by John Brunner
Then, at long last, with her head on the shoulder of this violent stranger whom she seemed not to know at all even after he wiped off his pale disguise—to make him harder to spot in the dark, he explained wryly—Anastasia broke down. He waited out her dry, gusty sobs.
Eventually, as he had sometimes done in the past around the time she first decided she wanted him and no one else but was still terrified of the way she would be treated by her foster family and their friends, he decided to distract her by telling her a story.
“You know, these invaders make me think of Cedric.”
“What?” She turned but did not raise her head.
“He was not just intellectual, but brilliant. He’d been an infant prodigy and grown used to adulation. Give him an IQ test and he’d finish it early and walk out before time, saying he was bored. He got to university two full years before the rest of his contemporaries, expecting he was going to blow everybody’s mind there, as well.
“Didn’t quite work out like that. Yes, he was bright—but so was everybody else, and some of them had experience and knowledge that he lacked. He was no longer special.
“He brooded over this, his first great disappointment, and gradually became embittered.
“Eventually his subconscious led him to a conclusion which he never voiced. He recalled how throughout his childhood his parents had promised that the world would be his oyster, and he began to believe that he’d betrayed them. Of course, they’d assured him that everything he learned was right, that everything he found in books was right, that knowledge was his right, in other words… that’s total knowledge.
“From which he deduced that if by the age of twenty-five he hadn’t yet become world-famous—as, surely, someone with his talent ought to be—there must be a reason. At first he imagined that he had rivals in the university, or in his field of research, who were slandering him behind his back, or otherwise plotting against him, but he could find no proof of that, and he was honest enough to admit it. In the end, all by himself, he reinvented the idea of having been ill-wished. I suppose you know that’s a standard concept in the theory of magic. But he extended it. He grew suspicious of the cosmos.”
“Ah, but you said he never spoke of the idea!” She lifted her head at last.
“That’s right. He was afraid of mockery. So when he set out on his journey he sought a place where what he had to keep secret, back at home, was taken for granted.”
“Did he find it?”—sleepily.
“Yes, of course. In this infinite universe there has to be a place for all of us, and Cedric found his.
“For a short time after his arrival, he thought he was in seventh heaven. He found himself among scientists, but when he began to talk about the laws of nature they reacted with amazement; for them, there were no laws as such, but only chances, good or bad.
“Clearly, they understood better than he did such principles as Heisenberg’s, so, though remaining permanently on guard, he cautiously voiced his own theory. To all appearances it struck his listeners as perfectly tenable. He had never met such open-minded people. They granted him the facilities he asked for, better than those he had been accustomed to. He drafted a major speech to be delivered at a scientific congress, and in the meantime set about recruiting a group of followers who declared themselves willing to accept his primary axiom: The universe is out to get us! With them, he planned to pack the audience at his first public appearance.
“He carried on in this manner for quite some while. His students were fascinated by his arguments, and many let themselves be seduced; reporters came to interview him, and quoted his words fairly. A major foundation consented to fund him after only one appeal for money. Cedric’s was at last a famous name.
“Then, when it came time to address the congress, he put on his smartest clothes and shook countless hands and mounted the rostrum. Slides had been prepared; he commentated on them, each in turn, and quoted the notes of all his best experiments.
“Not until he was halfway through the talk did he become aware that some of his hearers had begun to laugh. He carried on, and even reached the end, despite the tides of mirth that now assailed him. One last fragment of hope remained to him, as guffawing was supplanted by applause, and he saw the congress president rise to offer his hand. He still believed, even at that final moment, that he had persuaded his listeners to accept his views.
“But then the congress president said, with absolute sincerity: ‘Sir, you have amused us better than any speaker I remember. This notion that the universe is motivated by a kind of planned malevolence has led to so many good jokes one can quote at parties that we’re all indebted. When may we look forward to some serious work of equal brilliance?’
“In that moment, Cedric realized he had been right all along. The universe was not only malignant, but capable of outsmarting him, or anyone.”
Despite her wet clothes and uncomfortable posture, Anastasia was drowsing at his side. He nudged her gently.
“Don’t go to sleep—you mustn’t! We have to keep our eyes peeled for the boat.”
“Kaloyiannis is so late,” she whispered, lids still lowered. “He should have been here long ago.”
“We have to go on waiting,” he insisted, even as his weariness betrayed him also into slumber.
“Well, now we can arrest him for murder,” said Graumann. “And Kaloyiannis as an accessory. I did say—didn’t I?—it would be stupid to let the fishing fleet sail tonight, even though the islanders may go hungry without its catch. Know what’s amiss with you, Herr Leutnant? You don’t yet feel the Reich’s remorseless logic in your bones.”
PART FOUR
THE EXHIBIT
is a glass preserving jar with a wire closure to its lid.
It commemorates a vanished age of luxury
THE MONTH
is July
THE NAME
is Shanti
The steam yacht Medea was small compared to some of her kind—nothing like so large, for example, as those being built in America by Commodore Vanderbilt and others—but she was most luxuriously equipped; the very ensign flying at her stern was made of silk. Teak, mahogany, gold leaf and marble abounded in her staterooms, and everywhere below the main deck there was thick carpet to absorb the noise of her ultramodern compound engines.
