McBe shot a look at the Night and then lowered his sight to his feet and the street. He inclined his head. “You should see what they do in there,” he said. His tone was a mixture of awe and puzzlement. He told what they did in there.
Slyne found it strange, but no stranger than the ordinary run of human behavior. He found it less strange than McBe did, and be found it less strange than he found McBe.
But McBe was puzzled and expected an answer. When you are surrounded by a strange and hostile world, you need answers.
“I take it to be essentially religious,” said Slyne, considering this to be a safe answer.
“Religious,” said McBe. “But that would make it all right, then.” McBe had respect for religion.
“If it’s religious, then it’s all right?” Slyne asked, perking behind his amplifiers.
“Why, yes. I suppose,” said McBe.
“Very interesting,” said Slyne. His damp little nose behind its lattice touched McBe’s ear. Slyne whuffled deeply. He tried to make it last, but like all good holy experiences, this one, too, was ephemeral. A holy experience, infinitely extended, becomes trivial. Understanding this, Slyne exhaled and set off around the palisade for Gate Three. And McBe trailed behind, swiping at his ear.
* * *
“I have a special responsibility for young Badrian,” said the man. His name was Ossian Chimmeroon. He was newly come to white-mantled maturity and still settling into his new set of relationships, but enjoying the feeling of being a sage. The blue trimming on his white robes indicated Joralemon House. “Not only am I his Guide Leader, but he bought up my place in the Xochitl Sodality. Besides, I should be able to guide you as well as anyone you care to name. If anyone can tell you where Xochitl will run, it’s me.”
He walked the quiet winding curve of street. Beside him padded Torve the Trog. Chimmeroon had offered to take Torve to Badrian Beaufils since it was Xochitl Sodality Night and Badrian was out playing in the streets.
The town was a bowl, with a green and gardens in the cup curve and the quarters of the town laid out on the slopes above. People were settled in for the night. Houses were dark. The streets were private. From time to time as they walked, there were vantages from which could be seen the crystal sprawl of the city. There was a breeze that toyed lightly with sound and temperature, rustling and flicking. It was a pleasant evening for a walk.
“Is a nice planet you have here,” said Torve the Trog.
“Thank you. We like it,” said Chimmeroon. Of course, since he had never been off the planet, he had nothing to compare it with. Nonetheless, it is a fact that he liked Delbalso.
Now is the opportunity to observe the difference between a genuine Trog and a gross impostor. Even in dim light, even in darkness, Torve’s eyes shone a genuine divine lumined blue. Otherwise there wasn’t a great deal of obvious difference.
Above them, cracking and flashing white lightnings, a ship descended slowly toward the Rock. There were beacons on the rim of the Rock that marked its dark, flatulent bulk against the sky. Chimmeroon and Torve the Trog turned to watch until lightnings and beacons merged in flaring white and flashing red. Then the crackle and flash ended. The beacons continued to wink imperturbably, and yellow afterimages danced on the eyes.
Torve continued to stare at the Rock.
“Imagine that’s the nightboat from Duden,” said Chimmeroon.
Torve squatted. “I have feeling of imminent conjugation,” he said. “Pardon. I must steep myself.” He closed his eyes and went away. He concentrated with the solemn gravity of an old man examining his excreta for portents. After a silent minute or more, he made his throbbing noise, “Thurb.” He made it again, a number of times.
This was art, an aid to his concentration. And there, of course, is your essential difference—not the gross duplicable exterior, but the Troggish heart. That cannot be chunked out by a machine.
Torve’s art continued for its own sake after its utile function was complete. Torve paused for a brief moment to savor the event. Then he rose.
“Yes,” he said. “No mistake. Imminent conjugation.”
It is this sort of concept that is in part responsible for the restriction of Trogs. What can be fruitfully exchanged, after all, with people who believe that events ripen themselves, bide their time, wait for the proper interactive moment to occur? At a moment of conjugation, as Torve would have it, a cluster of events burgeon to their mutual satisfaction. And through the morass of events, things—Trogs and humans and dogs and bricks and sticks—must take their own chances. Events will use them as they will, and the best one can do is swim with the tide.
This representation is gross and inaccurate, of course, but still it would not be unfair to say that Torve considered himself largely irrelevant to his thurbs, which left him free to enjoy them to a degree that would be disgraceful in a human artiste.
Chimmeroon asked, “And what is ‘imminent conjugation,’ Friend Trog?”
Torve explained at some length, speaking of lines of occurrence and other inadequate approximations. He molded air with his furry fingers by way of illustration. Chimmeroon understood hardly a word. Some philosophies are not easily exported. Villiers and Torve had traveled together considerably, and neither would claim to understand the other, so Chimmeroon cannot be blamed.
Chimmeroon did become convinced that “imminent conjugation” was not so rare an event in the Trog’s experience that he should have reason for alarm, and after a more than reasonable show of attention, he nodded his lack of understanding and changed the subject. He reached beneath his robes and produced a handsome box of trocchi wood graced by inlaid filigree. He flipped it open with a practiced thumb.
“Majoon?” he said.
