"Mirni?" he asked, extending his hand. "I'm Wilbert K. Neff, chairman of the Institute of Governmental Studies, which you've probably never heard of. Get your jacket and we'll get out of this sick-room smell. Let's hustle!"
* * *
Hustle they did, at a pace that left Mirni excited and confused from being rushed into and out of a ground car and on to a noisy pub, where Neff led the way to a corner booth. A loud comic was holding forth on the 3V, and Mirni caught a snatch of a gag that ended with " . . . flipped by the flexible finger of the Fourth Foerst of Fingal!" The resulting roar of laughter was cut off as Neff flicked on the booth's sound curtain.
The man chuckled as he punched an order for drinks. "That Fingal affair is funnier than the 3V comics realize," he said. "I hear the squirmings in the President's conference chamber were something to behold when the council members sneered your 'joke' suggestion into oblivion and then 'recreated' it out of their own ingenuity."
"They're doing what I suggested?" asked Mirni.
"Indeed they are! But don't expect credit for it—not from them. What congratulations you get will have to come from such unimposing persons as myself."
"Your title sounds imposing," Mirni commented.
Neff sipped his drink and got down to business. "The Institute of Governmental Studies is not government-connected, nor confined to any one planet. It's a private operation supported by a dozen foundations. It had its beginnings way back in the pre-space era. Our work is described by its name. The IGS collects data and, on request, makes studies of whatever governmental problems anybody cares to drop in our lap. When a study is complete, we pass along the results and our recommendations. I want you to come to work with us."
"Oh. What would my job be?"
Neff shrugged. "Who knows? Maybe to boot me out and take over the whole show! I've learned a good bit about you, Mirni, and you look ideal for our line of activity. That training you got, manipulating your play-people, seems to have given you a rare insight into political ways and means. I'm offering you a chance to develop and use that insight."
"To solve problems, the way I tried to for Fingal?"
"Yes, and the way you did for Captain Devista on the Strahorn. You did better there, I would say, than on Fingal—probably because you had more pertinent information to use."
Mirni nodded guiltily. "I was sloppy in my thinking about Fingal, I guess. I did need more information, and maybe I was too anxious to please. I should have figured out something that wouldn't increase, even for a moment, the hostility between Fingal and Earth. And I shouldn't have left Fingal with a split-population problem in the making."
"But you got the immigrants moving away from Earth en masse again, for the first time this century," gloated Neff. "The unpleasant side effects are trivial compared to that! The people have to keep moving outward, or we'll wind up in a mess that nothing short of interstellar war can end. Conditions are already bad—everybody suspicious of everybody else."
"Yes, I know," Mirni agreed. "Is that the kind of thing IGS is concerned about?"
"Very much so!"
"Then I'll be glad to try to help," Mirni said.
* * *
IGS was small, with a staff of some four hundred persons, all of whom seemed to share Neff's inclination to hustle. Mirni hustled, too, although he soon realized the "hurry syndrome" was a response to a feeling of inadequacy. Relations between the human-settled planets were almost unanimously strained, and were worsening steadily. And the Institute, seemingly alone in its effort to find sound, unbiased resolutions to the vast complexity of discords, was indeed inadequate for the task.
So Mirni hustled. One of his first acts was to devise a means of getting IGS into action on urgent issues about which the Institute had not been consulted. This was his "review and insinuate" approach, in which IGS would inform some ex-client planet that a closed study had been reexamined in the light of recently-acquired data, and that additional recommendations were being dispatched. These recommendations would manage to touch upon—at least in passing—the urgent issue IGS wanted a hand in, thus "insinuating" the Institute into the role it desired.
And with the Institute's research facilities at his fingertips, Mirni soon proved his ability for finding useful means of settling troublesome disputes, some of which had lingered stubbornly for centuries. Also, he could phrase recommendations in ways that appealed to their recipients, and made their acceptance likely. This all but eliminated the most aggravating burden of any strictly advisory operation—that of convincing the clients they should heed the offered advice.
The task was endless, but with Mirni's arrival it soon ceased being hopeless. The Institute was making headway, and so were interstellar relations.
"You're a marvel, Mirni, my boy!" Neff enthused one morning. "There's no stopping you! What's your objective—first President of the United Planets?"
Mirni laughed, as he often did since joining the Institute. "Nothing like that, boss. I'm all for a United Planets, but the IGS gives me a better means of getting work done than any government position could. But watch yourself, sir, because I do have my eye on your job—and maybe on your granddaughter!"
"You'll be welcome to both with my blessings, son," Neff grinned, putting his feet on his desk and relaxing. "Any time!"
His work and Patricia Neff had preoccupied Mirni so fully that the letter from the Psychomed Center caught him by surprise. It was a jolting reminder of an unhappy mental state that, while less than two months behind him, had seemed distant and almost forgotten. Unwillingly, he tore open the envelope and scanned the contents, picking out key passages:
"Our preliminary summary is fully supported by further study of the data . . .
