by Jack Vance
With bravos and catcalls the group drank the toast. Ghyl took occasion to inspect his surroundings. The room was very large, with carved posts supporting an elegant old ceiling of green sapodilla and yellow tile. The walls were stained dull scarlet, the floor was stone. Light came from four candelabra supporting dozens of little lamps. Sitting in an alcove an orchestra of three men, with zither, flute and tympany, played jigs and reels. Below the orchestra twenty young women lolled on a long couch, wearing a variety of costumes, some flamboyant, others severe, but all characterized by an element of fantasy, setting them apart from the ordinary women of Ambroy. At last Ghyl fully realized where he was: in one of the quasi-legal taverns offering wine and food, music and good cheer, and also the services of a staff of hostesses. Ghyl looked curiously along the line of girls. None were particularly comely, he thought, and a few were actually grotesque, with garments of incredible complication and cosmetics all but concealing their faces.
“See any you fancy?” Nion Bohart called over to Ghyl. “They’re all here tonight. Business is poor. Pick out the one you favor; she’ll tingle your toes for you!”
Ghyl shook his head to indicate disinclination, and looked around the other tables.
“What do you think of the place?” Floriel asked him.
“It’s splendid, certainly. But isn’t it very expensive?”
“Not so much as you might think, if you drink only ale and stay away from the girls.”
“Too bad old Honson Ospude isn’t here, eh, Nion?” called Shulk Odlebush. “We’d pour him so full he wouldn’t know up from down!”
“I’d like to see him tackle that fat woman!” remarked Uger Harspitz with a lecherous grin. “Her with the green feather neck-piece. What a tussle that would be!”
Into the room came three men and two women, the men somewhat cautious of step and gaze, the women by contrast bold, even insolent. Nion nudged Floriel, muttered into his ear and Floriel in turn spoke to Ghyl: “Noncups: those five just taking a table.”
Ghyl stared in surreptitious fascination at the five men and women, who, after quick glances into all corners, were now relaxing into their chairs.
Ghyl asked Floriel, “Are they criminals—or just ordinary non-recipients?”
Floriel put the inquiry to Nion, who replied tersely, with a flicker of a cynical grin. Floriel reported to Ghyl: “He doesn’t know for sure. He thinks they deal in ‘scrap’: old metal, old furniture, old artware—probably anything else they lay their hands on.”
“How does Nion know all this?” asked Ghyl.
Floriel shrugged. “He knows all sorts of things. I think his brother is a noncup—or was. I’m not really sure. The folk who own this tavern are noncups too, for that matter.”
“What of them?” Ghyl nodded to the girls on the long bench.
Floriel put a question to Nion, received a reply. “They’re all recipients. They belong to the Matrons, Nurses and Service Workers’ Guild.”
“Oh.”
“On occasion lords come in here,” said Floriel. “Last time I was here with Nion there were two lords and two ladies, drinking ale and chewing pickled skauf like longshoremen.”
“Not really!”
“Really and absolutely,” stated Nion who had hitched around to join the conversation. “There may be lords in tonight, who knows? Here, old fellow, fill your mug—good strong ale!”
Ghyl allowed his mug to be replenished. “Why would lords and ladies come down to a place of this sort?”
“Because here is life! Excitement! Real people! Not flat-nosed voucher-douchers!”
Ghyl gave his head a marveling shake. “I thought that when they dropped to the ground they always flew to Luschein or the Mang Islands, or someplace out of Fortinone for their fun!”
“True. But sometimes it’s as easy to drop down to good old Keecher’s Inn. Anything to escape the boredom of the eyries, I suppose.”
“‘Boredom’?” Ghyl tested the word.
“Certainly. You don’t think the life of the lords is all Gade wine and star travel, do you? A good many of them find time hanging heavy on their hands.”
Ghyl considered this novel perspective regarding the life of the lords. What with air-boats to sweep them here and there, not only to Luschein and the Mangs, but to Minya-judos, or the wild Para Islands, or the Wewar Glaciers, the idea was not wholly convincing. Still—who could say? “Do they come without Garrion?”
“As to that I don’t know. You’ll never see Garrion here in the tavern. Perhaps they watch from behind that lattice yonder.”
