Night Lamp

by Jack Vance

  A few hundred feet down the road stood a trio of squat young peasants, eyes small and black in moony faces. They gave no signal of greeting, and stared with impersonal curiosity. Skirl said softly: “These might have been the persons who beat you.”

  “They are about the right age,” said Jaro tonelessly.

  “Aren’t you angry with them?”

  “Very angry. But I don’t think I’ll do anything about it.”

  Maihac strolled down the road and spoke to the men. They responded with exaggerated deference, more mocking than real. Maihac returned. “They say they don’t remember the episode. But they are lying—not out of fear, but for the sheer enjoyment of misleading an off-worlder. It’s common enough.”

  “There’s nothing to be learned here,” said Jaro.

  The flitter took to the air, and heading west once more crossed the Wyching Hills. A river flowing from the west reached the base of the hills, where it swung north to disappear at last into the haze. Five miles upstream a small town appeared near the river: Point Extase, according to the map, with a population of four thousand. Its structures, like those of Tanzig and Sronk, were built of warped clapboard, painted in any one of a hundred soft colors. Many of the houses were old and dilapidated; all had a rumpled look, and wore their roofs askew, like the hats of drunken old harridans.

  The town was separated from the river by a strip of marshy wasteland, overgrown in part by dense stands of tall bamboo. The flitter slid around the outskirts of the town, with Jaro scanning the area below. “I don’t see anything familiar yet,” he told the others. “Let’s get closer to the river.”

  The flitter swung away from the town and flew over the strip of wasteland beside the river. From the corner of his eye Jaro noticed an old yellow house. He pointed. “That is the place. I am sure of it!”

  The flitter landed to the side of the house. The four stepped down to the ground. The house had long been abandoned; windows were broken; at the back of the porch a board had been nailed across the door. Old yellow paint flaked from the punkwood clapboard. At either side, weeds grew rank.

  Jaro studied the house for a moment, then slowly approached. The others stood back, in unspoken accord that Jaro should explore the premises before others came on the scene and altered his perceptions.

  Jaro, oblivious to everything but what was in his own mind, stepped upon the porch, tugged at the board which had been nailed across the doorway and pulled it loose. He pushed at the door; creaking and groaning, it swung open, revealing a long narrow hall. Jaro entered, then turned aside into the front room. How small everything seemed! Odd! He stood looking about the dusty spaces and despite all his resolves, could not avoid a wave of melancholy: impossible not to grieve for what had once been dear and now was gone.

  Something else inhabited the room—something heavy, baleful, inert. Jaro’s pulse began to pound. He searched the shadows, but saw nothing to alarm him, and heard not so much as a whisper. He stood pondering, allowing one idea to lead into another. By degrees insight came to him. He could find nothing, because nothing was there. The pressure originated in his own brain, from vestigial memories scattered and left behind, after the therapy of Dr. Wanish. Jaro thought that if this were a hint of what lay latent in his mind, he would instantly stop brooding over the past.

  The thought acted like a relief valve; the pressure, whatever its source, drained from the room. Jaro gave a wry, rather unnatural, chuckle; he was thinking wild thoughts, quite bereft of coherent logic. He began to mutter: “I am here, not by chance, nor by desire, nor by force. I am here because this is the way things must be. If I had not come by one route, 1 would have come by another. Now where did I get that idea? It is not altogether sensible. I am here—but why? Something is stirring.”

  Jaro stood like a somnambulist. Present time had become amorphous. He looked down a tunnel of time. He saw the yellow house; the door was open. He heard a voice, which he knew to be the voice of his mother. She stood before him; he could feel her nearness but he could not see her face. She was speaking to him. “Jaro, time is short; I have put all my loving strength into making myself known to you! I will print these words into your brain, by what is called hypnotic suggestion. You will never forget what I say, but it will come clear only when you return here, to this dreadful place. For me the end of time has come! I have commanded you to take the black box and hide it in your secret den. When you come back, go to recover the box. Then obey the instructions you will find inside. I place this charge upon you because your father is dead. His name was Tawn Maihac; be faithful.”

