by Jack Vance
“They strike out at what’s closest.”
“I merely earn my salary. I did what I could for them. Completely useless, of course; there never were people so obdurate as the Teleks. Level the valley, build a stadium. Hurry, in time for their midsummer get-together. I said, why not build in Mismarch Valley, around the mountain, where only sheepherders would be disturbed, no crofts and farms to be broken up, no village to be razed.”
“What did they say to that?”
“It was Forence Nollinrude I spoke to; you know him?” “I’ve seen him; one of their liaison committee. A young man, rather more lofty than the average.”
Geskamp spat on the concrete under his feet. “The young ones are the worst. He asked, ‘Do we not give you enough money? Pay them well, clear them out. Swanscomb Valley is where we will have our arena.’ So”—Geskamp held out his hands in a quick gesticulation—“I bring out my machines, my men. We fly in material. For those who have lived here all their lives there is no choice; they take their money and go. Otherwise some morning perhaps they look out their door and find polar ice or mountains of the moon. I’d not put such refinement past the Teleks.”
“Strange tales are told,” Shorn agreed.
Geskamp pointed to the grove of oaks. His shadow, cast against the far side of the stadium by the level rays of the sun, followed the motion. “The oaks they brought, so much did they condescend. I explained that transplanting a forest was a job of great delicacy and expense. They were indifferent. ‘Spend as much as you like.’ I told them there wasn’t enough time, if they wanted the stadium inside the month; finally they were aroused. Nollinrude and the one called Henry Motch stirred themselves, and the next day we had all our forest. But would they dispose of the waste from the aqueduct, cast it in the sea? No. ‘You hire four thousand men, let them move the rubble, brick by brick if need be; we have business elsewhere.’ And they were gone.”
“A peculiar people.”
“ ‘Peculiar’?” Geskamp gathered his bushy eyebrows into arches of vast scorn. “Madmen. For a whim—a town erased, men and women sent forth homeless.” He waved his hand around the stadium. “Two hundred million crowns spent to gratify irresponsible popinjays whose only-”
A droll voice above them said, “I hear myself bespoken.” The two men jerked around. A man stood in the air ten feet above them. His face was mercurial and lighthearted; a green cap clung waggishly to the side of his head; dark hair hung below, almost to his shoulders. He wore a flaring red cape, tight green trousers, black velvet shoes. “You speak in anger, with little real consideration. We are your benefactors; where would you be without us?”
“Living normal lives,” growled Geskamp.
The Telek was disposed to facetiousness. “Who is to say that yours is a normal life? In any event, our whim is your employment; we formulate our idle dreams, you and your men enrich yourselves fulfilling them, and we’re both the better for it.” “Somehow the money always ends up back with the Teleks. A mystery.”
“No, no mystery whatever. It is the exercise of economic law. In any event, we procure the funds, and we would be fools to hoard. In our spending you find occupation.”
“We would not be idle otherwise.”
“Perhaps not. Perhaps . . . well, look.” He pointed across the stadium to the shadows on the far wall. “Perhaps there is your bent.” And as they watched their shadows became active. Shorn’s shadow bent forward, Geskamp’s shadow drew back, aimed and delivered a mighty kick, then turned, bent, and Shorn’s shadow kicked.
The Telek cast no shadow.
Geskamp snorted, Shorn smiled grimly. They looked back overhead, but the Telek had moved high and was drifting south.
“Offensive creature,” said Geskamp. “A law should be passed confiscating their every farthing.”
Shorn shook his head. “They’d have it all back by nightfall. That’s not the answer.’’ He hesitated, as if about to add something further.
Geskamp, already irked by the Telek, did not take the contradiction kindly. Shorn, an architectural draughtsman, was his subordinate. “I suppose you know the answer?”
“I know several answers. One of them is that they should all be killed.”
Geskamp’s irritation had never carried him quite so far. Shorn was a strange, unpredictable fellow. “Rather bloodthirsty,” he said heavily.
Shorn shrugged. “It might be best in the long run.”
Geskamp’s eyebrows lowered into a straight bar of gold-gray bristle across his face. “The idea is impractical. The creatures are hard to kill.”