“So long as it’s not a Special Agent,” suggested Mael Villy with a glance over his shoulder.
“Don’t worry, they know you’re here,” said Nion Bohart. “They know everything.”
Ghyl grinned. “Maybe the Garrion and welfare agents sit together behind the screen.”
Nion Bohart spat upon the floor. “Not much. The agents come to play with the girls, like all the rest.”
“The lords too?” asked Ghyl.
“The lords? Ha! You should see them. And the ladies! They vie in lechery!”
“Have you heard of Lord Mornune the Spay?” asked Uger Harspitz. “How he inveigled my cousin’s fiancée? It was at a place up the Insse—some resort. Brazen? Grigglesby Corners? I forget the name—anyway my cousin was called aside on a false message and when he returned Lord Mornune was with the girl, and next morning she never appeared for breakfast. She wrote that she was well, that Mornune was taking her traveling, to the Five Worlds and beyond. Isn’t that the life?”
“All one needs is 1.18 percent,” said Nion Bohart grimly. “If I had it I’d inveigle the girls no less.”
“You could try with your one voucher and eighteen checks,” suggested Shulk Odlebush. “Inquire of that fat one with the green neck-piece.”
“Bah. Not even one check…but hello! Here’s my friend Aunger Wermarch. Hi Aunger! This way! Meet my friends!”
Aunger Wermarch was a young man dressed in the most extreme style, with pointed white shoes and a black-tasseled yellow hat. Nion Bohart introduced him to the group: “A noncup is Aunger and proud of the fact!”
“Right and correct!” declared Aunger Wermarch. “They can call me Chaoticist, thief, pariah—anything they want—so long as they don’t put me on their damned welfare rolls!”
“Sit, Aunger—drink a mug of ale! There’s a good fellow!”
Aunger pulled a stool up under his splendid shanks and accepted a mug of ale. “A merry life to all!”
“And sand in the eyes of all the water-watchers!” proposed Nion. Ghyl drank with the rest. When Aunger Wermarch turned away, he asked Floriel for an explanation. Floriel gave back a significant wink, and Ghyl suddenly understood the reference to ‘water-watchers’, those welfare agents who patrolled the shoreline to apprehend smugglers of duplicated items, cheap elsewhere but hand-made and expensive in Fortinone. So here was a smuggler: an anti-social leech and bloodsucker—so Ghyl had learned at guild-meetings.
Ghyl gave a silent shrug. Perhaps. Smuggling violated welfare regulations, just as Amiante’s duplicating had done. On the other hand Amiante had not been motivated by profit. Amiante was hardly an anti-social leech, certainly no blood-sucker. Ghyl sighed, shrugged once more. Tonight he would withhold all judgments.
Perceiving the jug to be empty, Ghyl provided replenishment, and filled mugs all around the table. Then he sat back to watch the events of the evening.
Two other young men came to speak to Aunger Wermarch, and presently drew up chairs. Ghyl was not introduced. Sitting at the far end of the table, he was somewhat removed from the node of conversation, which suited him well enough. His head was becoming light, and he decided to drink no more ale. It might be a good idea to think about leaving for home. He spoke to Floriel, who looked at him with a vacant face, mouth looped in a loose grin. Floriel was drunk, in a facile ready fashion that suggested long habit. Floriel said something about hiring girls, but Ghyl had no enthusiasm for t
he project. Particularly so used and forlorn a set of drabs as these. He said as much to Floriel, who recommended that Ghyl drink a mug or two more ale. Ghyl pulled a wry face.
He was preparing to leave, when at the other end of the table he noted tension. Aunger Wermarch was speaking from the corner of his mouth to his two friends; surreptitiously they studied a group of four somberly dressed men who had just entered: Welfare Specials. This was clear even to Ghyl. Nion Bohart sat looking interestedly into his mug of ale, but Ghyl saw his hand flicker under the table.
Events moved with great swiftness. The Welfare Specials approached the table. Aunger Wermarch and his two friends sprang away, tumbled over two of the agents, ran for the door and were gone, almost before the mind could appreciate the fact. Nion Bohart and Shulk Odlebush rose to their feet in outrage. “What does this mean?”
“What does it mean, indeed?” said one of the Special Agents drily. “It means that three men have departed the premises without our permission.”