  Jaro heard his own voice, hoarse and faint as if coming from a great distance: “I will be faithful.” He paused to listen. There was only silence, heavy and thick. He felt himself drifting, though where he could not decide, since all directions were the same. His vision blurred; he could no longer see the yellow house with the open door. The tunnel of time became a wisp and was gone.

  Someone was calling his name. Jaro began to breathe again; how long had he stood in a daze? He turned his head, to find Skirl standing beside him, tugging at his arm and looking anxiously up into his face.

  “Jaro! Why are you so strange? Are you ill, or faint? I’ve been calling you! You would not answer!”

  Jaro drew another deep breath. “I’m not sure what came over me. I thought I heard my mother’s voice.”

  Skirl looked nervously around the room. “Come; let’s go outside. I don’t like this place.”

  They returned into the open. Maihac asked: “What happened?”

  Jaro tried to put his thoughts into order. “I don’t really know—except that I thought I heard my mother’s voice.”

  Maihac looked at him with eyebrows raised. After a pause he said, “How do you know it was your mother? What I mean is, did the voice identify itself?”

  “Yes,” said Jaro. “The voice identified itself. It mentioned hypnotic suggestion, so we need not look for a ghost.”

  “So what was the message? I assume it was comprehensible.”

  “I understood everything. She told me that you were dead, and that there was something I must do.”

  “And what was that?”

  Jaro stood thinking. After a moment he set off around the house, pausing every three or four steps to survey the surroundings. Suddenly he became assured, and ran to a tumble of stones, perhaps once a kennel or a small shed, now overgrown with red lichen and black puffwort. Jaro dropped to his knees and pulled stones to one side. Presently he opened a dark hole, which he enlarged by moving aside more stones. He reached into the hole and groped, but without success. He removed more stones, then, dropping flat, he crawled into the opening, twisted on his side, and felt along an overhead ledge. Triumph! He backed out of the hole, holding a flat black box.

  Jaro pulled himself to his feet and looked around him, into the faces of his companions. “I’ve found it, where she told me to put it!”

  “Open the box,” said Skirl. “I can’t control my curiosity.”

  Maihac looked warily around the area. “Let’s leave this place first. Just possibly Asrubal might have left someone on guard.”

  The four climbed into the flitter, and returned to Tanzig spaceport. Back aboard the Pharsang, with the flitter stowed in its bay, Jaro opened the box. He withdrew a buff envelope folded from heavy parchment, to which another, smaller, envelope had been clipped. Jaro put the first envelope aside and raised the flap of the second envelope, removed a sheet of paper, and for the second time in his life read a letter from someone who had loved him and now was dead.

  The letter had clearly been scribbled in haste and in an extremity of emotion. Jaro read aloud:

  “ ‘I wonder who will be reading this, and how far in the future? I hope, Jaro, that it will be you. If I succeed in bringing you back, you will know that I could have done nothing else; so if you resent the coercion that I placed into your mind, please forgive me!

  “ ‘Now I am desperate. I have waited too long; I have s
een Asrubal. He will soon find us, and then life will be gone and we will be dead! It is not a nice thought. We will know not even nothing, and fear not even the unimaginable! Jaro, what a queer fact, and it makes me shiver to think of it. If I survive, you will never read this letter. Since you are reading it you will know that events went badly, at least for me. But I expect nothing else, and I grieve only that I must place this burden on you, if you indeed survive.

  “ ‘Asrubal, or Urd House, is the feared one! He will have killed me, and he has killed Tawn Maihac, your father. I know this is so, since three years have passed, and he has not come to find us.

