunned disbelief. Then — and the gesture seemed as natural to her as breathing — she sank to her knees, placing both of her hands, palms upward, upon his sandaled feet, whispering words of almost worshipful import.

  Slowly he bent, and raised her up, shaking his head over and over, “No, no, no.” Then: “You mustn’t. I am only a man — like other men. A man in love.”

  Chapter XI

  Beran’s resolve to return to Pao was difficult to implement. He had neither funds to buy, nor authority to commandeer, transportation. He tried to beg passage for himself and the girl; he was rebuffed and ridiculed. At last frustrated, he sulked in his rooms, ignoring his studies, exchanging hardly a word with Gitan Netsko, who spent most of her time staring blankly along the windy chasm. Beran one time inquired what she found of interest in barren stone and windy haze, to which she replied that she saw none of it, nothing except the thoughts which passed before her eyes.

  Three months passed. And one morning Gitan Netsko remarked that she thought herself pregnant.

  Beran stared at her incredulously. Barely adolescent himself, he had never envisioned fathering a child. He took Gitan Netsko to the clinic, registered her for the pre-natal regimen. His appearance aroused surprise and amusement among the staff of the clinic.

  “You bred the child without assistance? Come now, tell us: who is the actual father?”

  “She is indentured to me,” Beran stated, indignant and angry. “I am the father!”

  “Forgive our skepticism, but you appear hardly the age of virility.”

  “The facts seem to contradict you,” Beran retorted.

  “We shall see, we shall see.” They motioned to Gitan Netsko. “Into the laboratory with you.”

  At the last moment the girl became afraid. “Please, I’d rather not.”

  “It’s all part of our usual routine,” the reception clerk assured her. “Come, this way, if you please.”

  “No, no,” she muttered, and shrank back. “I don’t want to go!”

  Beran was puzzled. He turned to the reception clerk. “Is it necessary that she go now?”

  “Certainly!” said the clerk in exasperation. “We make standard tests against possible genetic discord or abnormality. These factors, if discovered now, prevent difficulty later.”

  “Can’t you wait until she is more composed?”

  “We’ll give her a sedative.” They laid hands on the girl’s shoulder. As they took her away, she turned an anguished glance back to Beran that told him many things that she had never spoken.

  Beran waited — an hour, two hours. He went to the door, knocked. A young medic came forth and Beran thought to detect discomfort in his expression.

  “Why the delay? Surely by now …”

  The medic held up his hand. “I fear that there have been complications. It appears that you have not sired after all.”

  A chill began to spread through Beran’s viscera. “What sort of complications?”

  The medic moved away, back through the door. “You had best return to your dormitory. There is no need to wait longer.”

  Tears swelling at his eyes, Beran ran forward, groping to hold back the door. “Tell me, tell me!”

  But the door closed in his face, and there was no further response to his signals …

  Gitan Netsko was taken to the laboratory, where she submitted to a number of routine tests. Presently she was laid, back down, on a pallet and rolled underneath a heavy machine. An electric field damped her cephalic currents, anaesthetized her while the machine dipped an infinitesimally thin needle into her abdomen, searched into the embryo and withdrew a half-dozen cells.

  The field died; Gitan Netsko returned to consciousness. She was now conveyed to a waiting room, while the genetic structure of the embryonic cells was evaluated, categorized and classified by a calculator.

  The signal returned: “A male child, normal in every phase. Class AA expectancy.” The index to her own genetic type was shown, and, likewise, that of the father.

  The operator observed the paternal index without particular interest, then looked again. He called an associate, they chuckled, and one of them spoke into a communicator.

  The voice of Lord Palafox returned. “A Paonese girl? Show me her face … I remember — I bred her before I turned her over to my ward. It is definitely my child?”

  “Indeed, Lord Palafox. There are few indices we are more familiar with.”

  “Very well — I will convey her to my dormitory.”

  Palafox appeared ten minutes later. He bowed with formal respect to Gitan Netsko, who surveyed him with fear. She had experienced nothing but pain at his hands; none of her imaginings had prepared her for the callousness of his breeding.

  Palafox spoke politely. “It appears that you are carrying my child, of Class AA expectancy, which is excellent. I will take you to my personal lying-in ward, where you will get the best of care.”

  She looked at him blankly. “It is your child that I carry?”