There was a row of neat candies within—honey and nuts, and wondrous spices, all dipped in toasted sesame seeds. Chimmeroon took one and offered the box.
“In surety,” said the Trog, taking three. Or would it be fair to say that three pieces forced themselves upon him? In any event—three.
Chimmeroon nibbled his piece with proper respect, for majoon deserves respect, but the Trog had all three pieces in his mouth before Chimmeroon had replaced his box beneath his burnoose, and had gobbled and gulped the lot before Chimmeroon was more than begun. Ah, but it is futility to expect politeness from a Trog, or a proper appreciation of a careful blend of delicate flavourings.
Torve did smile widely. “Is good,” he said. “Already I feel seeping emanations.” It was almost as though the pleasure he took was not so much in the eating as in the digestion of the candy.
Chimmeroon may have marveled at this, but as an officially wise old man—even if only newly so—he was willing to grant the Trog his peculiarities. For Badrian Beaufils’ sake, if none other. And, as they walked, digestion proceeding, the Trog’s smile grew broader.
However, Chimmeroon was not given an extended opportunity to observe the process. Before they had progressed more than a few blocks down the sloping, winding street toward the green center of town, a party of four men came out of a side street and hailed them.
Chimmeroon groaned. “Newman, Rose, Zimmerman and Cohen,” he said. “I hope they don’t insist on singing.”
The four were of Chimmeroon’s age, or a bit younger—mature men. They were dressed in green, with little peaked and jaunty caps. One had a feather in his cap.
“They sing?” asked Torve.
“Oh, yes,” said Chimmeroon. “At every sodality meeting. And badly.” Having been named Ossian, from an early age he had looked upon poetry and song as being particularly his own and felt free to criticize as he would. If he had not criticized Torve’s attempts, it was largely because he had not recognized them as art.
“Well, how are things over at Pierrepont House?” Chimmeroon asked as the four came up.
“Well enough,” said the one with the feather. “What are you doing out tonight, Ossian? You know this is Xochitl’s night. You have your new sodality. Can’t you let go?”
This is the outside of enough, Chimmeroon,” said Newman. “You don’t think we’re going to allow you to hand over a Marvel like this to Joralemon House, do you?”
“But I’m not playing,” said Chimmeroon in exasperation.
“But we are,” said Zimmerman. “It is our night and this is our territory. Finders keepers, Chimmeroon.”
Torve just smiled broadly. “Thurb,” he said.
“Oh, my,” said Rose. “That’s it. He has to be our Marvel. None of the other Houses will have anything to compare.”
“But he’s just Badrian Beaufils’ pen pal,” said Chimmeroon.
“Come now,” said Newman with no sign of belief. “You were a Xochitl long enough to know a proper Marvel when you see one.”
“Can you really write?” asked Cohen.
Torve nodded.
The four moved around the Trog and looked at Chimmeroon. Chimmeroon banged his knuckles together and looked pensively at them all. “Do you understand what this is about?” he asked the Trog.
“Of course,” said Torve. “Is imminent conjugation.”
“Oh,” said Chimmeroon. “Well, then. Go along with these gentlemen, such as they are, and I will do my best to find Badrian Beaufils, Friend Trog.”
“Do that,” said Newman. “He can find us on the green when it’s time to match Marvels.”
“All right,” said Chimmeroon. “All right.” He drew his gabardine and his dignity about him, and turned away down the street.
The four continued to stand close about the Trog.
Rose said, “Let’s show the others what we’ve found.”
Zimmerman said, “I think we had best be on our way before Chimmeroon finds Badrian Beaufils.”
Cohen said, “He was mad, wasn’t he?”
Newman said, “Well, come along, Trog. Friend Trog.”
Torve said, “You sing, is true?”
“Why yes,” said the four.
6
Do places dream of people until they return?
* * *
“Turn on, please,” Villiers said, but only at last when he had searched on hands and knees without success for the copy of Companions of Vinland that he had prepared for mailing before he went to sleep.
The light roused when he did. Villiers swung out of bed and yawned and stretched, but he didn’t call for the light to fulfill itself and it lurked impotently overhead. He rose and sought his clothing, and the light followed him darkly across the room.
He dressed, and not badly considering that he dressed himself and that he dressed in the dark. In younger days he had attended a school that thought there was a relationship between character and an ability to dress in the dark. Villiers had abandoned the practice for many years with obvious sad result. His moral instructors would no doubt consider his present return to past habit a hopeful sign. He did not take the trouble to complete his robe with the garnish of a drapeau, however, which might have caused them to dwell and mull a bit.
He took up his cloak in the dark, but then was unable to locate his package. He patted and pawed and mumble-fingered the floor in the darkness, but though the feel of the carpeting was pleasant, he did not find the book. In irritation with himself, and feeling quite rightly that he was making a capitulation, Villiers at last called on the light.
It was slow to come up and only cast small shadows. It wasn’t half the light it had been at dinnertime. Villiers looked up reproachfully and with seeming politeness it moved behind the crane of his neck. There it intensified a little, keeping its private glare fixed on the back of his head.
When Villiers lowered his gaze, it centered itself again directly above him. Even with the grace of reluctant illumination, he did not find the book immediately.
