Night Lamp

by Jack Vance

  Mur relinquished the podium to Hape who described his efforts to translate the inscriptions on a set of eighty-five iridium alloy sheets, discovered in a shallow cave near his camp. His recital was essentially a tale of incessant efforts to wring meaning from the incomprehensible markings. He told of the various artifices, techniques and tests he had used over the years—all to the same effect. As he finished, he glanced toward Laurz Mur. “I suppose that by local standards I have earned for myself a very lowly and rather sordid tamsour.” He spoke with a grim smile. “I am sure that I am using the word incorrectly, but no matter. I have devoted many years to these inscriptions, and I have nothing whatever to show for my work: not even a pension from my university. They discharged me from their faculty over ten years ago. Still, I will scratch by, one way or another. It may even surprise you to learn that I have several new approaches I am desperately anxious to apply to the cursed inscriptions, and I can hardly wait to return to my office. I do not truly know whether I have been cheated by the cosmos or not.

  “I might point out that, over yonder, as smug as ever and no doubt as erroneous as ever in his theories, sits Clois Hutsenreiter. I worked with him once and even the laborers called him ‘Careless Clois,’ and every night they would take away his money at some gambling game. Since then he has mended his fortunes, and has become Dean at an institute of higher learning. How did ‘Careless Clois’ achieve this office? By assiduous proctosculation, so I am told. Also, he married a deluded heiress without informing her of a previous—”

  Dean Hutsenreiter jumped to his feet and called: “Where is the monitor of ceremonies? How long will he tolerate this insane rhodomontade? We hear the warblings of a madman; can we find no surcease? Monitor, do your duty, if you please! Exclude this demon of verbal turpitude!”

  Laurz Mur stepped forward and with great sangfroid urged Kyril Hape to step down from the podium, or at least modify the tenor of his address. Hape protested that he wished to recount several other anecdotes of possible interest to the audience. He cried out: “This afternoon you will hear ‘Careless Clois’ as he attempts to refute my remarks. Be warned! You will hear sophistry and innuendo!”

  Laurz Mur gave a meaningful signal.

  Kyril Hake said, “I see that time is of the essence and I must terminate my remarks. I can only suggest that you hold tight to your purses when Clois is near, and lend him no money. Alas! My lifetime has come and gone! Unless in my last golden years I decipher the plaques, my career will lack distinction. I will mention in passing that I suspect Clois Hutsenreiter of fabricating these selfsame plaques and hiding them where he knew I would find them. Is he innocent or guilty of this crime? Look at his face now; you will see that he is smiling very broadly. It is not the limpid smile of innocence.

  “That, ladies and gentlemen, concludes my remarks.”

  Kyril Hake bowed to Laurz Mur and stepped down from the platform, to the accompaniment of applause from the audience.

  Hilyer muttered to Althea: “A most unconventional address!”

  Althea nodded. “Unconventional or not. Dean Hutsenreiter showed little enthusiasm.”

  Laurz Mur spoke. “Next you will hear the remarks of Professor Hilyer Fath, from Thanet Institute, at Thanet on Gallingale. His topic, so I understand, is ‘Aspects of Aesthetic Symbology.’ ”

  Hilyer marched to the speaker’s platform. Ordinarily, he was comfortable with such occasions; today. Dean Hutsenreiter sat in the audience. Hilyer squared his shoulders. There was no help for it. To avoid being distracted from the substance of his remarks; Hilyer must keep his eyes averted from the Dean whose eyes glowered from beneath the brim of his eccentric scarlet hat.

  “My subject is vast,” said Hilyer. “However, it is coherent and universally consistent. I for one would reject the constraints Sir Wilfred Voskovy would impose in the name of manageability. After all, where is the harm in superabundance? If you are invited to a banquet, you denounce not too much fine food, but its absence. Let us continue to celebrate the delectable crime of gluttony, with no thought for the hollow-eyed vegetarian who glares at us so enviously. Is it not plain then? Sir Wilfred must search for a new credo. ‘Abundance,’ ‘Plethora,’ ‘Diversity’—these are the sign-posts pointing the way to a fine ‘tamsour,’ to use, or perhaps misuse, one of the peculiar local concepts. So much having been said, I take up my principal theme.

