by Jack Vance
Under the pergola a man jumped to his feet and flourished his hand; Duray recognized the tall spare form of Bob Robertson. “Just in time,” Bob called jocosely. “Not too early, not too late. We’re glad you could make it!”
“Yes, we found we could accept your invitation after all,” said Alan Robertson. “Let me see, do I know anyone here? Roger, hello!…And William…Ah! the lovely Dora Gorski!…Cypriano…” He looked around the circle of faces, waving to his acquaintances.
Bob clapped Duray on the shoulder. “Really pleased you could come! What’ll you drink? The locals distill a liquor out of fermented mare’s milk, but I don’t recommend it.”
“I’m not here to drink,” said Duray. “Where’s Elizabeth?”
The corners of Bob’s wide mouth twitched. “Come now, old man; let’s not be grim. This is the Rumfuddle! A time for joy and self-renewal! Go dance about a bit! Cavort! Pour a bottle of champagne over your head! Sport with the girls!”
Duray looked into the blue eyes for a long second. He strained to keep his voice even. “Where is Elizabeth?”
“Somewhere about the place. A charming girl, your Elizabeth! We’re delighted to have you both!”
Duray swung away. He walked to the dark and handsome Roger Waille. “Would you be good enough to take me to my wife?”
Waille raised his eyebrows as if puzzled by Duray’s tone of voice. “She’s in primping and gossiping. If necessary I suppose I could pull her away for a moment or two.”
Duray began to feel ridiculous, as if he had not been locked away from his world, subjected to harassments and doubts, and made the butt of some obscure joke. “It’s necessary,” he said. “We’re leaving.”
“But you’ve just arrived!”
“I know.”
Waille gave a shrug of amused perplexity, and turned away toward the house. Duray followed. They went through a tall narrow doorway into an entry-hall paneled with a beautiful brown-gold wood, which Duray automatically identified as chestnut. Four high panes of tawny glass turned to the west filled the room with a smoky half-melancholy light. Oak settees, upholstered in leather, faced each other across a black, brown and gray rug. Tabourets stood at each side of the settees, and each supported an ornate golden candelabra in the form of conventionalized stag’s-heads. Waille indicated these last. “Striking, aren’t they? The Scythians made them for me. I paid them in iron knives. They think I’m a great magician; and for a fact, I am.” He reached into the air and plucked forth an orange, which he tossed upon a settee. “Here’s Elizabeth now, and the other maenads as well.”
Into the chamber came Elizabeth, with three other young women whom Duray vaguely recalled having met before. At the sight of Duray, Elizabeth stopped short. She essayed a smile, and said in a light strained voice, “Hello, Gil. You’re here after all.” She laughed nervously and, Duray felt, unnaturally. “Yes, of course you’re here. I didn’t think you’d come.”
Duray glanced toward the other women, who stood with Waille watching half-expectantly. Duray said, “I’d like to speak to you alone.”
“Excuse us,” said Waille. “We’ll go on outside.”
They departed. Elizabeth looked longingly after them, and fidgeted with the buttons of her jacket.
“Where are the children?” Duray demanded curtly.
“Upstairs, getting dressed.” She looked down at her own costume, the festival raiment of a Transylvanian peasant girl: a green skirt embroidered with red and blue flowers, a white blouse, a black velvet vest, glossy black boots.
Duray felt his temper slipping; his voice was strained and fretful. “I don’t understand anything of this. Why did you close the passways?”
Elizabeth attempted a flippant smile. “I was bored with routine.”
“Oh? Why didn’t you mention it to me yesterday morning? You didn’t need to close the passways.”
“Gilbert, please. Let’s not discuss it.”
Duray stood back, tongue-tied with astonishment. “Very well,” he said at last. “We won’t discuss it. You go up and get the girls. We’re going home.”
Elizabeth shook her head. In a neutral voice she said, “It’s impossible. There’s only one passway open. I don’t have it.”
“Who does? Bob?”
“I guess so; I’m not really sure.”
“How did he get it? There were only four, and all four were closed.”
“It’s simple enough. He moved the downtown passway from our locker to another, and left a blank in its place.”