  “ ‘These are your instructions; follow them if you are able. The other envelope contains, first, a draught upon the Natural Bank at Ocknow, which, with accrued interest, will make up to a very large sum. Secure this money by placing it in a new account of your own. Secondly, make six copies of the documents in the large envelope. Place one of these copies in the bank vault; take the other copies to Loorie on the world Nilo-May, by the star Yellow Rose. Place one of the copies into the vault of the local Natural Bank. Mail one copy to the Justiciar at Romarth on the world Fader, by the star Night Lamp. These documents will destroy Asrubal if and when they are received by the Justiciar. They must not fall into the hands of anyone from the House of Urd.

  “ ‘Next, proceed to Romarth. This is dangerous and must be done carefully. At Loorie, locate Aubert Yamb, most likely to be found at the Primrose Consolidators. Identify yourself, induce him to charter a small spaceship and travel to Fader. Land near Romarth. This is illegal but you can protect yourself by stating that you are a special envoy to the Justiciar. As soon as possible, make yourself known to my father, Ardrian of Ramy, at his palace Carleone.

  “ ‘When you meet the Justiciar, give him another of the copies and describe how you came by them. Assert that they demonstrate the criminal peculations of Asrubal of Urd. Assert that Asrubal has killed me, your brother Garlet, Tawn Maihac and also has tried to kill you. The duty I lay upon you is now fulfilled. You can do no more at Romarth, which, despite its beauty, is also most dangerous. Return to Loorie, and thence to Ocknow. Secure your money and thereafter pursue a happy life.

  “ ‘Note: do not deal with Lorquin shipping; you will be killed and your body will be thrown into space. Lorquin is an agency of Urd House: which is to say, Asrubal.

  “ ‘Fader is an old, old world; it is mostly wild and very dangerous. It is where your father met his death. At Loorie ask Yamb about conditions on Fader. Remember, Asrubal will kill you with pleasure.

  “ ‘As I watch you I am heartsick, for now we will part. I love this brave little morsel of life named Jaro; I look across the room and see you as you are now, so earnest and handsome; you are wondering why I write so sadly, and when you read this letter you will know. My poor little Jaro. Once you had a twin brother, but Asrubal killed him, too.

  “ ‘I have finished the letter. Now I will put a hypnotic force on your mind, to bring you back to this desperate place. You may not know why you are coming, but come you must.

  “ ‘I can write no more. My love goes with you always; even when I am gone, it will persist, and perhaps you will feel it. If you listen, it might even give you counsel. I have often wondered about such things, and perhaps soon I will know. You will notice that I am contradicting the dreary remarks I inscribed above. That is called ‘hope’! As for now, I can do no more.

  “ ‘Your mother, Jamiel.’ ”

  After a time Skirl said softly: “Poor brave woman! So she was killed!”

  Jaro found that tears were welling down his cheeks. Maihac said gruffly, “It is a melancholy letter.”

  Jaro opened the heavy brown envelope and withdrew the contents. There was a sheaf of what appeared to be commercial accounts and a bank draught upon the Natural Bank to the sum of three hundred thousand sols, payable to bearer, along with accruement of interest. Gaing examined the draught. “Sixteen years and more, at compound interest, the account will have doubled, or tripled, by this time, depending upon interest.”

  “The money belongs to you and my father,” said Jaro. “It was intended as compensation for the Distilcord; it is not mine.”

  “The money is nice to have,” said Gaing. “There is enough for us all.”

  Skirl asked: “And these other papers? They seem to be invoices or bills of lading, or something similar.”

  Jaro studied them. “They mean nothing to me. Still, my mother wanted them taken to Romarth, and I will do my best to oblige her.”

  “That is how it must be,” said Maihac. “It is also dangerous, but not so dangerous as it might be if Gaing and I were not part of the company.”

  Jaro returned the papers into the envelope. “So far as I can see, there is nothing to keep us on Camberwell. I have even learned the facts of my missing six years.”

  Maihac rose to his feet. “I have an errand I must see to; it won’t take me long.” He left the ship.