  “Time is short and my scope is limitless; I will tell you only a few descriptive anecdotes. They will be both brief and to the point, since my subject, to be well and truly comprehended, requires an emotive perception of the symbols under consideration. I emphasize that every separate symbology requires an enormous and extremely subtle study. I am sadly amused by persons who pretend to chic or avant-garde status by feigning enjoyment of the music of a culture different from their own. By so doing they instantly brand themselves as poseurs.

  “Still, it is possible to perceive the symbols without understanding their emotive force. There is, in fact, an intellectual satisfaction in simply recognizing the patterns. Often, I even think that I enjoy the music, though surely it is for the wrong reasons. Musical symbology must be imbibed with the mother’s milk and the mother’s voice and the sounds of the native homestead.

  “My field is therefore doubly complex, since any study of a music must entail analysis of the society from which the symbology has sprung. The analyst will find fascinating correspondences which link the musical symbology with other aspects of the matrix. For instance—” Hilyer mentioned several societies, described their somatypes and typical costumes and played representative segments of each society’s music. “You must listen closely. For each society I play first festive music, then music of circumstance, then funeral music. You will note interesting differences and interesting correspondences.”

  So went Hilyer’s presentation. He finished with the statement: “Aesthetic symbology, naturally, is not confined to music, though it is perhaps most accessible for study. Other systems are more complex and more ambiguous. The concepts may also be contradictory. I warn my students that if they hope to impose absolutes upon aesthetic symbology, he or she had better turn to a more malleable study.”

  Hilyer returned to his seat. Althea assured him that his remarks had nicely engaged the interest of the audience, and that even Dean Hutsenreiter had muttered what appeared to be grudging praise to his companion. “And now, if you are of a mind, I think I’d just as soon adjourn for a time.”

  “ ‘Adjourn’? You mean, ‘leave the hall’?” Hilyer was surprised. “Whatever for? The session still has an hour to run.”

  Althea grimaced. “So it does, but I have already heard too much of urgencies and moods and transferences. Perhaps I too am a borderline ‘sensitive,’ or whatever such folk are called.”

  Hilyer looked dubiously to right and left. “You go if you like. I’d feel conspicuous if I went now.”

  Althea subsided into her seat. “I’ll wait. But let’s leave as soon as possible.”

  Hilyer agreed and Althea reluctantly composed herself.

  Laurz Mur introduced Dame Julia Neep, who discussed a topic which she called “Sick Societies.” Before embarking upon her topic she also took time to refute Sir Wilfred for his proposals. “Like Hilyer Fath, I deplore this sort of dreary pessimism. If we took Sir Wilfred seriously, we would terminate the conclave at this very instant and all go home, resign our places of honor and spend the rest of our lives in vegetarianism and apathy. I, for one, refuse to do so. Now then, some of you may be thinking that my topic ‘Sick Societies’ is no less grim and portentous than that of Sir Wilfred’s topic. Already my presentation has been called: ‘Dame Neep’s Brief Introduction to Eschatology.’ This, of course, is a canard. For every ‘sick society,’ dozens are healthy, where anything and everything may and probably does happen. Still, this is no reason for us to throw our hands in the air, cry havoc, and pull the coverlets over our heads.” She frowned down at the florid man in the first row, who had jumped
to his feet. “Well, sir?”

  “You are addressing a literate audience. If your scholarship is as muddled as your metaphors, we are in for a painful morning.” He bowed curtly and resumed his seat.

  Dame Neep examined him for a moment, then said, “My topic is ‘Sick Societies’ and you will serve very nicely as a case study. Do you care to step up on the podium and submit to my examination?”

  “Certainly not!” said the man stiffly. “Not unless first you step down here and submit to my own examination.”