“And who closed off the other three?”
“I did.”
“Why?”
“Because Bob told me to. I don’t want to talk about it; I’m sick to death of the whole business.” And she half-whispered: “I don’t know what I’m going to do with myself.”
“I know what I’m going to do,” said Duray. He turned toward the door.
Elizabeth held up her hands and clenched her fists against her breast. “Don’t make trouble please! He’ll close our last passway!”
“Is that why you’re afraid of him? If so—don’t be. Alan wouldn’t allow it.”
Elizabeth’s face began to crumple. She pushed past Duray and walked quickly out upon the terrace. Duray followed, baffled and furious. He looked back and forth across the terrace. Bob was not to be seen. Elizabeth had gone to Alan Robertson; she spoke in a hushed urgent voice. Duray went to join them. Elizabeth became silent and turned away, avoiding Duray’s gaze.
Alan Robertson spoke in a voice of easy geniality. “Isn’t this a lovely spot? Look how the setting sun shines on the river!”
Roger Waille came by rolling a cart with ice, goblets and a dozen bottles. Now he said: “Of all the places on all the Earths this is my favorite. I call it ‘Ekshayan’, which is the Scythian name for this district.”
A woman asked, “Isn’t it cold and bleak in the winter?”
“Frightful!” said Waille. “The blizzards howl down from the north; then they stop and the land is absolutely still. The days are short and the sun comes up red as a poppy. The wolves slink out of the forests, and at dusk they circle the house. When a full moon shines, they howl like banshees, or maybe the banshees are howling! I sit beside the fireplace, entranced.”
“It occurs to me,” said Manfred Funk, “that each person, selecting a site for his home, reveals a great deal about himself. Even on old Earth, a man’s home was ordinarily a symbolic simulacrum of the man himself; now, with every option available, a person’s house is himself.”
“This is very true,” said Alan Robertson, “and certainly Roger need not fear that he has revealed any discreditable aspects of himself by showing us his rather grotesque home on the lonely steppes of prehistoric Russia.”
Roger Waille laughed. “The grotesque house isn’t me; I merely felt that it fitted its setting…Here, Duray, you’re not drinking. That’s chilled vodka; you can mix it or drink it straight in the time-tested manner.”
“Nothing for me, thanks.”
“Just as you like. Excuse me; I’m wanted elsewhere.” Waille moved away, rolling the cart. Elizabeth leaned as if she wanted to follow him, then remained beside Alan Robertson, looking thoughtfully over the river.
Duray spoke to Alan Robertson as if she were not there. “Elizabeth refuses to leave. Bob has hypnotized her.”
“That’s not true,” said Elizabeth softly.
“Somehow, one way or another, he’s forced her to stay. She won’t tell me why.”
“I want the passway back,” said Elizabeth. But her voice was muffled and uncertain.
Alan Robertson cleared his throat. “I hardly know what to say. It’s a very awkward situation. None of us wants to create a disturbance—”
“There you’re wrong,” said Duray.
Alan Robertson ignored the remark. “I’ll have a word with Bob after the party. In the meantime I don’t see why we shouldn’t enjoy the company of our friends, and that wonderful roast ox! Who is that turning the spit? I kno
w him from somewhere.”
Duray could hardly speak for outrage. “After what he’s done to us?”
“He’s gone too far, much too far,” Alan Robertson agreed. “Still, he’s a flamboyant feckless sort and I doubt if he understands the full inconvenience he’s caused you.”
“He understands well enough. He just doesn’t care.”
“Perhaps so,” said Alan Robertson sadly. “I had always hoped—but that’s neither here nor there. I still feel that we should act with restraint. It’s much easier not to do than to undo.”
Elizabeth abruptly crossed the terrace and went to the front door of the tall house, where her three daughters had appeared: Dolly, 12; Joan, 10; Ellen, 8: all wearing green, white and black peasant frocks and glossy black boots. Duray thought they made a delightful picture. He followed Elizabeth across the terrace.
“It’s Daddy,” screamed Ellen, and threw herself in his arms. The other two, not to be outdone, did likewise.
“We thought you weren’t coming to the party,” cried Dolly. “I’m glad you did though.” “So’m I.” “So’m I.”