“Why shouldn’t they?” demanded Nion hotly. “Who are you?”
“Welfare agents, Special Department—who do you suppose?”
“Well then,” said Nion virtuously, “why didn’t you say so? You came in so furtively my friends considered you criminals and decided to leave.”
“Come along,” said the agent. “All of you. Certain questions must be answered. And if you please,” he told Nion Bohart, “be so good as to pick up the parcel you threw to the floor and hand it to me.”
The group was marched to a wagon and conveyed to the Hoge Detention Center.
Ghyl was released two hours later. He was questioned only cursorily; he told the precise truth and was instructed to go home. Floriel, Mael Villy and Uger Harspitz were released with warnings. Nion Bohart and Shulk Odlebush, with parcels of contraband material in their possession, were required to expiate their anti-social behaviour. Their Base Stipends were diminished by ten vouchers a month; they were obliged to work two months on the Cheer and Cleanliness Walkabout Squad, removing rubbish from the streets, and they were enjoined to one day a week of intensive Temple exercises.
Chapter VIII
Undle Square was cool and absolutely quiet when Ghyl arrived home. Damar, a thin sickle, hung low, backlighting the featureless black hulks to the east. No light showed; the air was cool and fresh; the only sound to be heard was the scrape of Ghyl’s footsteps.
He let himself into the workroom. The odor of wood and finishing oil came to his nostrils: so familiar and secure and redolent of everything that he loved that tears came to his eyes.
He stopped to listen, then climbed the stairs.
Amiante was not asleep. Ghyl undressed, then went over to his father’s bed and described the events of the evening. Amiante made no comment. Ghyl, peering vainly through the dark, was unable to sense his opinion of the scrape. Amiante finally said, “Well then, go to bed; you’ve done no harm and suffered none; you’ve learned a great deal: so we must count the night a success.”
Somewhat cheered, Ghyl laid himself down on his couch, and fell asleep from sheer weariness.
He awoke to Amiante’s hand on his shoulder. “The welfare agent is here to discuss the events of last night.”
Ghyl dressed, washed his face in cold water, combed back his hair. Descending to the second floor, he found Schute Cobol and Amiante sitting at the table, drinking tea, apparently on a basis of courtesy and good-fellowship, though Schute Cobol’s mouth was even tighter and paler than usual and his eyes had a far-off glint. He greeted Ghyl with a curt nod and a glance of careful appraisal, as if he found himself face to face with a stranger.
The discussion began on a note of polite restraint, with Schute Cobol asking only for Ghyl’s version of last night’s events. Presently his questions became keener and his comments cutting; Ghyl became angry rather than abject. “I have told you the truth! To the best of my knowledge I did nothing irregulationary; why do you imply that I am chaotic?”
“I imply nothing. You are the one who draws inferences. Certainly you have been irresponsible in your friendships. This fact, coupled with your previous lack of orthodoxy, compels me to an open mind, rather than the trust I automatically extend to the typical recipient.”
“In this case, not enjoying your trust, it is pointless for me to say more. Why waste my breath?”
Schute Cobol’s mouth tightened; he looked toward Amiante. “And you, Rt. Tarvoke—you must realize that you have been remiss as a father. Why have you not inculcated in your son a more abiding respect for our institutions? I believe that you have been reproached on this score before.”
“Yes, I recall something of the sort,” said Amiante with the ghost of a smile.
Schute Cobol became even more brittle than before. “Will you answer my question then? Remember, on you rests the ultimate responsibility for these sad events. Truth is what a father owes to his son, not evasion and ambiguity.”
“Ah, truth indeed!” mused Amiante. “If only we could identify truth when we perceived it! Here would be reassurance!”
Schute Cobol snorted in disgust. “This is the source of all our difficulties. Truth is orthodoxy, what else? You need no reassurance beyond the regulations.”
Amiante rose to his feet, stood with his hands behind his back, looking from the window. “Once there lived the hero Emphyrio,” said Amiante. “He spoke such truth that monsters halted to hear him. Did he, I wonder, expound Welfare Agency regulations through his magic tablet?”