  Dame Neep proceeded with her topic, describing the characteristics of a sick society: its symptoms, maturity, decline and ultimate decay. “The superficial indications are by no means consistent. For instance, a static society need not be sick, if it is challenged by its environment. A society with disparities in privileges or wealth may be healthy if upward mobility is possible. The same society is sick if there is no such mobility, while rewards and perquisites are given to drones and parasites. Isolated societies may well become strange and queer, but not necessarily sick; their risk is great, however, since they receive no corrective criticism; they are not aware of what might be a morbid degeneracy. Isolated societies are almost inevitably doomed to decay. Sacerdotal, religious or priest-dominated societies are like organisms with a cancer.”

  Dame Neep briefly developed her concepts, took some questions from the audience, then left the podium.

  Laurz Mur stepped forward, now wearing a conical hat of black velvet which accentuated the elegant pallor of his face.

  “I wish to thank Dame Neep for her cogent remarks. I see that the time is verging toward that hour which we had stipulated for recess. We shall try to meet this schedule.” A prim little smile appeared upon his face. “On Ushant we cite the dictum: ‘All events must obey their imperatives.’ So then—while the time is brief, only about six minutes, it will suffice for my own short presentation, which I was too modest to include upon the official calendar.

  “The truth is, that in my own personal style, I too am a sociologist of a stature, so I believe, equivalent to your own. I make this assertion without embarrassment. ‘Ah!’ you cry out in wonder, and you whisper back and forth: ‘In which field does Sir Laurz so quietly excel?’ ” Laurz Mur gave his head a sad shake. “It is a complex story, too detailed for the time available to us. Suffice it to say that my papers, embodying truly novel concepts, have never been published, and the propositions which should have gained universal currency, have gone unheard, wasted, like so much trash. I have toiled like the fabulous Heracles against this shame; I have submitted my papers to every organ of intellectual broadcast I could discover. Unanimously they refused to cope with the novelty of my ideas. That is the gist of the story, and though saddened, I will not complain. Instead, I have organized this conclave, where I can take a moment or so to express my views.

  “This gathering includes the top skim of social anthropologists and savants of related sciences from across the Gaean Reach. Indeed, there is not one of you who has not published on Old Earth, and this of course is the touchstone of achievement. I congratulate you all, and, so saying, I request a brief period of your attention—now only three minutes until recess—to a truncated exposition of my views. And why should you not? You are here by my invitation and through the intricacy of my arrangements. When foundation funding was inadequate, I made up the shortfall from my private purse. So, as you see, I have committed a great deal of myself to the success of this conclave.

  “But time is short, and I must make haste if I am so much as to adumbrate the scope of my thinking. I deal with the mystery of life, personality and individual destiny: concepts which are embodied in the idea of ‘tamsour.’

  “My thesis is that I have generated a cosmos by my own striving: a cosmos which draws its élan from my own life energy and uses my noble impulses to augment its own characteristics. This cosmos, so I might have hoped, considering my natural attributes, should have been amiable and supportive, but as you have heard the opposite was the case and I met malice at every turn. Is it not strange and wonderful, that this cosmos of my own creation should in its arrogance draw itself up before me, mocking and sarcastic, to become my implacable tormentor?” Laurz Mur leaned forward, face stern. “For a time I felt that we were evenly matched, but now the cosmos gains strength, and would reduce me to a paltry squeaking sub-thing, had I not found a means to blast the cosmos and its most precious darlings.” Laurz Mur glanced at a clock and took up his satinwood mallet. “Ladies and gentlemen, the hour verges upon the time of recess, and the most glorious, most dramatic tamsour ever conceived. I have outwitted the cosmos! I batter it, I destroy its precious things, I smash its ornaments; I knock it awry; I annihilate it! The time is—now!” He struck the gong with his mallet.

  The central chandelier grew suddenly luminescent. For the fraction of a second, those who were looking up saw it separate into flying shards of colored glass with an eye-searing glare behind, which instantaneously expanded to fill the rotunda and explode the colored glass of the great hemisphere into splinters, and so ended the conclave at Dimplewater on the world Ushant, in a tamsour which would excite murmurs of awe for centuries to come.

  Twelve

  1

  The big old house echoed to the sounds of emptiness. Jaro realized, with sorrow and guilt, that he had taken Hilyer and Althea for granted, as if they would be with him forever. But now they were gone, exploded into luminous dust, along with all their kindness and humor, and he could not bring them back.

