The Gods of Riverworld

by Philip José Farmer

  First, he had them describe their appearance in the converter. It had taken place in the huge cube in a corner of this very room. They had awakened from death in the converter, and, after a few moments of confusion, had opened the door and gone into this room. They had explored the other rooms, then gone into the corridor. And Burton had come around the corner in his flying chair.

  “Then you saw no one else?” he said.

  They replied that they had not.

  Burton took Gull into the bathroom of the next room and found, as he had expected, a bottle with a liquid to apply to the scratches on his face. This stopped the bleeding and would, within twenty-four hours, heal the wounds.

  He asked them if they were hungry. Netley and the women said they were; Gull shook his head. Burton got their orders and transmitted them to the converter. After they were seated and eating from little tables before them, Burton launched into the very long exposition of the Riverworld, of his and others’ tribulations in getting to the tower, and what had happened since. By the time he was through, he had drunk two tall goblets of Scotch, and they were deep into their own cups.

  “So you see,” he said, “just what the situation is. I know you have a thousand questions, and it will take you some time to learn to use the Computer. Meanwhile, I suggest that you settle down for the night—I can get sleeping pills for you if you wish—and I’ll see you tomorrow. I’ll also introduce you to my eight companions then. Perhaps not personally but via the wall-screens.”

  Mary Kelly said, slurring, “How do we know that those two bastards won’t try to murder us again while we sleep?”

  “I would not even dream of doing such a deed!” Gull said. “I have changed; I am not what I was! Believe me, ladies, I deeply regret my crimes, and I have tried—am trying—to live a Christian life. I would not only not harm you, I would defend you against anyone who tried to do so.”

  “Fine words,” Liz Stride said scornfully.

  “I mean them, madam, I truly do!”

  “I think he’s sincere,” Burton said. “In any event, I suggest that you three women sleep in an apartment room separate from that of the men. I will give you a codeword that will prevent anyone from coming through your door except myself and you three.”

  After he had shown them how to get food and drink from their converters and how to call him, he left them. Instead of going on to his world, he returned to his apartment. Since he would have to show them the ropes tomorrow morning, he should be close to them.

  On the way back, he considered the question of who had resurrected the five. Whoever it was had a vicious sense of irony. But who could it be? Only Frigate and Nur knew about his investigations of the Ripper, and neither would have brought five here. Who then? Loga and the Mongolian Agent were dead. Was there … he did not even like to approach the thought … another unknown, another Snark?

  Burton had just gotten into bed when a screen appeared on the wall. Star Spoon’s distraught face was in it.

  Speaking Esperanto rapidly, tears flowing, she asked Burton if she could come to his apartment.

  “Why?”

  “I am tired of sharing Po with five other women, though he gives very little time to any of us. He’s too busy drinking with his cronies or studying. Besides … I do not desire his embraces.”

  Burton did not have to ask her whose embraces she did desire.

  “Does Po know you’re calling me?”

  “Yes. I told him an hour ago. He raved and ranted and then…”

  “He didn’t beat you?”

  “No, he does not beat women, I’ll say that for him. Not physically, anyway.”

  “And then?”

  “Then? Oh! Yes, he smiled and blessed me and said he hoped I’d be happy with you. He spoiled it, though, by saying that he doubted that I would.”

  Burton got out of bed and put on a towel-kilt. “I’d like to speak with him.”

  Her black eyes widened. “Why? Do you think I’m lying?”

  “No, of course not. It’s just that I don’t want him to think I’m afraid to face him. I also want to make sure that he doesn’t think I was sneaking around behind his back.”

  “Oh, he doesn’t think that. I told him that you were not in the least aware I desired you.”

  “That’s a lie,” Burton said, but he did not reproach her. There were lies and there were lies, and this was in the “white” category. Besides, who was he to rebuke anyone for falsehood?

  “I’ll speak to him if he’s awake,” Burton said.

  “No, he’s awake, but he won’t want to be disturbed. He’s with a woman. A woman he just resurrected. He said she’ll replace me. Poor devil.”