Shorn laughed. “It’s more than impractical—it’s dangerous. If you recall the death of Vernisaw Knerwig.. . .”
Vernisaw Knerwig had been punctured by a pellet from a high-power rifle, fired from a window. The murderer, a wildeyed stripling, was apprehended. But the jail had not been tight enough to keep him. He disappeared. For months misfortune dogged the town. Poison appeared in the water supply. A dozen fires roared up one night. The roof of the town school collapsed. And one afternoon a great meteor struck down from space and obliterated the central square.
“Killing Teleks is dangerous work,” said Geskamp. “It’s not a realistic thought. After all,” he said hurriedly, “they’re men and women like ourselves; nothing illegal has ever been proved.”
Shorn’s eyes glittered. “Illegality? When they dam the whole stream of human development?”
Geskamp frowned. “I’d hardly say-”
“The signs are clear enough when a person pulls his head up out of the sand.”
The conversation had got out of hand; Geskamp had been left behind. Waste and excess he admitted, but there were so few Teleks, so many ordinary people. How could they be dangerous? It was strange talk for an architect. He looked sidewise in cautious calculation.
Shorn was faintly smiling. “Well, what do you make of it?”
“You take an extreme position. It’s hardly conceivable-”
“The future is unknown. Almost anything is conceivable. We might become Teleks, all of us. Unlikely? I think so myself. The Teleks might die out, disappear. Equally unlikely. They’ve always been with us, all of history, latent in our midst. What are the probabilities for the future? Something like the present situation, a few Teleks among the great mass of common people?”
Geskamp nodded. “That’s my opinion.”
“Picture the future, then. What do you see?”
“Nothing extraordinary. I imagine things will move along much as they have been.”
“You see no trend, no curve of shifting relationships?” “The Teleks are an irritation, certainly, but they interfere very little in our lives. In a sense they’re an asset. They spend their money like water; they contribute to the general prosperity.” He looked anxiously into the sky through the gathering dusk. “Their wealth, it’s honestly acquired; no matter where they find those great blocks of metal.”
“The metal comes from the Moon, from the asteroids, from the outer planets.”
Geskamp nodded. “Yes, that’s the speculation.”
“The metal represents restraint. The Teleks are giving value in return for what they could take.”
“Of course. Why shouldn’t they give value in return?” “No reason at all. They should. But now—consider the trend. At the outset they were ordinary citizens. They lived by ordinary conventions; they were decent people. After the first Congress they made their fortunes by performing dangerous and unpleasant tasks. Idealism, public service was the keynote. They identified themselves with all of humanity, and very praiseworthy, too. Now, sixty years later! Consider the Teleks of today. Is there any pretension to public service? None. They dress differently, speak differently, live differently. They no longer load ships or clear jungles or build roads; they take an easier way, which makes less demands on their time. Humanity benefits; they bring us platinum, palladium, uranium, rhodium, all the precious metals, which they sell at half the old price, and they pour the money back into circulation.” He
gestured across the stadium. “And meanwhile the old ones are dying and the new Teleks have no roots, no connection with common man. They draw ever farther away, developing a way of living entirely different from ours.”
Geskamp said half-truculently, “What do you expect? It's natural, isn't it?”
Shorn put on a patient face. “That's exactly the point I'm trying to make. Consider the trend, the curve. Where does this ‘natural' behavior lead? Always away from common humanity, the old traditions, always toward an elite-herd situation.”
Geskamp rubbed his heavy chin. “I think that you’re— well, making a mountain out of a molehill.”
“Do you think so? Consider the stadium, the eviction of the old property-owners. Think of Vernisaw Knerwig and the revenge they took.”
“Nothing was proved,” said Geskamp uneasily. What was the fellow up to? Now he was grinning, a superior sort of grin.
“In your heart you agree with what I say; but you can't bring yourself to face the facts—because then you’d be forced to take a stand. For or against.”
Geskamp stared out across the valley, wholly angry, but unable to dispute Shorn’s diagnosis. “I don’t see the facts clearly.”
