Emphyrio

by Jack Vance

  “I’ll explain all this to him,” said Amiante. “Perhaps he may be encouraged to worship; who can say?”

  “The parent bears the responsibility,” intoned the Guide Leaper. “When have you done your last leaping? I suspect months have passed!”

  Amiante calculated a pensive moment. He nodded. “Months at the very least.”

  “Well then!” exclaimed the Leaper in triumph. “Is this not an explanation in itself?”

  “Very likely. Well then, I’ll have a discussion with the boy later in the day.”

  The Guide Leaper started to expostulate further, but, observing Amiante’s absorption in his work, he shook his head in defeat, performed a holy sign and departed.

  Amiante glanced up expressionlessly as the Leaper passed through the door.

  Time and welfare regulations pressed in upon Ghyl. On his tenth birthday he joined the Wood-carvers’ Guild, his first choice, the Mariners’ Guild, being closed to all save sons of existing members.

  Amiante dressed for the occasion in formal guild-meeting wear: a brown coat flared wide at the hips, peaked up at the shoulders, with black piping and carved buttons; tight trousers, with rows of white buttons down the sides, a complicated billed hat of tan felt with black tassels and guild medals. Ghyl wore his first trousers (having heretofore gone only in a gray child’s smock) with a maroon jacket and a smart polished leather cap. Together they walked north to the Guild Hall.

  The initiation was a lengthy affair, consisting of a dozen rituals, questions and responses, charges and assurances. Ghyl paid his first year’s dues, received his first medal, which the Guild-master ceremoniously affixed to his cap.

  From the Guild Hall Ghyl and Amiante walked east across the old Mercantilikum to the Welfare Agency in East Town. Here there was further formality. Ghyl was somatyped; his Beneficial Number was tattooed upon his right shoulder. Henceforth, by Agency reckoning, he was an adult, and would be counseled by Helfred Cobol in his own right. Ghyl was asked his status at the Temple, and was forced to admit to none. The Qualification Officer and the Department Scrivener looked with raised eyebrows from Ghyl to Amiante, then they shrugged. The scrivener wrote upon the questionnaire: “No present capability; status of parent in doubt.”

  The Qualification Officer spoke in a measured voice: “To achieve your most complete fulfillment as a participating member of society, you must be active at the Temple. I will therefore assign you to Full Operative Function. You must contribute four hours voluntary cooperation per week to the Temple, together with various assessments and beneficial gifts. Since you are somewhat—in fact, considerably—retarded, you will be enrolled in special Indoctrination Class…Did you speak?”

  “I was asking if the Temple was necessary,” stammered Ghyl. “I just wanted to know—”

  “Temple instruction is not ‘fully compulsory’,” said the officer. “It is of the ‘Strongly Recommended’ category, inasmuch as any other course suggests noncuperativity. You will therefore report to the Temple Juvenile Authority at ten o’clock tomorrow.”

  So, willy-nilly, and with Amiante keeping his own counsel, Ghyl presented himself at the Central Temple in Cato Precinct. The clerk issued him a dull red cloak with high hitches for leaping, a book which displayed and explained the Great Design, charts of uncomplicated patterns; then assigned him to a study group.

  Ghyl made but fair progress at the Temple, and was far outshone by others younger than himself, who skipped easily through the most complicated patterns: bounding, dancing, whirling, flicking a toe to touch a sign here, an emblem there, swinging contemptuously wide over the black and green ‘Delinquencies’, coursing swiftly down the peripheries, veering past the red demon spots.

  At home Amiante in a sudden fit of energy taught Ghyl to read and write the third-level syllabary, and sent him to the Guild instruction chambers to learn mathematics.

  It was a busy year for Ghyl. The old days of idleness and wandering seemed remote indeed. On his eleventh birthday Amiante gave him a choice panel of arzack, to be carved into a screen of his own design.

  Ghyl looked among his sketches and chose a pleasant composition of boys climbing fruit trees, and he adapted the composition to the natural grain of the panel.

  Amiante approved the design. “Quite suitable: whimsical and gay. It is best to produce gay designs. Happiness is fugitive; dissatisfaction and boredom are real. The folk who gaze upon your screens are entitled to all the joy you can give them, even though the joy be but an abstraction.”