  “Perhaps,” Burton said. “But for the time being she’ll be very grateful he rescued her from the dead.”

  He was not in love with the Chinese woman. However, he did not consider love to be a prerequisite for a good bond between man and woman. He had certainly been in love with Alice, and look at what had happened to them.

  “Come on over,” Burton said. “I’ll tell the Computer to let you in.”

  Star Spoon quit weeping and snuffling and smiled like the sun at dawn.

  “Just as soon as I repair my makeup and get my belongings together. You do want me, don’t you?”

  “If I didn’t, I would say so,” Burton said.

  He did not get to sleep until five in the morning.

  24

  Burton called the three women, in their room, and the two men, who had slept in separate rooms. After bidding them good morning, he told them that he had instructed the Computer to teach them how to operate it. He also invited them to the weekly meeting of the eight—more now—that evening.

  “After that, you’re on your own. I will, however, call you now and then or even drop in on you, if I’m welcome. And you may call me if you have some problem.”

  They did not like what he said. Apparently, they felt that he should devote all his time to making sure that they were adjusted. But they could do nothing about it.

  He and Star Spoon had breakfast, eggs au beurre noir, blueberry muffins, and figs with cream. They then flew to his little world, Theleme, named after the mythical state in Rabelais’ Gargantua and Pantagruel. Its motto was, in the old Frenchman’s work, Do What You Will. Burton’s motto was: Do What Burton Wills. The world might, however, have been better called Baghdad-in-the-Tower. Burton had had erected in its center a small town and castle that looked like a romanticist’s or Hollywood producer’s conception of a place out of The Thousand Nights and One. A river ran from the west end of the vast chamber, circled the city, and snaked eastward, disappearing in the sands of the desert not far from the entrance. Outside the city roamed several lions and leopards and many gazelles, antelopes, ostriches, and other desert creatures. Hippopotami and crocodiles swam in the river, and the patches of jungle were alive with monkeys, civet cats, and birds.

  As of the moment, Theleme was populated only by himself and Star Spoon. He planned to bring in some suitable people later, though he was in no hurry.

  At 8:00 P.M., he and Star Spoon went to the party, though not without incident. The black motorcycle rider, this time with a black woman riding behind him, roared below them. The man waved a hand at them but his greeting was more courteous. “Hey, Burton, what’s happening?” A few seconds later, they traveled over a large pig trotting along, its hooves clicking.

  “My God,” Burton said. “Now what?”

  “I don’t know,” Star Spoon said. “I talked to Aphra this afternoon, and she said she’s running into people she never saw before. Most of them are from Tom Turpin’s world. At least, she thinks so, since they’re black. But she flew by a dozen people that looked like gypsies.”

  “Gypsies? Who’d resurrect them?”

  They entered Nur’s apartment, which was noisy with chatter and laughter. Alice was there, dressed in the 1920s flapper’s clothes that she liked so much. She smiled slightly at him but made no effort then or later to tal
k to him. He had expected to surprise everybody by showing up with the Chinese woman. Apparently, however, Li Po had told them about her. If he was jealous, he did not show it. He was realist enough to know that a display of it would not only be useless but also make him lose face. Besides, he was not suffering from lack of company or sex. He had by now resurrected forty men and forty-seven women, all of whom he had known on Earth. Seven of the women were his, one for each day of the week. Tonight, however, he had brought only one.

  “They take turns going with me to these meetings,” he told Burton.

  “Eventually, they’re going to tire of this sharing and resurrect men for themselves,” Burton said. “What do you plan to do then?”

  “Nothing,” Li Po said, smiling. “I am not a tyrant. When that happens, I will raise others to replace them. It is just as well that does happen, since, sooner or later, I will tire of them or, difficult as it is to conceive, they may tire of me.”

  Burton could visualize the people-burgeoning of Li Po’s world. When the saturation point was reached, the excess would have to live in the apartments. The same thing was happening in Turpin’s world.