Sight confirmed that it was not on the table on which he believed he had left it. It was not where he had been searching on the floor close by the table. It was not anywhere in ready view.
Only then, prompted by the lingering impression of conducting a nighttime class in Evasion—a subject he in fact had never formally taught—did he begin to lift cushions. He found the book under the second cushion.
He nodded and eyed himself with proper suspicion in the wall mirror. Then he laughed.
He dusted himself, tugged and shrugged, and then put the package under his arm. The light centered itself properly and he had one last look in the glass. Then he proceeded into the hall.
The earlier sounds of moving and cleaning and decorating had largely been replaced by faint warm simmering smells of pudding and holiday, though Villiers did catch a distant trial blat of convivial music. The sound died.
The house was dark and only robots and mechanicals were afoot. They were busy. They had things to do. Purpose. The hour of Lord Semichastny’s masquerade was not far distant, and since this year they had been allowed an opportunity for display usually denied by Lord Semichastny’s sense of economy, they were determined to do more than they possibly could in the short time remaining.
Charles, faint yellow courtesy light shining, was waiting for Villiers when he reached the foot of the stairs.
“Good evening, sir,” he said.
“Good evening,” said Villiers.
Charles handed Villiers a letter. “Lord Semichastny instructed me to give this to you when you arose.”
“Did the Duden mailboat arrive?”
”I’m sorry, sir. I don’t know. Lord Semichastny said to tell you that he discovered this in reconsideration of his desk, and apologizes for the oversight, pleading a full stomach and the lateness of the hour. He promises to look yet again when he wakes.”
”My uncle overelaborates his points,” said Villiers. “Thank you, Charles.”
The letter bore Villiers’ personal address symbol as a sign that it was not a common bill or solicitation or an anonymously addressed bit of random trash. It had been opened before it came into Villiers’ hands.
It was from Villiers’ mother and it began, “I disapprove . . .” which was not at all her usual way. It turned out, however, that what she disapproved of was Villiers’ association with her brother. The final paragraphs were even addressed directly to Geoffrey on the assumption that his habits hadn’t altered, as indeed they hadn’t.
While Villiers was reading the letter, his light suddenly brightened appreciably. He looked up to see Harbourne Firnhaber trotting down the stairs.
“You’re up early,” said Harbourne.
“I have immediate business in town,” said Villiers, holding up the packaged book by way of misdirection.
“Would you like me to mail that for you, sir?” asked Charles.
“I think not,” said Villiers. “And why are you up so soon, Cousin?”
Harbourne said, “I’m to find masquerade guests for Uncle’s party. I thought to make an early start on it.”
“Whom are you inviting?”
“Anyone, Milord Charteris. I shall sweep the streets of town.”
“You may not find many on the streets. Xochitl Sodality of the Delbalso Monist Association is playing Wonders and Marvels tonight and most people are keeping to their homes. I saw few on my way here tonight.”
“But it was late then. It’s earlier than that now,” said Harbourne.
“True,” said Villiers, “but I think it makes small difference. They seemed bent on making a full night of it. Be careful lest they take you for a Wonder and keep you.”
“Do you think they might take me for a Wonder?”
“It’s perfectly possible. I fell into their hands myself.”
“But apparently they didn’t keep you.”
“No,” said Villiers. “They found me insufficiently marvelo
us and cast me back into the streets again to grow to larger size. Alas, I fear I have attained a final and insufficient height, and shall ultimately disappoint them.”
In fact, Villiers had not been that disappointing. Small, yes, and no Ian Steele, but not without presence when he cared to make the point. As it had happened, Villiers had encountered the friend of a friend, and of course there had been no question about his movements once that had been established.
“Will you gentlemen have breakfast?” asked Charles.
* * *
In this world there are a million windows through which to see. There are a million mirrors, and a million prospects. The ordinary man accepts this, and if the world looks a little different to him one day and the next, or if his mirror shows him something new, it neither troubles nor surprises him. The variety lends roundness to life.
However, for those few raised to a single narrow squint, the discovery of even a second perspective on the smoke and swirl of the evanescent world can be important, shocking, and joyful. This is good if it leads to new vistas, and bad if the second perspective is mistaken for Final Truth.
Timur i Leng, vizier of Chagatay under Suyurghatmish, discovered one day that the world looks different from forty feet in the air and was overwhelmed. He gathered his army and overran Khorasan, Jurjan, Mazandaran, Sijistan, Azerbaijan, and Fars. In each place he raised a pyramid of skulls forty feet high and limped to the top in the hopes of recapturing that first thrilling rush—and missed the point completely.
Sir Henry the Trog stood in danger of similarly refining too greatly on a single new view of the world. He would not come out of his costume no matter what his wife said. He was quiet about it—when he did not forget himself and dance or sing to savor once again the puzzling and pleasing strangeness of it all—but he was adamant. He would not come out.
His mind had been busy and kept him from sleep, but at last he had fallen into warm electric dreams. When he woke he turned his woolly head and saw that his wife had risen. He did not seek her company immediately but lay awake and let the butterflies in his mind take spotted wing. He hummed.
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