  “So the analyzers show. If you bear well, you will earn a bonus. I assure you, you will never find me niggardly.”

  She jumped to her feet, eyes blazing. “This is horror — I won’t bear such a monster!”

  She ran wildly down the room, out the door, with the medic and Palafox coming behind.

  She sped past the door which led to the room where Beran waited, but saw only the great spine of the escalator which communicated with levels above and below.

  At the landing she paused, looked behind with a wild grimace. The spare shape of Palafox was only a few yards behind. “Halt!” he cried in passion. “You carry my child!”

  She made no answer, but turning, looked down the staircase. She closed her eyes, sighed, let herself fall forward. Down and down she rolled, bumping and thudding, while Palafox stared after her in amazement. At last she came to rest, far below, a limp huddle, oozing blood.

  The medics took her up on a litter, but the child was gone and Palafox departed in disgust.

  There were other injuries, and since Gitan Netsko had decided on death, the Breakness medicine could not force life upon her … and she died an hour or two after her fall.

  When Beran returned the next day he was told that the child had been that of Lord Palafox; that, upon learning of this fact, the girl had returned to the dormitory of Palafox in order to collect the birth-bonus. The actual circumstances were rigidly suppressed; in the society of Breakness Institute, nothing could so reduce a man’s prestige, or make him more ridiculous in the eyes of his peers, than an episode of this sort: that a woman had killed herself rather than bear his child.

  For a week Beran sat in his cubicle, or wandered the windy streets as long as his flesh could withstand the chill. And indeed it was by no conscious will that his feet took him trudging back to the dormitory.

  Why had she gone to Palafox? Had she been promised swifter return to Pao? … Pao! Waves of homesickness swept over Beran. Pao, blue with water, green with leaves, warm from the sunlight! Pao! His only escape from misery was to return to Pao! Never had life seemed so dismal a panorama.

  He reacted from his stupor and dullness with an almost vicious emotion. He flung himself into his work at the Institute, wadding knowledge into his mind to serve as poultice against his grief.

  Two years passed. Beran grew taller; the bones of his face showed hard through his skin. Gitan Netsko receded in his memory, to become a bittersweet dream.

  One or two odd things occurred during these years — affairs for which he could find no explanation. Once he met Palafox in a corridor of the Institute; Palafox turned him a glance so chill that Beran stared in wonder. It was himself who bore the grievance, not Palafox. Why then Palafox’s animosity?

  On another occasion he looked up from a desk in the library to find a group of high-placed dominies standing at the side, looking at him. They were amused and intent, as if they shared a private joke. Indee
d this was the case — and poor Gitan Netsko had provided its gist. The facts of her passing had been too good to keep, and now Beran was pointed out among the knowledgeable as the stripling who had, to paraphrase, ‘out-bred’ Lord Palafox to such an extent that a girl had killed herself rather than return to Palafox.

  The joke at last became stale and half-forgotten; only emotional scar-tissue remained.

  After the passing of Gitan Netsko, Beran once more began to frequent the space-port — as much in hopes of garnering news of Pao as watching the incoming women. On his fourth visit he was startled to see debarking from the lighter a large group of young men — forty or fifty — almost certainly Paonese. When he drew close enough to hear their speech, his assumption was verified; they were Paonese indeed!

  He approached one of the group as they stood waiting for registration, a tall sober-faced youth no older than himself. He forced himself to speak casually. “How goes it on Pao?”

  The newcomer appraised him carefully, as if calculating how much veracity he could risk. In the end he made a non-committal reply. “As well as might be, times and conditions as they are.”

  Beran had expected little more. “What do you do here on Breakness, so many of you in a group?”

  “We are apprentice linguists, here for advanced study.”

  “‘Linguists’? On Pao? What innovation is this?”

  The newcomer studied Beran. “You speak Paonese with a native accent. Strange you know so little of current affairs.”

  “I have lived on Breakness for eight years. You are the second Paonese I have seen in this time.”

  “I see … Well, there have been changes. Today on Pao one must know five languages merely to ask for a glass of wine.”

  The line advanced toward the desk. Beran kept pace, as one time before he had kept pace with Gitan Netsko. As he watched the names being noted into a register, into his mind came a notion which excited him to such an extent that he could hardly speak … “How long will you study on Breakness?” he asked huskily.