  “Man, I don’t know,” Turpin said, shaking his head. “It all started out with the people I brought in, and then it got out of hand. They resurrected people, and those raised people, and now those’re resurrecting like it was going out of style.”

  Burton told him about the black motorcyclist. Turpin grinned and said, “That’s Bill Williams. I don’t know who in hell brought him here. I could find out, but what difference would it make? He isn’t an American black, you know. He’s Russian.”

  “Russian?”

  “Yeah. He’s got quite a story to tell. You ought to talk to him sometime.”

  Burton had observed Gull, Netley, Crook, Stride, and Kelly when he entered. They were standing in two corners, the men in one, the women in another, and they were obviously not meshing with the others. Burton took them around the room to introduce them. It seemed, however, that Frigate had already spread the news about them. This had aroused curiosity about the newcomers, but many were uneasy with Netley and Gull. Anyone would be in the company of the two-thirds of the unholy trinity forming “Jack the Ripper.” So affected was Netley by this that he left early. Burton went into the hall off the main room, where he was unobserved, and ordered the Computer to keep track of him.

  Noticing the shyness of Stride, Crook, and Kelly, Nur went to them and soon jollied them up. He was at ease with the high and the low, the educated and the uneducated, the rich and the poor, and he adjusted quickly to any company, though he always kept his dignity. After a while, Aphra Behn and Frigate joined them, and Nur drifted off, ending up with Gull. Curious, Burton invited himself into the conversation.

  Gull was telling the Moor about the man who had converted him, Lorenzo Dow. Dow had been born in Coventry, Tolland County, Connecticut, in 1777. A highly imaginative and impressionable youngster, he had become devout beyond his years when he had seen an angel. Or claimed to have done so. As a young adult, he became a traveling preacher loosely connected to the Methodist Church. Of all the wandering ministers of the early American frontier, he had been the most traveled and best known. He was famous from Maine to South Carolina and from New York to the wildernesses of the Mississippi River. Wherever there were even a few people, he traveled by boat, by coach, by horse, or on foot, and he preached his eccentric rambling sermons.

  When he was raised from the dead on the Riverworld, he had been surprised but not shocked. “I was wrong in some things,” he told his converts. “But mainly right.”

  He was convinced that the angel he had seen as a child was one of those who had made this Riverworld as a stage through which the worthy must pass to get to a better world. He believed, like the Second Chancers, that all must strive to better themselves morally and spiritually. Unlike the Chancers, he did not believe that the ultimate goal was absorption in the Godhead. No, this River was only a sort of purgatory in which God and his angels had given everybody another chance. But those who attained the rich change of spirit demanded here would go on to another world in which they would be physically resurrected again. However, those who failed would die here and become dust forever.

  “I have met your angels,” Burton said, “and they are only men and women. In fact, except for one, they were born on Earth and died there when they were children. The exception was Monat, an extra-Terrestrial, a nonhuman, who was in charge of this project. Does this tower look as if it had been built by angels?”

  “It certainly does,” Gull said. “This Loga you speak of, he … he must be a fallen angel.”

  “You’re crazy, man,” Burton said, and he walked away.

  “That man,” Star Spoon said, “will resurrect others of his faith, and we won’t be able to go into the halls without bumping into them. His kind won’t leave you alone.”

  “We’ll be in Theleme. They won’t get in there.”

  “No person or place is inviolable.”

  Star Spoon fitted into Burton’s way of life as a well-made shoe shaped itself around a foot. The analogy was not just literary. When he took his shoes off, he did not have to pay any attention to them until he was ready to wear them again. The woman seemed content to be ignored when he was busy studying or working the Computer. She often operated it when he was doing the same. She was an excellent companion, a ready and sometimes amusing talker, and she did not insist on interrupting him. She was intelligent, knew Chinese poetry, could paint well, and played the Chinese lute beautifully. She was passionate, thoroughly versed in every aspect of sex, uninhibited, and yet, when Burton did not make love to her for a week because he was engrossed in his studies, she did not seem to mind.