  Ghyl felt impelled to protest at the cynicism of his father. “I don’t consider happiness an illusion! Why should folk content themselves with illusions when reality is so pungent? Are not acts better than dreams?”

  Amiante gave his characteristic shrug. “There are many more excellent dreams than meaningful acts. Or so it might be argued.”

  “But acts are real! Each real act is worth a thousand dreams!”

  Amiante smiled ruefully. “Dream? Act? Which is illusion? Fortinone is old. Billions of folk have come and gone, pale fish in an ocean of time. They rise into the sunlit shallows; they glitter a moment or two; they drift away through the murk.”

  Ghyl scowled off through the amber panes, which allowed a distorted view of the comings and goings in Undle Square. “I can’t feel like a fish. You’re not a fish. We don’t live in an ocean. You are you and I am I and this is our home.” He threw down his tools and marched outside to draw a breath of air. He walked north into Veige Precinct and by force of habit mounted Dunkum’s Heights. Here to his annoyance he found two small boys and a little girl, perhaps seven or eight years old. They were sitting in the grass tossing pebbles down the slope. Their chatter seemed much too boisterous for the spot where Ghyl had spent so much time musing. He gave them a glare of outrage, to which they returned puzzled stares. Ghyl strode off to the north, down the long descending ridge which died upon the Dodrechten mud flats. As he walked, he wondered about Floriel, whom he had not seen for some time. Floriel had joined the Metal-benders’ Guild. When Ghyl had seen him last, Floriel had sported a little black leather skull-cap from under which his hair curled out in a manner almost too charming for a boy. Floriel had been somewhat remote. He had finally, so Ghyl decided, been caught up in a sensible career, for all the wild talk of his childhood.

  Ghyl returned home during the late afternoon, to find Amiante sorting through a portfolio of his private treasures, which he generally kept in a cabinet on the third floor.

  Ghyl had never seen at close hand the contents of the portfolio. He approached and watched over Amiante’s elbow as Amiante pored over the objects, which were old writings: manuscript, calligraph, ornaments and illustrations. Ghyl noted several extremely ancient fragments of parchment on which were characters indited with great regularity and uniformity. Ghyl was puzzled. He squinted down at the archaic documents. “Who could write so careful and minute a hand? Did they employ mites? No scrivener today could do so well!”

  “What you see is a process called ‘printing’,” Amiante told him. “It is duplication a hundred times, a thousand times over. Nowadays, of course, printing is not allowed.”

  “How is it accomplished?”

  “There are many systems, or so I understand. Sometimes carved bits of metal are inked and pressed against paper; sometimes a jet of black light instantaneously sprays a page with writing; sometimes the characters are burnt upon paper through a pattern. I know very little about these processes, which I believe are still used on other worlds.”

  Ghyl studied the archaic symbols for a period, then went on to admire the rich colors of the decorations. Amiante, reading from a little pamphlet, chuckled quietly. Ghyl looked around curiously. “What does it say?”

  “Nothing of consequence. It is an old bulletin describing an electric boat which was offered for sale by the Bidderbasse Factory in Luschein. The price: twelve hundred sequins.”

  “What is a sequin?”

  “It is money. Something like welfare v
ouchers. I don’t believe the factory is in operation any more. Perhaps the boats were of poor quality. Perhaps the Overtrend lords laid an embargo. It is difficult to know; there are no dependable chronicles, at least not in Ambroy.” Amiante heaved a sad sigh. “One can never learn anything when he so desires… Still, I suppose that we should count our blessings. Other eras have been far worse. There is no want in Fortinone, as there is in Bauredel. No wealth, of course, except for that of the lords. But no want.”

  Ghyl examined the printed characters. “Are these hard to read?”

  “Not particularly. Would you like to learn?”

  Ghyl hesitated, considering the many demands upon his time. If he were ever to travel to Damar, to Morgan, to the Wonder Worlds (already the dream of owning a space-yacht was becoming remote) he must work with great industry, and earn vouchers. But he nodded. “Yes, I would like to learn.”