“I’m glad I came too, if only to see you in these pretty costumes. Let’s go see Grandpa Alan.” He took them across the terrace, and after a moment’s hesitation, Elizabeth followed. Duray became aware that everyone had stopped talking to look at him and his family, with, so it seemed, an extraordinary, even avid, curiosity, as if in expectation of some entertaining extravagance of conduct. Duray began to burn with emotion. Once, long ago, while crossing a street in downtown San Francisco, he had been struck by an automobile, suffering a broken leg and a fractured clavicle. Almost as soon as he had been knocked down, pedestrians came pushing to stare down at him, and Duray, looking up in pain and shock had seen only the ring of white faces and intent eyes, greedy as flies around a puddle of blood. In hysterical fury he had staggered to his feet, striking out into every face within reaching distance, man and woman alike. He hated them more than the man who had run him down: the ghouls who had come to enjoy his pain. Had he the miraculous power, he would have crushed them into a screaming bale of detestable flesh, hurled the bundle twenty miles out into the Pacific Ocean…Some faint shadow of this emotion affected him now, but today he would provide them no unnatural pleasure. He turned a single glance of cool contempt around the group, then took his three eager-faced daughters to a bench at the back of the terrace. Elizabeth followed, moving like a mechanical object. She seated herself at the end of the bench and looked off across the river. Duray stared heavily back at the Rumfuddlers, compelling them to shift their gazes, to where the ox roasted over a great bed of coals. A young man in a white jacket turned the spit; another basted the meat with a long-handled brush. A pair of Orientals carried out a carving table; another brought a carving set; a fourth wheeled out a cart laden with salads, round crusty loaves, trays of cheese and herrings. A fifth man, dressed as a Transylvanian gypsy, came from the house with a violin. He went to the corner of the terrace and began to play melancholy music of the steppes.
Bob Robertson and Roger Waille inspected the ox, a magnificent sight indeed. Duray attempted a stony detachment, but his nose was under no such strictures; the odor of the roast meat, garlic and herbs tantalized him unmercifully. Bob Robertson returned to the terrace and held up his hands for attention; the fiddler put down his instrument. “Control your appetites; there’ll still be a few minutes, during which we can discuss our next Rumfuddle. Our clever colleague Bernard Ulman recommends a hostelry in the Adirondacks: the Sapphire Lake Lodge. The hotel was built in 1902, to the highest standards of Edwardian comfort. The clientele is derived from the business community of New York. The cuisine is kosher; the management maintains an atmosphere of congenial gentility; the current date is 1930. Bernard has furnished photographs. Roger, if you please…“
Waille drew back a curtain to reveal a screen. He manipulated the projection machine and the hotel was displayed on the screen: a rambling half-timbered structure overlooking several acres of park and a smooth lake.
“Thank you, Roger. I believe that we also have a photograph of the staff…“
On the screen appeared a stiffly posed group of about thirty men and women, all smiling with various degrees of affability. The Rumfuddlers were amused; some among them tittered.
“Bernard gives a very favorable report as to the cuisine, the amenities and the charm of the general area. Am I right, Bernard?”
“In every detail,” declared Bernard Ulman. “The management is attentive and efficient; the clientele is well-established.”
“Very good,” said Bob Robertson. “Unless someone has a more entertaining idea, we will hold our next Rumfuddle at the Sapphire Lake Lodge. And now I believe that the roast beef should be ready: done to a turn as the expression goes.”
“Quite right,” said Roger Waille. “Tom, as always, has done an excellent job at the spit.”
The ox was lifted to the table. The carver set to work with a will. Duray went to speak to Alan Robertson, who blinked uneasily at his approach. Duray asked, “Do you understand the reason for these parties? Are you in on the joke?”
Alan Robertson spoke in a precise manner: “I certainly am not ‘in on the joke’, as you put it.” He hesitated, then said: “The Rumfuddlers will never again intrude upon your life or that of your family. I am sure of this. Bob became over-exuberant; he exercised poor judgment, and I intend to have a quiet word with him. In fact, we have already exchanged certain opinions. At the moment your best interests will be served by detachment and unconcern.”