A short while ago, however, those engines had gradually ceased to turn and there had been a rattling of anchor chains.
Waiting for the inevitable report from her captain and engineer, gazing absently at the plume of smoke which now rose straight up from the Medea’s funnel, her owner Lord Arthur Fenton said languidly, “You know, Osman old fellow, there are times when I think it may not have been such a good idea to fall in with your suggestion of cruising to Constantinople. Not at this time of year, at any rate.”
He was a slender, brown-haired man, still under thirty, of middle height, wearing a light linen suit of the most impeccable London cut. He was stretched out on a chaise longue on the afterdeck, in the shade of a canvas awning; it was a blazing July day, and the thermometers were registering ninety. Between him and the person he addressed, who occupied an identical chaise longue, there stood a small table bearing a box of Egyptian cigarettes in paper striped with faint gray lines, a bottle of whisky, a double-globe soda syphon enclosed in wire mesh, and a stock of glasses. His man, who was called Tompkins, sat sweating at a discreet distance, alert for any call to replenish the drinks.
Osman Effendi, who was about the same age, equally well dressed, but somewhat shorter and swarthier, with a thick black mustache on his upper lip and a fez on his head which he somehow contrived to keep in position even when lying down, signaled his own servant Mustapha to hand him another of the cigarettes; he smoked incessantly. While it was being lighted for him, he thought desperately about his response. He had met Lord Arthur in Monte Carlo, and been overjoyed at the chance to make his acquaintance, for he was manifestly very rich, and it would be immensely useful to Osman in the future were
he to enjoy wealthy contacts in the world’s wealthiest nation. Since it was an unfashionable time of year for the Riviera, with little society to keep one amused, he had indeed proposed this cruise, and sung the praises of his home city until the Englishman consented. However, things were not going as smoothly as one might have hoped… He decided at last that it was safest to try and turn the comment with a joke.
“Ah, perhaps in such heat even your excellent British engines have decided we Mediterranean types are correct in taking a siesta!”
“We’ll soon know,” Lord Arthur grunted. “Here come Wilson and Macalister.”
Snapping to attention as he arrived at his employer’s side, the yacht’s captain gave a naval-style salute. Behind him, scowling, her little Scottish engineer wiped perspiration from his forehead with a grimy rag.
“Trouble, I’m afraid, m’lord,” Wilson said.
“Can it be fixed? If so, how soon?”
“Macalister says it may take five or six hours.”
“Really?”—raising one eyebrow. “What’s amiss?”
The engineer stepped forward. “The oil we bought in Italy,” he answered curtly. “One of the shaft bearings has seized. We’ll have to unship it and—”
But Lord Arthur was waving explanations aside. He said, “Just get us on the move again as quick as may be.”
“Yes, of course, m’lord,” Wilson agreed.
When they had gone, Lord Arthur rose to his feet and began to pace distractedly back and forth. “Well, there’s a thing!” he said in exasperation, though his tone when addressing his underlings had betrayed no sign of it. “I foresee a boring day, don’t you?”
And gestured for Tompkins to mix him another chota peg.
Hurt, for it was in no way his fault if the oil the engineer had bought in Italy was of such bad quality, Osman stared around, screwing up his eyes against the brilliant sun. They had cast anchor off the southern tip of one of the countless islands that littered this part of the world. Spotting it, he had a sudden inspiration.
“It’s nearly time for lunch, is it not? Perhaps we could go ashore and make a picnic!”
He greatly prided himself on his knowledge of British culture.
Lord Arthur brightened. “It would pass the time, at least. That is, if there’s a decent beach. Tompkins, fetch a telescope!”
It was promptly brought. Surveying the island, he said eventually, “Why, yes. One might well do that. I notice a shack of some sort, though, and there’s a woman in front of it staring at us. I trust there won’t be too many other folk around. Your people are less than popular in Greece, I understand, and one has no wish to provoke a riot.”
Oh, these tactless English!… But Osman bridled his tongue. He said only, “In a way, we were as glad to be shut of them as they of us. You should meet some of the thieving, cheating traders that they breed. Anyway, that’s history now, isn’t it? And I can assure you from long acquaintance that they yield as easily as anyone to the power of money.”
Lord Arthur was paying no attention, the telescope still to his eye. “Good lord!” he breathed. “That fellow—Here, take a look for yourself.”
Osman adjusted the focus, bracing himself on one of the poles of the awning against the shift and ripple of the water. He saw the woman clearly: young, with quite a good figure—so far as could be judged under her coarse brown ankle-length dress, but she was unlikely to be corseted—and long untidy dark hair. At her side now stood, with one arm protectively around her, a thin man wearing a shabby shirt and a pair of seaman’s trousers with one leg torn at the knee. Both were barefoot.
At first Osman did not realize what had so astonished his companion; to him, they looked like any other peasant couple. Then he realized: of course, the man was not just sunburned, but black. Having been accustomed all his life to negro servants and eunuchs, this had not immediately struck him as unusual.
Handing back the telescope, he shrugged.