“There are only two courses for us. We must either control the Teleks, that is, make them answerable to human law—or we must eliminate them entirely. In blunt words— kill them. If we don’t—they become the masters; we the slaves. It’s inevitable.”
Geskamp’s anger broke surface.
“Why do you tell me all these things? What are you driving at? This is strange talk to hear from an architect; you sound like one of the conspirators I’ve heard rumors of.” “I’m talking for a specific purpose. I want to bring you to our way of thinking.”
“Oh. So that’s the way of it.”
“And with this accomplished, recruit your ability and your authority toward a definite end.”
“Who are you? What is this group?”
“A number of men worried by the trend I mentioned.” “A subversive society?” Geskamp’s voice held a tinge of scorn.
Shorn laughed. “Don’t let the flavor of words upset you. Call us a committee of public-spirited citizens.”
“You’d be in trouble if the Teleks caught wind of you,” said Geskamp woodenly.
“They’re aware of us. But they’re not magicians. They don’t know who we are.”
“I know who you are,” said Geskamp. “Suppose I reported this conversation to Nollinrude?”
Shorn grinned. “What would you gain?”
“A great deal of money.”
“You’d live the rest of your live in fear of revenge.”
“I don’t like it,” said Geskamp in a brutal voice, “I don’t care to be involved in any undercover plots.”
“Examine your conscience. Think it over.”
II
The attack on Forence Nollinrude came two days later.
The construction office was a long L-shaped building to the west of the stadium. Geskamp stood in the yard angrily refusing to pay a trucker,more than the agreed scale for his concrete aggregate.
“I can buy it cheaper in half a dozen places,” roared Geskamp. “You only got the contract in the first place because I went to bat for you.”
The trucker had been one of the dispossessed farmers. He shook his head mulishly. “You did me no favor. I’m losing money. It’s costing me three crowns a meter.” Geskamp waved an arm angrily toward the man’s equipment, a small hopper carried by a pair of ramcopters. “How do you expect to make out with that kind of gear? All your profit goes in running back and forth to the quarry. Get yourself a pair of Samson lifts; you’ll cut your costs to where you can make a few crowns.”
“I’m a farmer, not a trucker. I took this contract because I had what I have. If I go in the hole for heavy equipment, then I’m stuck with it. It’ll do me no more good now, the job’s three-quarters done. I want more money, Geskamp, not good advice.”
“Well, you can’t get it from me. Talk to the purchasing agent; maybe he’ll break down. I got you the contract, that’s as far as I go.”
“I already talked to the purchasing agent; he said nothing doing.”
“Strike up one of the Teleks then; they’ve got the money. I can’t do anything for you.”
The trucker spat on the ground. “The Teleks, they’re the devils who started this whole thing. A year ago I had my dairy—right where that patch of water is now. I was doing good. Now I’ve got nothing; the money they gave me to get out, most of it’s gone in this gravel. Now where do I go?”
Geskamp drew his bushy gray-blond eyebrows together. “I’m sorry, Hopson. But there’s nothing I can do. There’s a Telek now; tell him your troubles.”
The Telek was Forence Nollinrude, a tall yellow-haired man, magnificent in a rust cape, saffron trousers, black velvet slippers. The trucker looked across the yard to where Nollinrude floated a fastidious three feet above the ground, then resolved himself and trudged sullenly forward.
Shorn, inside the office, could hear nothing of the interview. The trucker stared up belligerently, legs spread out. Forence Nollinrude turned himself a little to the side, looked down with distaste deepening the lines at the corners of his mouth.
The trucker did most of the talking. The Telek replied in curt monosyllables, and the trucker became progressively more furious.
Geskamp had been watching with a worried frown. He started across the yard with the evident intention of calming the trucker. As he approached, Nollinrude pulled himself a foot or two higher, drew slightly away, turned toward Geskamp, motioned toward the trucker, as if requiring Geskamp to remove the annoyance.
The trucker suddenly seized a bar of reinforcing iron, swung mightily.
Geskamp bawled hoarsely; Forence Nollinrude jerked away, but the iron caught him across the shins. He cried in agony, drew back, looked at the trucker. The trucker rose like a rocket a hundred feet into the air, turned end for end, dived head-first to the ground. He struck with crushing force, pulping his head, his shoulders. But, as if Nollinrude were not yet satisfied, the bar of iron rose and beat the limp body with enormous savage strokes.
