Collected Fiction

by Henry Kuttner

  “It was—is. Only you’ve never done it.” “No.”

  DAWSON waited a minute, and then said, with carefully-assumed casualness, “I suppose the Council would give you permission to go ahead with the experiment, if you asked?”

  Fered looked almost guilty.

  “But, Dawson, why should I? I could do nothing that the Council could not do much better. It would be selfish of me.”

  “Why? The Council could still have the plans, and you might just happen to stumble over something they’d miss. Why, look here, Fered—” Dawson pointed out an angle the other had apparently overlooked in his sketchy diagrams. “How would vibration affect molecular action? And quanta? Suppose—”

  “The molecules would be—” Fered stopped. “This isn’t my job!”

  Dawson said nothing. Fered walked to the other end of the room and back. He glanced down at the diagrams, and remained without moving for a full minute. And Dawson smiled.

  Maybe it was merely throwing a monkey-wrench in the machinery. Perhaps it was that Dawson liked Fered, and felt sorry for the kid after seeing what had happened during the near-accident.

  A little self-reliance wouldn’t hurt Fered. If he worked on the experiment by himself, it would give him a feeling of independence, a realization that he wasn’t just a cog in a machine. There was something unwholesome about the utter lack of self-reliance in Dasonee.

  Dawson dined that night with Fered and Bethya. He was beginning to like them both, but seeing them together brought back painful and poignant memories. The soft lighting of the room reminded him of a restaurant in Greenwich Village, where he had often taken Marian.

  Abruptly he was struck with a sense of complete unreality.

  Could it be true that he was sitting here alive, eating, drinking, in the twenty-sixth century, while everything he had ever known was merely—history? And Marian? She was not even history. It was horrible to think that she had passed without leaving the slightest trace on Earth. She was dust, and the food was dust, too, in Dawson’s mouth.

  HE fought down the unhealthy feeling.

  He’d have to keep his mind fully occupied . . .

  “How’s the experiment? Did you ask permission?”

  “Yes.” Fered smiled at Bethya’s inquiring blond eyebrows. “I’m going to work it out myself, darlya. Or try to.”

  The girl shook her head, but before she could reply a bell rang softly. A panel opened in the table, and a small metal cylinder popped out before Fered. He picked it up, glancing at the others.

  “Speaking of the subject, this must be the answer.”

  Dawson was pondering on the evolution of the colloquialism—“talk of the devil”—when Fered looked up, his eyes agleam. “I’ve got permission!”

  “You have?” Somehow Dawson felt a pang of disappointment. He had expected something else, though he did not know just what.

  “Yes. They want me to come to Washington. They’ll put an entire laboratory at my service. Darlya—” He sprang up, circled the table, and kissed Bethya enthusiastically. “This will mean a very large grant!” The girl’s eyes glistened.

  “You’re going to leave me?” she said. “It’s not for long. I’m handicapped a little here. I’ll have so much equipment in Washington. And whenever I’m stuck, I can get help.”

  “Uh-huh,” Dawson said.

  Fered flushed. “I don’t mean—well, it won’t take long, anyway. They want you to come, too, Dawson. They sent you greetings and asked me to bring you.”

  “Nice of them. Suppose I don’t go to the Council?” Dawson resented feeling like a cog in a well-oiled machine.

  “Why, I imagine they’d send someone to you.”

  Very nice and friendly! A bit too much so. There seemed to be a dread of causing friction on the part of this mysterious Council.

  It was, perhaps, a subconscious fear of meeting the Council, more than anything else, that made Dawson refuse to accompany Fered the next morning when he took his departure.

  But apparently there were no ill effects, immediately, at least. Dawson continued to live in Fered’s home, and Bethya took him in charge. She was a conscientious hostess, though it was plain that she missed Fered badly.

  “We’ve never been separated before, S’ephen. It’s like losing him.”

  “He’ll be back.”

  Bethya looked away.