"The obvious question is: Why did the 'teachers' choose to erase Mirni's training? Only one tenable answer presents itself, although we have searched diligently for an alternative explanation. To put it bluntly, Mirni flunked out of their 'school.' Presumably the nature of his studies was such that the non-graduates cannot be released with possibly dangerous partial knowledge. At any rate, we conclude that Mirni's performance was not satisfactory.
"This finding is in no way a criticism of Dalton Mirni. We consider him a superior person in every respect. If he flunked out of the 'school,' then the human race itself flunked out. Needless to say, we trust that this finding will not be communicated to the public, as it would be harmfully and pointlessly depressing.
"The detrimental effect on morale . . . has perhaps manifested itself in one researcher, DV, on our staff (See File DV-437). Unable to accept the evidence of humanity's poor rating in the estimation of the 'teacher' race, DV denies that Mirni flunked out. To support this belief, he states that the only knowledge Mirni lost was theoretical, and that Mirni was permitted to keep skills derived from the theoretical training.
"As DV explains the case, Mirni can be compared to persons who are taught the 'theory of science' of some field to aid them in developing special skills which, once acquired, will function without further referral to theory. He cites artists and musicians as typical examples. When confronted by the fact that such persons remember their more academic preparatory work, he admits this is true, but argues that such retention is not essential to skilled performance.
"In Mirni's case, the theoretical training postulated by DV was in 'advanced political science,' from which working and retained skills were developed during the play-people 'lab course.'
"The essential failure of DV's hypothesis is that it offers no satisfactory reason for the removal of Mirni's memory. DV's only suggestion is that the teaching of 'advanced political science' is a role jealously guarded by the 'teachers,' that perhaps it is a role no 'student' could adequately fill. Thus, Mirni's theoretical knowledge was taken from him so that he would engage in no vain attempts to train others.
"This is far too conjectural, and too wishful, a line of thought to be taken seriously."
* * *
All this was not easy to take. It stir
red a dull echo of that sick emptiness that had hit Mirni, months before, when he had first discovered his loss. Still, he was able to feel a wave of sympathy for the researcher DV, who was finding the situation so difficult to accept.
But of course DV was wrong. He had to be. Mirni's training—whatever it may have been—could hardly have been to prepare him for something as simple as this political work he was doing for IGS. Why, this was just play-people stuff! Satisfying, useful work, certainly, but work that could be done by anyone with the understanding needed to get along with people and to comprehend the mechanisms of society. There was no—no wisdom required. Definitely not a twenty-year accumulation of wisdom.
Still, DV could be right, Mirni mused. There was no actual evidence to prove the man wrong. There was a possibility that Mirni was now engaged in precisely the kind of work for which the teachers had prepared him. It was a tempting idea, anyway, and—
And that was just the trouble with it, Mirni concluded with a feeling of impatience with himself. It was tempting! He, more than DV or anyone else, could fall very easily into the trap of wishful thinking on this subject. If he had learned any lesson well among the play-people, it was not to cling to some cherished notion despite abundant logic and evidence that the notion was wrong. Such clinging was the road to irrationality.
Disappointments had to be accepted, and lived with. And for that matter, he had no time to waste grieving over a lost dream—not with the chore of establishing peace and relative tranquility among a hundred and sixty-two planets on his hands, plus a dinner date with Pat Neff.
Mirni stuffed the report in a bottom drawer and got to work.
The Other Way Around
For a score of days the chronicler Raedulf had sought the magician, trailing him on uncertain information obtained from sulky peasants, importuning mendicants and cautious bandits encountered along the way.
The going was often difficult. The magician followed the weedy Roman roads only when they seemed to suit his odd fancy. Nor did he confine his course to the wandering byways and riding paths.
It was as if, thought Raedulf, the magician were impatient with the routes of ordinary men, pushing his way instead through whatever bog and bramble stood between him and his destination.
Why, then, was the course he took so far from straight?
Raedulf was minded of some mighty knight bereft of his senses by too many blows on the head in too many jousts, mounting his charger and clattering hither and yon while convinced he was riding straight into the face of the foe.
"Yea, I encountered an ancient such as you detail," said a young friar met on the old road along the River Kennet. "We talked somewhat, but I fear he will find meager favor in the eyes of our Redeemer. There was no charity in the man."
Raedulf took the hint and dropped two coppers in the young man's hand. "Did he say whither he journeyed?"
"No, gracious sir, nor whence he came. He was hard of speech and arm, and I did not deem it prudent to question him closely. He seemed of a sullen humor."
Raedulf nodded. All reports indicated the magician was indeed a man of temper. "Did he say ought to you of his errand?"
"Nothing. He tested my knowledge on various matters, sneering at my replies, then whirled and strode away. He muttered foully at what he called my ignorance of the Old Stones."
"I know little of the Old Stones, myself," said Raedulf, "except that they stand somewhere in this region of Briton."