  Amiante seemed pleased. “I am not overly well-versed, and there are many idioms which I fail to recognize—but perhaps we can puzzle them out together.”

  Amiante pushed all his tools to the side, spread a cloth over the screen upon which he had been working, arranged the fragments, brought stylus and paper and copied the crabbed old characters.

  During the days which followed Ghyl struggled to master the archaic system of writing—not so simple a matter as he had originally supposed. Amiante could not transliterate the symbols into either primary pictographs, secondary cursive, nor even the third level syllabary. And even after Ghyl could identify and combine the characters, he was forced to learn archaic idioms and constructions, and sometimes allusions regarding which Amiante could provide no enlightenment.

  One day Helfred Cobol came to the shop to find Ghyl copying from an old parchment, while Amiante mused and dreamed over his portfolio. Helfred Cobol stood in the doorway, arms akimbo, a sour look on his face. “Now what occurs here in the wood-carving shop of old Rt. Tarvoke and young Rt. Tarvoke? Are you turning to scrivening? Don’t tell me you evoke new patterns for your screens; I know better.” He came forward, inspected Ghyl’s exercises. “Archaic, eh? Now what will a wood-carver need with Archaic? I can’t read it, and I’m a welfare agent.”

  Amiante spoke with a trifle more animation than he was accustomed to show. “You must remember that one does not carve wood every hour of the day and night.”

  “Understood,” responded Helfred Cobol. “In fact, judging from the work performed since my previous call, you have carved wood very few hours of either day or night. Much more of this and you will be existing on Base Stipend.”

  Amiante glanced at his nearly finished screen, as if to appraise how much work remained. “In due course, in due course.”

  Helfred Cobol, coming around the heavy old table, looked down at the portfolio. Amiante made a small motion as if to fold up the covers, but restrained himself. Such an act would only stimulate a man trained to curiosity and suspicion.

  Helfred Cobol did not touch the portfolio, but leaned over it with hands behind his back. “Interesting old stuff.” He pointed. “Printed material, I believe. How old do you reckon it?”

  “I can’t be sure,” said Amiante. “It makes reference to Clarence Tovanesko, so it won’t be more than thirteen hundred years old.”

  Helfred Cobol nodded. “It might even be of local fabrication. When did anti-duping regulations go into effect?”

  “About fifty years after this.” Amiante nodded at the bit of paper. “Just a guess of course.”

  “One doesn’t see much printing,” ruminated Helfred Cobol. “There’s not even any contraband off the space-ships, as there used to be in my grandfather’s day. Folk seem to me more law-abiding, which of course, makes life easier for the welfare agents. Noncups are more active this year, worse luck: vandals, thieves, anarchists that they are.”

  “A worthless group, by and large,” agreed Amiante.

  “‘By and large’?” snorted Helfred Cobol. “Altogether, I would say! They are non-productive, a tumor in the society! The criminals suck our blood, the small-dealers disrupt the Agency’s book-work.”

  Amiante had no more to say. Helfred Cobol turned to Ghyl. “Put aside the erudite uselessness, boy; that’s my best advice. You’ll never gain vouchers as a scrivener. Also, I’ve been told that your Temple attendance is spotty, that you’re only leaping a simple Honor-to-Finuka Half-about. More practise there, young Rt. Tarvoke! And more time with chisel and gouge!”

  “Yes sir,” said Ghyl meekly. “I’ll do my best.”

  Helfred Cobol gave him a friendly slap on the shoulder and left the shop. Amiante returned to the portfolio. But his mood was broken, and he twitched the papers with quick petulant jerks.

  Ghyl heard him mutter a peevish curse, and, looking up, saw that in his annoyance Amiante had torn one of his treasures: a long fragile sheet of low-grade paper printed with wonderful caricatures of three now-forgotten public figures.

  Amiante, after his outburst, sat like a rock, brooding over some matter which he obviously did not plan to communicate to Ghyl. Presently, without a word, Amiante rose to his feet, slung his second-best brown and blue cape around his shoulders and set forth upon an errand. Ghyl went to the door, watched his father amble across the square and disappear into an alley which led away into Nobile Precinct and the rough dock area.