Duray spoke with sinister politeness: “You feel then that I and my family should bear the brunt of Bob’s jokes?”
“This is a harsh view of the situation, but my answer must be ‘yes’.”
“I’m not so sure. My relationship with Elizabeth is no longer the same. Bob has done this to me.”
“To quote an old apothegm: ‘Least said, soonest mended’.”
Duray changed the subject. “When Waille showed the photograph of the hotel staff, I thought some of the faces were familiar. Before I could be quite sure the picture was gone.”
Alan Robertson nodded unhappily. “Let’s not develop the subject, Gilbert. Instead—”
“I’m into the situation too far,” said Duray. “I want to know the truth.”
“Very well then,” said Alan Robertson hollowly, “your instincts are accurate. The management of the Sapphire Lake Lodge, in cognate circumstances, has achieved an unsavory reputation. As you have guessed, they comprise the leadership of the National Socialist Party during 1938 or thereabouts. The manager of course is Hitler, the desk clerk is Goebbels, the head-waiter is Goering, the bellboys are Himmler and Hess, and so on down the line. They are of course not aware of the activities of their cognates on other worlds. The hotel’s clientele is for the most part Jewish, which brings a macabre humor to the situation.”
“Undeniably,” said Duray. “What of that Rumfuddlers party that we looked in on?”
“You refer to the high-school football team? The 1951 Texas champions as I recall.” Alan Robertson grinned. “And well they should be. Bob identified the players for me. Are you interested in the line-up?”
“Very much so.”
Alan Robertson drew a sheet of paper from his pocket. “I believe—yes, this is it.” He handed the sheet to Duray, who saw a schematic line-up:
Duray returned the paper. “You approve of this?”
“I had best put it like this,” said Alan Robertson, a trifle uneasily. “One day, chatting with Bob, I remarked that much travail could be spared the human race if the most notorious evil-doers were early in their lives shifted to environments which afforded them constructive outlets for their energies. I speculated that having the competence to make such changes it was perhaps our duty to do so. Bob became interested in the concept and formed his group, the Rumfuddlers, to serve the function I had suggested. In all candor I believe that Bob and his friends have been attracted more by the
possibility of entertainment than by altruism, but the effect has been the same.”
“The football players aren’t evil-doers,” said Duray. “Sir Galahad, Charlemagne, Samson, Richard the Lion Hearted…”
“Exactly true,” said Alan Robertson, “and I made this point to Bob. He asserted that all were brawlers and bully-boys, with the possible exception of Sir Galahad; that Charlemagne, for example, had conquered much territory to no particular achievement; that Achilles, a national hero to the Greeks, was a cruel enemy to the Trojans; and so forth. His justifications are somewhat specious perhaps…Still these young men are better employed making touchdowns than breaking heads.”
After a pause Duray asked: “How are these matters arranged?”
“I’m not entirely sure. I believe that by one means or another, the desired babies are exchanged with others of similar appearance. The child so obtained is reared in appropriate circumstances.”
“The jokes seem elaborate and rather tedious.”
“Precisely!” Alan Robertson declared. “Can you think of a better method to keep someone like Bob out of mischief?”
“Certainly,” said Duray. “Fear of the consequences.” He scowled across the terrace. Bob had stopped to speak to Elizabeth. She and the three girls rose to their feet.
Duray strode across the terrace. “What’s going on?”
“Nothing of consequence,” said Bob. “Elizabeth and the girls are going to help serve the guests.” He glanced toward the serving table, then turned back to Duray. “Would you help with the carving?”
Duray’s arm moved of its own volition. His fist caught Bob on the angle of the jaw, and sent him reeling back into one of the white-coated Orientals, who carried a tray of food. The two fell into an untidy heap. The Rumfuddlers were shocked and amused, and watched with attention.
Bob rose to his feet gracefully enough and gave a hand to the Oriental. Looking toward Duray he shook his head ruefully. Meeting his glance, Duray noted a pale blue glint; then Bob once more became bland and debonair.
Elizabeth spoke in a low despairing voice: “Why couldn’t you have done as he asked? It would have all been so simple.”