  Jaro sorrowfully put sentimentality aside and set about the dreary process of reorganizing his life. He arranged for the removal of all the Faths’ personal possessions; otherwise, everywhere he looked he would be reminded of their cheerful presence. Out the door went shoes, clothes, lotions and cosmetics, oddments of this and that, as well as much of the heavy old furniture which the frugal Hilyer had refused to jettison. Althea’s candelabra? They represented so much of Althea, her joy and enthusiasm, that Jaro could not bring himself to include them in his house-cleaning. Some he stored in a pair of cabinets; others he arranged along a high shelf, where they imparted color and vitality to an otherwise drab room.

  During the first two days after receiving the news from Ushant, Jaro made several attempts to reach Skirl, both by way of the Clam Muffin Committee and at Sassoon Ayry. On the third day a cool voice, responding to his call to Sassoon Ayry, notified him that the bank had seized all of Clois Hutsenreiter’s assets, closed the house to tenancy. The former occupants of the house were no longer in residence. Jaro asked, “Where, then, is Skirl Hutsenreiter?”

  The cool voice replied: “The bank cannot supply this sort of information. Such questions should be placed with an appropriate agency.”

  2

  The next morning Jaro was visited by a gentleman of obvious comporture, wearing a Kahulibah emblem. He was suave of demeanor, sleek of torso, impeccably groomed and barbered, with sparse dark hair, plump cheeks, large dog-brown eyes. With each movement he exuded a waft of forest-fern essence.

  The gentleman introduced himself. “I am Forby Mildoon, an acquaintance of your late father. What a dreadful tragedy! I happened to be passing along Katzvold Road, so I thought to drop in and express my condolences.”

  “Thank you,” said Jaro. Forby Mildoon stepped forward and Jaro perforce had to move aside. Mr. Mildoon marched into the house. Jaro looked after him with raised eyebrows, then shrugged and followed Mr. Mildoon into the sitting room.

  “Please be seated,” said Jaro formally. Mildoon made an all-inclusive assessment of the room; then, after considering his limited choice, settled gingerly upon the couch. “I see that you have been hard at work,” said Mildoon. “Very sensible; it’s the best way to ease your emotion. I trust that things are going passably well?”

  “Well enough.”

  Mildoon made a gesture of sympathy and once again looked around the room, showing no more approval than before. “I hope you are not alone. You should be with you
r friends, or at your club.”

  Jaro said stonily, “I have work to do.”

  Mildoon smiled and nodded his endorsement of Jaro’s activities. “It appears that before long you’ll be moving into more suitable accommodations?”

  “I’ll stay here. Why should I move?”

  “Hm ha. It’s rather a desolate old barn for you to be rattling around in; don’t you think?”

  Jaro made no reply. Mildoon gave a small self-conscious cough and shuffled his feet. “Oh me, oh my! How the time dashes past, with worlds of work confronting me! I must be on my way.” He started to rise, then paused, as if at the advent of a sudden thought. “Perhaps I should not bring the matter up at this time, but I’ll do so anyway, out of respect for your late father. Over the last few months he’s shown some interest in selling the property. I had to tell him that the market was rather limp, but only yesterday I got wind of what might turn out to be an advantageous situation. Do you wish to hear the details?”

  “I don’t think I’m interested. I plan to do some remodeling, then I might rent.”

  Mildoon gave his head a dubious shake. “Remodeling is a risky business and you may well end up pouring money down a rathole. I’ve seen many such projects come to grief.”

  Jaro, now half-amused, said, “It might be cheaper and end up safer to do nothing whatever.”

  Mildoon blew out his plump cheeks. “If you can tolerate such a dreary life out here in the rain and wind! It’s a virtual wilderness!”

  “I’m used to it; in fact, I like it.”

  “Still, you’d be better off selling, in my opinion, and at once, while the market is still showing signs of life. In fact, I’ll go out on a limb and bend the Association’s scalebook of values to its limit and make you an offer myself.”

  “That’s nice of you,” said Jaro. “What sort of offer did you have in mind?”