Schute Cobol also rose to his feet. He spoke in a voice passionless and rigidly formal. “I have carefully explained what the Welfare Agency expects in return for the benefits you derive. If you wish to continue to derive these benefits, you must obey regulations. Do you have any questions?”
“No.”
“No.”
Schute Cobol gave a curt bow. He went to the door and, turning, said, “Even Emphyrio, were he alive today, would be obliged to obey regulations. There can be no exceptions.” He departed.
Amiante and Ghyl followed him down to the workroom. Ghyl slumped upon his bench, put his chin on his hands. “I wonder if this is true? Would Emphyrio obey welfare regulations?”
Amiante seated himself at his own bench. “Who knows? He would find no enemy, no tyranny—only inefficiency and perhaps peculation. No question but that we work hard for very little return.”
“He would hardly be a noncup,” mused Ghyl. “Or would he? One who worked hard and honestly, but off the welfare rolls?”
“Possibly. He might choose to be elected Mayor of the City, and try to increase everyone’s stipend.”
“How could he do that?” asked Ghyl with interest.
Amiante shrugged. “The Mayor has no real power—although the Charter names him the city’s chief executive. He could at least demand higher prices for our goods. He could urge that we build factories to produce things we need but now import.”
“That would mean duplication.”
“Duplication is not inherently wrong, so long as it does not diminish our reputation for craftsmanship.”
Ghyl shook his head. “The Welfare Agency would never permit it.”
“Perhaps not. Unless Emphyrio were, in fact, Mayor.”
“Someday,” said Ghyl, “I will learn the rest of the tale. We will know what happened.”
Amiante gave his head a skeptical shake, as if his thoughts had many times coursed the same road. “Perhaps. But more likely Emphyrio is legend after all.”
Ghyl sat brooding. Presently he asked, “Is there no way we could learn the truth?”
“Probably not in Fortinone. The Historian would know.”
“Who is the Historian?”
Amiante, becoming uninterested in the conversation, began to strop one of his chisels. “On a far planet, so I am told, the Historian chronicles all the events of human history.”
“The history of Halma and Fortinone, as well?”
“Presumably.”
“How would such i
nformation reach the Historian?”
Amiante, bending over the screen, plied his chisel. “No difficulty there. He would employ correspondents.”
“What a curious idea!” remarked Ghyl.
“Curious indeed.”
Across Undle Square, a few steps up Gosgar Alley to a door with a blue hourglass painted on the panel, up four flights of steps to a pleasant little penthouse: here was the home of Sonjaly Rathe and her mother. Sonjaly was a small slight girl, extremely pretty, with blonde hair and innocent gray eyes. Ghyl thought her enchanting. Unfortunately Sonjaly was something of a flirt, well aware of her charms, always ready with a provocative pout or a clever tilt of the head.
One afternoon Ghyl sat with Sonjaly at the Campari Café trying to make earnest conversation, to which Sonjaly would only give back pert irrelevancies, when who should appear but Floriel. Ghyl frowned and slumped back in his seat.
“Your father told me you’d probably be here,” said Floriel, dropping into a chair. “What’s that you’re drinking? Pomardo? None for me. Waitress, a flask of edel wine, please: the Amanour White.”
Ghyl performed introductions. Floriel said, “I suppose you’ve heard the news.”
“News? A Mayor’s election in a month or so. I’ve finished a new screen. Sonjaly thinks she’ll change from the Marble-Polishers to the Cakes, Tarts and Pastry-Makers.”
“No, no,” complained Floriel. “I mean news! Nion Bohart is free of the Cheer Squad. He wishes to celebrate, and has called for a party tonight!”
“Oh indeed?” Ghyl frowned down into his goblet.
“Indeed. At the Twisted Willow Palace, if you know of it.”
“Naturally,” said Ghyl, not wishing to appear stupid in front of Sonjaly.
“It’s in Foelgher Precinct, on the estuary—but then I’d better take you; you’d never find your way.”
“I’m not certain of going,” said Ghyl. “Sonjaly and I—”
“She can come too; why not?” Floriel turned to Sonjaly, who was practising her most outrageous beguilements. “You’d enjoy the Twisted Willow; it’s a delightful old place, with a marvelous view. The most interesting and clever folk go there, and many noncups. Even lords and ladies: on the sly, of course.”