  Ghyl, also restless, could concentrate no longer on the old writing. He made a half-hearted attempt to master a rather difficult Temple exercise, then set to work on his screen, and so occupied himself the remainder of the day.

  The sun had fallen behind the buildings across the square before Amiante returned. He carried several parcels which he put without comment into a cabinet, then sent Ghyl out to buy seaweed curd and a leek salad for their supper. Ghyl went slowly and reluctantly; there was a pot of left-over porridge which Amiante, who was somewhat frugal with food expenditures, had been planning to use. Why the unnecessary expenditure? Ghyl knew better than to ask. At best Amiante might give him a vague and irrelevant response. At worst Amiante would pretend not to have heard the question.

  Something peculiar was in the wind, thought Ghyl. In a heavy mood he visited the greengrocer’s, then the marine paste dealer’s. Over the evening meal Amiante, to anyone other than Ghyl, might have seemed his ordinary self. Ghyl knew differently. Amiante, not a talkative man, alternated periods of staring glumly down at his plate with attempts at contriving an easy conversation. He inquired as to Ghyl’s progress at the Temple, a subject regarding which he had heretofore shown little interest. Ghyl reported that he was doing fairly well with the exercises but found difficulty with the catechism. Amiante nodded but Ghyl could see that his thoughts were elsewhere. Presently Amiante asked if Ghyl had recently seen Floriel, and it so happened that Ghyl had come upon Floriel at the Temple, where he took instruction on much the same basis as Ghyl.

  “A peculiar lad, that one,” Amiante remarked. “Easily persuaded, or so I would say; and with a streak of perversity to make him uncertain.”

  “That is what I feel too,” said Ghyl. “Although now he seems to be buckling down to guild work.”

  “Yes, why not?” mused Amiante, as if the reverse—indolence, noncuperativity—were standard conduct.

  There was another silence, with Amiante frowning down at his plate as if for the first time he had become aware of what he was eating. He made an offhand reference to Helfred Cobol. “He means well enough, the agent; but he tries to reconcile too many conflicts. It makes him unhappy. He’ll never do well.”

  Ghyl was interested in his father’s opinion. “I’ve always thought him impatient and rude.”

  Amiante smiled, and looked off into his private thoughts. But he made another comment. “We are lucky with Helfred Cobol. The polite agents are harder to deal with. They offer smooth surface; they are impervious…How would you like to be a welfare agent?”

  Ghyl had never considered the possibility. “I’m not a Cobol. I suppose it’s very cuperative, and they gain bonus vouchers, o
r so I hear. I’d rather be a lord.”

  “Naturally; who wouldn’t?”

  “But it’s not possible in any way?”

  “Not here in Fortinone. They keep themselves to themselves.”

  “On their home world were they lords? Or ordinary recipients like ourselves?”

  Amiante shook his head. “Once, long ago, I worked for an off-world information agency and I might have asked, but during these times my thoughts were elsewhere. I don’t know the lords’ home world. Perhaps Alode, perhaps Earth, which I’ve been told is the first home of all men.”

  “I wonder,” said Ghyl, “why the lords live here in Fortinone. Why did they not choose Salula or Luschein or the Mang Islands?”

  Amiante shrugged. “The same reason, no doubt, that we live where we do. Here we were born, here we live, here we will die.”

  “Suppose I went to Luschein and studied to be a space-man; would the lords hire me aboard their yachts?”

  Amiante pursed his mouth dubiously. “The first difficulty is learning to be a spaceman. It is a popular occupation.”

  “Did you ever want to be a spaceman?”

  “Oh indeed. I had my dreams. Still—it may be best to carve wood. Who knows? We shall never starve.”

  “But we will never be financially independent,” said Ghyl with a sniff.

  “True.” Amiante, rising, took his plate to the wash-table where he scraped it very carefully and cleaned it with a minimum of water and sand.

  Ghyl watched the meticulous process with detached interest. Amiante, so he knew, begrudged every check he was forced to pay over to the lords. It was a process which puzzled him. He asked: “The lords take 1.18 percent of everything we produce, don’t they?”

  “They do,” said Amiante. “1.18 percent of the value of imports and exports alike.”