  “You don’t understand. You don’t know what it means—”

  She stopped abruptly.

  “There’s the televisor. Just a minute.” They were in Fered’s home. It was late evening. Dawson saw the televisor screen light up, and the figure of a uniformed man appear on it.

  “Bethya Dorn?”

  “Yes.”

  “When I called your home they told me I’d find you here. I’m representing the Council. Are you in charge of the man named Stephen Dawson?”

  “He’s right here with me.”

  “He is asked again to come to Washington. The Council is anxious to learn of the past from him. Will he come?”

  “Ask him about Fered.” Dawson said. The official heard. “Fered Yolath has been made a member of the Council.”

  Briefly Bethya stood perfectly motionless. Then her hand flew up to her throat. “Oh—no—” she cried.

  Dawson was beside her. “What’s all this?”

  “Johan Burk of the Council died today,” the man on the screen said. “He has been ill for some time. Instead of holding an election, the Council examined Fered Yolath and recognized his potentialities and achievement in a theory he presented. He was appointed a member.”

  Dawson’s arm was around Bethya’s shoulder, keeping her from falling.

  “Will you come to Washington, Stephen Dawson? The Council invites you.”

  “Yes. I’ll come. I’d like to meet—the Council!”

  CHAPTER IV

  The Council

  BETHYA looked up with tearful eyes at Dawson.

  “Fered would never have consented. We talked it over often. He said that if they elected him, he’d refuse. He loved me.” They were sitting in the robot-controlled Washington air-liner, a government-owned plane that was ready for them at the airport the next morning. Dawson had been amazed by the smallness of the wings and the rocketing speed it developed. It would not take long to reach Washington, at this rate.

  “We’ll see Fered. If they’ll let us.”

  “They’ll let us.”

  Dawson nodded. The Council must be pretty sure of itself. But what on Earth could have changed Fered’s mind so suddenly? He didn’t know.

  “It was good of you to come,” Bethya said.

  “Forget it. I’d have had to see the Council sometime.”

  “I feel better with you along, though. Not so lonely.”

  Dawson grinned. That, of course, was the motive behind his decision. He liked both Bethya and Fered, and had realized how helpless this child of a strangely decadent culture would be under the circumstances. Besides, he was curious.

  A streak flashed by outside the plane, far above. Dawson pointed.

  “What’s that?”

  “A stratoship.”

  “Moving fast.”

  “It doesn’t use propellers. It’s powered by the Earth’s magnetic lines of force.”

  This was electro-magnetism with a vengeance. Dawson whistled. Good Lord! If mankind had discovered that power, why hadn’t they used it in the construction of space ships? Another mystery to ponder!

  He relaxed, examining his broken arm. It was healing surprisingly fast, and there was scarcely any pain. The brace still held it motionless.

  The plane sped on. The countryside below was lovely, little changed from the scene Dawson remembered. The rolling hills, forests, and plains remained the same. Rivers and mountains had not altered in six hundred years. But the occasional cities were far different, delicate structures like toy villages.

  There were many broad highways, with cars on them, and a surprising number of helicopter planes in the
air. People had plenty of time to play. Perhaps too much time . . .

  THEY did not touch New York, and Dawson was vaguely relieved at that. He found himself remembering the vast metropolis of his time, with the Empire State thrusting up gigantically against the blue sky, and snow crunching underfoot in Times Square. Always, tied up inextricably with those memories, was Marian, with her curling brown hair and her soft lips . . . Dust!

  Dawson set his jaw and stared ahead. A city was coming into view ahead. “Washington,” Bethya said.

  The man looked in vain for the Capitol’s dome. Instead of the great city he remembered, he saw a park, with a number of smaller buildings surrounding what looked like a stone block. The towers and minarets of other towns were not here. There was only this great cube of undecorated stone towering above what had been Washington.

  Its roof was a garden, however, lush with bright flowers, and in the exact center was a great elliptical dome of silvery metal. The contrast with the elfin cities Dawson had seen was striking.