Had Nollinrude been less anguished by the pain of his legs he would have been more wary. Almost as the trucker struck the ground, Geskamp seized a laborer’s mattock. As Nollinrude plied the bar of iron, Geskamp stalked close behind, swung. The Telek collapsed to the ground.
“Now,” said Shorn to himself, “there will be hell to pay.” He ran from the office. Geskamp stood panting, looking down at the body huddled in the finery that suddenly seemed not chosen human vestments, but the gaudy natural growth of a butterfly or flash-beetle in pathetic disarray. He became aware of the mattock he still held, flung it away as if it were red-hot and stood wiping his hands nervously together.
Shorn knelt beside the body; searched with practiced swiftness. He found and pocketed a wallet, a small pouch, then rose to his feet.
“We’ve got to work fast.” He looked around the yard. Possibly half a dozen men had witnessed the occurrence—a toolroom attendant, a form foreman, a couple of time-clerks, a laborer or two. “Get them all together, everyone who saw what happened; I’ll take care of the body. “Here, you!” He called to a white-faced lift-operator. “Get a hopper down here.”
They rolled the gorgeous hulk into the hopper. Shorn jumped up beside the operator, pointed. “Up there where they’re pouring that abutment.”
They swept diagonally up the great north wall, to where a pour-crew worked beside a receptor designed to receive concrete from loaded hoppers. Shorn jumped four feet from the hopper to the deck, went to the foreman. “There’s a hold-up here; take your crew down to B-142 Pilaster and work there for a while.’’
The foreman grumbled, protested. The receptor was half full of concrete.
Shorn raised his voice impatiently. “Leave it set. I’ll send a lift up to move the whole thing.”
The foreman turned away, barked ill-naturedly t
o his men. They moved with exaggerated slowness. Shorn stood tautly while they gathered their equipment and trooped down the ramp.
He turned to the lift operator. “Now.”
The bedizened body rolled into the pour.
Shorn guided the dump-hose into position, pulled the trigger. Gray slush pressed down the staring face that had known so much power.
Shorn sighed slightly. “That’s good. Now—we’ll get the crew back on the job.”
At Pilaster B-142 Shorn signaled the foreman, who glowered belligerently. Shorn was a mere draughtsman, therefore a fumbler and impractical. “You can go back to work up above now.”
Before the foreman could find words for an adequate retort, Shorn was back in the hopper.
In the yard he found Geskamp standing at the center of an apprehensive group.
“Nollinrude’s gone.” He looked at the body of the trucker who had caused the original outburst. “Somebody will have to take him home.”
He surveyed the group, trying to gauge their strength, and found nothing to reassure him. Eyes shifted sullenly from his. With an empty feeling in his stomach Shorn knew that the fact of the killing could not be disposed of as easily as the body. He looked from face to face. “A lot of people to keep a secret. If one of us talks—even to his brother or his friend or his wife—then there's no more secret. You all remember Vernisaw Knerwig?”
A nervous mutter assured him that they did: that their urgent hope was to disassociate themselves from any part of the episode.
Geskamp's face was working irritably. Shorn remembered that Geskamp was nominally in charge and was possibly sensitive to any usurpations of his authority. “Yes, Mr. Geskamp? Did you have something to add?"
Geskamp drew back his heavy lips, grinning like a big blond dog. With an effort he restrained himself. “You're doing fine.”
Shorn turned back to the others. “You men are leaving the job now. You won’t be questioned by the Teleks. Naturally they’ll know that Nollinrude has disappeared, but I hope they won’t know where. Just in case you are asked—Nollinrude came and went. That’s all you know. Another thing.” He paused weightily. “If any of us becomes wealthy and the Teleks become full of knowledge—this person will regret that he sold his voice.” And he added, as if it were an inconsequential matter, “There’s a group to cope with situations of this sort.” He looked at Geskamp, but Geskamp kept stonily silent. “Now, I’ll get your names—for future reference. One at a time... .”