"They form a round figure, and are ten leagues south and west from here. That was all I could respond to the ancient's test."
Raedulf grew alert. "He wished to know where the Old Stones stand, then?"
"Why . . . I think not. Seemingly he knew, and was but trying my knowledge." The friar hesitated with puckered face. "Think you the ancient scamp made a pretense of trying me, to hide his own ignorance?"
Raedulf replied, "The ancient scamp seems capable of that—or of most anything."
The friar uttered an unchristian oath. "I am shamed to have been awed! A fraud!"
"It is perhaps well you were," said Raedulf. "This ancient may travel like a bull both crazed and lost, but like the bull he has horns with which to gore."
After proper farewells, Raedulf turned his mare and rode westward along the road, watchful for a good way trending more to the south. By and by he found a side road that proved well-frequented, with a fair scattering of villages and farm stockades along the way.
Through the afternoon he rode at a comfortable pace, having no need for hurry if the magician were indeed making for the Old Stones. The magician traveled afoot and would easily be outpaced to the destination by Raedulf's mare.
The chronicler found a comfortable inn for the night, and there obtained clearer information on the location of the Old Stones and how they might best be reached. He was also warned that the Stones were in outlaw-infested country, to which he nodded solemnly, thinking of how many times he had received similar warnings during this quest, and of how he had yet to meet a brigand who cared to challenge a man who was mounted and wearing a sword.
If he rode in fear of any man, Raedulf mused, that man might best be the very one he was seeking.
Late the following afternoon he reached the Old Stones. They rose above the thick brush of the deserted heath like some primitive colonnade. Raedulf stared at them in wonder. Here was surely a thing that should be better chronicled. Who had raised these great stone slabs on end along a circling line, and had spanned many of their tops with massive lintels?
Certainly they were not the work of the Romans. They had not the style of Roman structures. And they appeared far too old.
Allowing his mare to stroll along what paths she could find through the brush, Raedulf explored the place at length, but found nothing enlightening. Here and there were ashes of campfires, some quite fresh, left by outlaws or outcasts or whoever, but nothing to indicate what the Stones might have once been.
And no sign of the magician. The old man would not reach the place until the morrow, he guessed.
With that thought, he turned his mount back the way he had come, toward the stockade of a peasant-squire he had passed half a league to the north.
He met the magician on the way.
Raedulf had never seen him before, but descriptions made his identity certain. He was a huge man, a head taller than even King Lort, with a heavy beard of gray and frowning brown eyes. Strapped to his shoulders was a backpack of peculiar design.
The magician halted in the middle of the path, and Raedulf stopped his mare.
"Hail, thou of renowned wisdom!" he called out.
The magician's right hand stole out of sight under his cloak. "Who the hell are you?" he growled.
Taken aback by the strangeness and vehemence of the magician's words, he replied, "Raedulf of Clerwint, good sire, a chronicler in the service of God and His Majesty, Lort."
"Huh! A damned newspaper reporter! Of a sort, anyway. You know who I am?"
"Thou art he who is called Merlin," replied Raedulf, wondering if it would be safe as well as courteous to dismount.
The magician said, "I'm Wilmoth T. Aberlea of Maryland, and if you hayseeds make 'Merlin' out of that, what the hell's the difference to me?" He paused. "Is this a chance meeting, what's-your-name, or were you laying for me?"
"Raedulf of Clerwint," the chronicler supplied, feeling miffed. "I confess to having sought you out, good magicker."
"Okay, Roddy," the magician said brusquely, "let's hear what you want. I'm a busy man."
"In behalf of my liege, sire, I would have of you circumstantial knowledge of the lamented King Arthur."
Merlin stared at him, then chuckled. Raedulf took heart from this display of good humor and dismounted.
"This Lort of yours . . . isn't he the bully boy over in the Leicester neighborhood? What's his interest in Arthur?"
"There is a likeness in the names, Lort and Arthur," Raedulf explained. "My lord wishes to know if there is a tie of blood; if, inde
ed, he might be heir to the kingdom of Camelot. And if so, he would have me enquire the whereabouts of that kingdom."
The magician bellowed a gust of laughter, then soured abruptly. "Tell him no," he grunted. "Now pull your pony aside so I can get by, boy."
Raedulf began moving his mare slowly out of the way, hesitant to let the magician move on but fearful of disobeying. "Frankly, renowned magicker," he entreated, "that is not the answer my liege wishes to hear."
"Nuts to your puny liege!" grumbled Merlin as he stomped forward. Raedulf quickly yanked the mare aside as the magician went past, and stood looking helplessly after him.
But a few steps later the magician halted and turned, frowning unhappily. "This Lort of yours . . . he doesn't know his own genealogy?"
"Not precisely, sire," Raedulf replied. "Like the great Arthur himself, my king's origins are confused. Since the departure of the Roman legions, our land has been rife with disorder and civil strife to a degree that families are uprooted and—"
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