  There was no need to touch the controls. Following its radio beam, handled by robot machinery, the plane slackened its flight and angled down smoothly. They were level with the roof of the great white cube. It towered above them as they sank down. They were descending into a small, cleared space of greensward.

  There was not the slightest jolt as the plane landed and a door slid open. A man was standing outside, clad in a neat gray uniform of light material. His long face was pleasant enough, but in his belt Dawson saw a small, light pistol that looked like a toy.

  “Come in,” the man smiled. “You’re Stephen Dawson, of course. The Council is ready for you.” He pointed back of him to where the vast cube rose. “It’s not far. And you—” His eyes asked a question. Bethya got out of the plane.

  “I want to see Fered Yolath.”

  “The new member of the Council? You’re a relative? I’ll have to ask. Usually the Council is completely isolated, you know, but in cases like these an exception is sometimes made. Come along.”

  The guide led the way. Bethya, in an instinctive, long-forgotten gesture, slipped her hand into Dawson’s, and he tightened his grasp on it with a comforting squeeze.

  There was no need for words.

  There was a small arched door in the face of the cube that they approached. Again Dawson was struck by the vastness of the structure. It was like the ramp of a cliff, as though he stood at the bottom of the Grand Canyon and stared up, craning his neck.

  “Come along.”

  The door slid up. They entered a bare, stone-walled corridor. They walked forward perhaps two hundred feet, turned sharply to the left after their guide, and found themselves in a small room empty save for five chairs neatly ranged in a row.

  “Sit down,” the guide said genially. “I’ll see if the Council will see you, girl. Your name is—”

  She told him, and the man slipped away. For a space Bethya and Dawson sat motionless, staring at the blank wall ahead of them.

  Suddenly it began to move. It slid upward smoothly, utterly without sound, and vanished. They looked down a long corridor. At its end was a stone wall, featureless.

  The row of chairs began to slip forward, on a moving conveyor belt, Dawson thought.

  “Do not be alarmed,” a quiet voice from nowhere announced. “You are entering the Council Room. The girl, Bethya Dorn, may see Fered Yolath, though we do not usually have contact with the outer world.”

  As they approached the end of the passage, the wall in which it ended also slid up. The row of chairs moved on, into a square, fairly large room that was empty save for a long, low bench set to face the moving chairs.

  On this bench sat five men and a woman.

  Dawson scarcely realized that he had stopped moving. He was staring at the five motionless figures who ruled the Earth. No—it was the woman at whom he looked. And his breath caught sharply in his throat.

  He stopped breathing. He had never thought he would see that face again—brown curling ringlets, and gray eyes cool under the sweeping lashes . . .

  He swallowed convulsively. It wasn’t Marian. Like her, but not the same—not quite.

  Yet it had been a shock. To see again that face so very much like Marian’s. He looked more closely.

  She was small and soft and fragile-looking, with a slightly tilted nose. She seemed very warmly human in the sleeveless light fabric garment she wore. Her eyes met Dawson, and he felt a cold, inexplicable shock ripple down his spine. He could not have told why.

  It was Bethya’s voice that brought him back.

  “Fered!”

  Dawson looked. The other men were normal specimens, two of them gray-haired, with smooth, beardless faces, two of them approaching middle age, and there was Fered, too, sealed at one end.

  He wore the same sleeveless plain garment as the others.

  “Yes, Bethya?” he said.

  THE girl glanced at the others.

  “May I speak?”

  “Of course,” said one of the older men. “Speak as you wish. The Council is for the help and guidance of humanity.”

  Reassured, Bethya looked again at Fered. “Why did you do it?” she asked, her voice quite steady. “You said that if you were elected to the Council, you’d refuse.”

  Dawson waited for the answer. But, when it came, he was shocked nevertheless.