“The man looks strong and healthy. If we rattle a few coins he will no doubt be glad enough to help carry our things ashore. One should not, however, pay attention to his woman.”
“I’m not inclined to,” Lord Arthur said fastidiously. “But so long as the place doesn’t reek of their sewage… Tompkins, tell the stewards to make up a hamper.”
“Who are they?” whispered Anastasia. “What do they want with us?”
“I think they stopped because they must. Look, there is no more smoke from the funnel.”
Evgenos knew about things like steamships, indeed had traveled on some, but she had only ever seen one before and from a greater distance. Trembling, she watched as a boat was loaded and lowered, and rowed toward the shore.
“I will go down to meet them,” Evgenos decided.
“Wait!” She caught his arm. “One of them is wearing the fez!” The last Turks to lord it over Oragalia had been slaughtered long before she was born, but her foster parents had told her many stories about their cruelty.
“Yes, but that is the flag of the country which helped Greece to become free.” Evgenos pointed to the yacht’s stern. “We must greet them with pride. Both of us.”
“Very well.” But she remained near the shack.
The boat grounded in shallow water, still some distance from dry land. In obedience to an order Evgenos did not understand, one of its passengers took off his shoes, rolled up his trousers, and waded ashore. In pidgin Greek he said, “Here is an English lord and his friend. Want to eat food here. You help, you will be paid. Come with me.”
Evgenos was dismayed. He said, “But we have nothing to give a lord! We have little enough for ourselves!”
The man was smiling patronizingly. “No, no! We bring own food for them. You help carry, yes? Not take from you nothing. Here, see?”
And he offered a couple of shiny new coins.
Uncertainly Evgenos accepted them—they came to as much as he was paid for a month of casual labor with the fishing fleet—and after biting them tucked them into his cheek, for lack of any other way to carry them. Then he waded to the boat.
“You take lord on shoulders,” he was told, and the lord, who luckily was quite light, clambered laughing over the side of the boat and was borne ashore. His friend with the fez was the next, but not the last, burden. Along with the two sailors who had been rowing, and the man who had come ashore first and another servant, Evgenos had now to bring load after load: first, poles and a roll of canvas, which were assembled to make a shady canopy; then folding chairs; then a folding table; then an immense wicker hamper that held, along with dishes and cutlery, something round and bright and brassy that gave off a pale blue flame when a match was set to it, and a seemingly endless supply of food and bottles of wine.
He felt his eyes grow round with amazement, and they all chuckled. Embarrassed, he called to Anastasia.
“Here, these people mean us no harm!”
She descended timidly to join him, and he explained about the English lord. To him, she made a sort of rough curtsy, and he spoke to her kindly enough in what Evgenos guessed was meant to be Greek, though the pronunciation was unfamiliar. But her eyes were full of hatred and suspicion whenever she looked at the man in the fez.
Shortly the visitors were ensconced in luxury, eating and drinking, and Evgenos decided it was time to withdraw. Leading Anastasia back to the shack, he showed her the money he had been given, and she agreed that it was worth his trouble. Then she resumed the task of tending their vegetable patch, while he sat on a rock waiting for his trousers to dry and gazing—not without envy—at the picnickers.
“My Greek didn’t make much impression, did it?” said Lord Arthur. “Your man Mustapha did better! Any more champagne in that bottle?”
Tompkins darted to refill his glass.
“Of course,” he went on, “one wouldn’t expect to find the language of Plato and Sophocles in a corner like this. It looks as barren as the worst part of the Highlands, only without so much water. What do you suppose these peo
ple do to survive? One can’t exactly call it living, can one?”
Osman shrugged; he cared little about such matters. “I imagine they rely on fishing,” he said after a pause, and signaled Mustapha to light him another cigarette.
“The way that blackamoor is staring at us,” Lord Arthur murmured, “one would think he had us in mind for his next catch… Finished?”
“What? Oh—oh, yes. And thank you very much: the potted pheasant was particularly good.”
“I’m glad you liked it. Shot it myself at Ardnacraish last year. I must admit I was wondering whether it would have stood the heat, but our cook up there is a positive marvel… Are you sure you won’t have an orange? No? How about a drop of brandy?”
“Yes, with pleasure!”
“Tompkins!”
For a while there was a pleasantly sated pause. Eventually, however, Lord Arthur started to fidget.
“He’s still staring at us, you know. And if those great eyes of his were proboscises, he’d have sucked us in!”
“My dear fellow, I assure you there’s nothing to worry about! He wouldn’t dare try anything. He’s outnumbered, to begin with, and your engineer assured us we shall be away before nightfall. Besides, there’s another point to consider. You said my kind were unpopular here; well, his are even more so, and indeed I’m astonished that he’s found himself a woman. Conceivably she—ah—disgraced herself and was driven out by her family, and he was the only man around to take her on. They’re not as choosy as civilized people, you know.”
“How do you suppose he came to be here in the first place?”
“Arthur, sometimes you puzzle me. What in the world do you find interesting about nonentities like these?”
Lord Arthur stretched and yawned. “Anything can seem interesting when there’s nothing else to provide a distraction. And—to quote you—there’s another point to consider.”