  The only thing that Star Spoon complained about was that she could not bring her parents to this place. She had located her mother, but she was alive in The Valley. Her father could not be found.

  “You would not mind if I could bring them here?” she said. “Perhaps, someday, I will be able to get them here. They could have their own apartment, and they would not bother you. I would see them only when you consented.”

  “Not at all,” Burton said. “Bring your sisters and brothers, too. Your aunts and uncles and your cousins.”

  He could not have stopped her if had wanted to, but he was not going to tell her that. Why spoil her desire to please him? She was a perfect mate for him.

  When he spoke of this to Frigate, the American said, “I’m surprised that she didn’t learn to be more independent while she was in The Valley. She was raised in the Chinese culture of the eighth century, but she must have lived in many others in The Valley. Usually, The Valley frees women.”

  “Not always by any means,” Burton said. “She’s had a rough life, to put it mildly. You know the sad story of her Terrestrial life. She didn’t fare any better on The River. She was raped several scores of times in The Valley, but she doesn’t seem to have suffered any deep trauma because of that.”

  “She doesn’t seem to, but she’s very self-controlled.”

  “Ah, yes, the inscrutable Oriental.”

  “She’s very beautiful.”

  “Exquisite. And I must confess that I’m flattered that she wanted me so fiercely. However … I still prefer a blond not-too-bright Caucasian who’s devoted to me.”

  “If you find one and resurrect her, watch out for Star Spoon. There’s more fire in her than she lets on to.”

  Several days after the party, Burton and Star Spoon set out to visit Frigate’s world in specially built chairs designed by Burton. These were larger than the others and were completely enclosed in a three-inch-thick irradiated plastic hemisphere. Beamers projecting from the shell could be fired fore and aft, above and below.

  Star Spoon, seeing them the first time, had murmured, “Whom are you afraid of?”

  “I fear nobody,” he said, “but I trust very few. There are too many strangers, unknown quantities, prowling the corridors. Also, we still d
on’t have any assurance that an Ethical isn’t hidden here.”

  They rose in their chairs above the minarets and domes made of gold alloy and glittering with gigantic jewels, and they sped over the river and the jungle to the exit. Burton pressed a console button, which transmitted the coded open-sesame via radio. Star Spoon’s vehicle lacked this because he had refused to give her access to the codeword. She had hesitatingly asked him why, and he had told her that he did not want to take the chance that she might be seized and the codeword forced from her.

  “Who would do that?” she had said softly.

  “Perhaps nobody. But it’s a possibility.”

  “What if they should grab you and torture the codeword from you?”

  “I’ve anticipated that.”

  She did not ask him what the precautions were. Obviously, if she knew, she could be forced to give that information.

  The circular area was empty of people, though a few robots were cleaning up the litter. Halting his chair before the entrance to Frigate’s world, Burton shouted Frigate’s name. In a few seconds, the American’s face appeared on a glowing screen. The door opened outward, and they went through in single file. The second door admitted them into a world where the sun was ten degrees past the zenith, the temperature was 85°F, and the air was wet. They shot over a very thick, lush jungle, a river and several joining streams, and some large clearings. The creatures in the streams and basking on the banks were crocodilian, vast and toothy. Now and then they glimpsed a huge reptilian head at the end of a long neck, and, once, an armor-plated saurian lumbered across the clearing. Winged reptiles swooped by them: pterodactlys. These were not from recordings, since the Ethicals had arrived on Earth seventy million years after the last of the dinosaurs had died. But Frigate had had the Computer fashion living replicas of the mighty beasts, and these reigned in the lush growths. In the center of the Brobdingnagian chamber was a rock monolith, two hundred feet high, with slick leaning-out sides impossible for anything to scale. On top was his stronghold, a flat ten acres with an antebellum Southern mansion in the center of an island surrounded by a wide moat in which swam ducks, geese, and swans. Burton and Star Spoon landed on the green lawn before it.