  “Perhaps I owe you an explanation,” Fered said. “This may be difficult for you to understand, but I have learned a great deal in the last twenty-four longsecs. I told the Council of my theory, and they thought more of it, even, than I did. Johan Burk was dying, and I was offered his place.”

  “You said—”

  “At first I refused. But many things were revealed to me. Knowledge given only to the Council, passed down from old members to new. Knowledge that showed me why I must sacrifice my life for humanity by serving in the Council. I said you might not understand this, Bethya, but you must try.” There was silence. The girl’s head was bent. Dawson felt a sharp pang of pity for her. How could Fered sit there unmoving while Bethya was trying to repress her tears?

  “Do not think that this was easy,” the man said. “I loved you very much. I still do. Yet I have learned a greater wisdom. It is for the benefit and future of mankind that I must give up you and all the other things that were part of my life.”

  Bethya lifted her head and looked at Fered.

  “No, you don’t love me. I can tell that by your voice. What has changed you?” The Council sat like a row of stone statues.

  “Knowledge has changed me,” Fered said. “I can see now that I was like a child before. I have learned so much . . . That is why no man has ever refused to serve the race by becoming a member of the Council. You must believe that I have my reasons, and that they are good ones.”

  “And I—”

  “You must forget me. Move from Dasonee, if you wish. Work-units will be provided for your convenience. Think of me as one dead, and marry someone else, when you can do so.”

  A hurt, pitiful little cry came from Bethya’s lips. She said nothing more.

  She kept staring at Fered, all her soul in her eyes.

  One of the older men tapped Dawson’s arm.

  “You are Stephen Dawson?”

  “Yes.”

  “May we ask you some questions?”

  “You’re very polite,” Dawson said, feeling a strong dislike for these six motionless figures.

  They seemed utterly without emotion—and Fered had become one of them.

  Irony seemed wasted on the Council. “Yes,” Dawson said, and waited.

  “Not here. We have machines—psychographs and others—that will save much labor. You will not be harmed or hurt.”

  “AH right,” Dawson said.

  “The guide will take you—”

  “Wait.”

  IT was the woman member of the Council who spoke. She stood up, her gray eyes fixed on Dawson’s.

  “Wait. I wish to superintend his examination m
yself.”

  “Very well.”

  The woman walked toward Dawson, who rose.

  “I am Laurena San,” she said impersonally. “Come.”

  She went toward the wall, and a concealed door within it slid up. Dawson cast a reassuring glance back at Bethya, but the girl did not look up.

  He followed Laurena San.

  She was completely detached, cool and aloof. Yet always, during the hours that followed, he was conscious of her resemblance to Marian. Always when her eyes met his there was that cool, dispassionate appraisal.

  Yet under it, he sensed something else—a very vague and inexplicable thrill of strangeness.

  They went from laboratory to laboratory, where trained experts in psychology and other scientists manipulated machines that examined Dawson. They tested him physically—his blood-pressure, his pulse, his metabolism. They probed his mind, using a curious form of word-association test. They X-rayed him and literally put him through the wringer.

  They turned a ray upon his wounded arm which, they said, would speed up the healing process. And always Laurena San kept at his side.

  Dawson was uneasily conscious of her presence. For he was pretending. Some impulse he could not define told him to “play possum”—to pretend a stupidity which might disarm suspicion. Why he sensed danger he could not guess, but he felt its nearness nevertheless. By playing dumb he might lead his enemies into underestimating him.

  His enemies? Were the members of the Council inimical? That remained to be seen. At last the examination was finished, and he was taken back into the presence of the Council. Bethya was no longer in the room. Laurena took her place on the bench beside the others.

  One of the older men took command.

  “Stephen Dawson,” he began, “you have been found healthy in body and mind. You are not fitted for other than work below the thirty-level—that is, nothing that requires concentration and quick thinking is open to you.”

  Dawson suppressed a grin. So his stratagem had worked.

  “After you have acquainted yourself with this civilization, you may choose what work you wish, within certain limits. It will not be arduous. Have you anything to ask?”