  Almost two hours passed. Maihac returned, looking grim and cheerless. He dropped into a chair and accepted a cup of tea. “I had not expected to find Jamiel alive, but now it’s official. At the Registry of Vital Records I learned that thirteen years ago a woman known as Jamu May, residing at 7 Riverfront Way in Point Extase, had been found dead in the river, the victim of unspecified foul play. Her son, age five or six years, was missing and presumed drowned.” Maihac sprawled back in the chair. “I thought that perhaps by some miracle Jamiel might have escaped. But now there is no more hope. In some horrid way she had been done to death. We will visit Romarth and deliver the documents Jamiel won at such great cost. We shall go prepared, and Asrubal of Urd will not be happy to see us. He will know that we have come for revenge. I only hope that he is alive.”

  2

  At Ocknow Maihac and Jaro visited the Natural Bank. Skirl remained aboard the Pharsang, while Gaing went to look for a shipyard capable of making the alterations to the Pharsang now considered necessary.

  At the bank, Maihac and Jaro found that Erin Dykich now held the position of managing director. He made no difficulty about cashing the draught. As Gaing had predicted, the principal, compounding at six and three quarters percent, had far more than doubled itself. Six hundred thousand sols was redeposited in a new account; the balance was packed into a canvas bag.

  Maihac told Dykich of how affairs had gone at Point Extase. Dykich reported that about five years previously Asrubal had come to his office, to demand that the draught, now seven years stale, should be voided. Dykich had refused, citing his instructions from the Council at Romarth. Asrubal had voiced bitter complaints; when Dykich remained adamant, Asrubal had stormed from his office in a cold fury.

  Maihac and Jaro returned to the Pharsang with the canvas bag, now packed with cash. Gaing had found a reputable spaceyard and had arranged for alterations to be made upon the Pharsang.

  Three weeks later armament of several types from heavy to light had been installed aboard the Pharsang. Additionally, power guns and target detection equipment had been fitted to the flitter, so that it functioned as a light version of an IPCC patrol craft.

  Maihac took Skirl aside and explained the dangers which might beset the Pharsang and its crew on the world Fader. With great delicacy, Maihac suggested to Skirl that several options were open to her, any of which she might adopt without the slightest prejudice to herself or to the respect in which she was held. While the Pharsang and its crew pursued a dangerous program on Fader, Skirl could wait at Ocknow or even at Loorie, if she chose, until the Pharsang returned. On the other hand, Maihac was quick to add, should she wish to participate in the venture and share the attendant risks, everyone would take pleasure in her company.

  Skirl responded in a stiff voice. She pointed out that, as a Clam Muffin, she feared nothing, and naturally her choice was the last option. She could not pretend to be pleased with Maihac for dangling the undignified alternatives before her. She declared that Maihac had tacitly called into q
uestion not only her courage and her adventurous spirit, but also her loyalty to Jaro and her honor.

  Maihac protested with great fervor that Skirl had misunderstood his motives. He questioned neither her courage, nor her gallantry, nor her readiness to share Jaro’s destiny, and certainly not her honor, which would have been unthinkable. He insisted that he had broached the topic only in the interests of orderly procedure. He wanted to make sure that Skirl knew everything there was to be known about the expedition, so that he need never feel guilty that he had allowed her a false sense of security. Maihac told her: “It is simply a matter of clearing my conscience, in case you are torn limb from limb by the Loklor. I would mourn you, of course, but I would be in a sense gratified to know that you had gone to your fate without any persuasion from me.”

  “You are conscientious,” said Skirl. “Still, I am trusting you, along with Gaing and Jaro, to make sure that my person is protected at all times.”

  “I will do my best,” said Maihac. “Jaro would never forgive me if I did less.”

  “Does Jaro know that you are talking to me like this?”

  “Definitely not! Jaro is perhaps just a bit vain. He would never suspect that you might prefer wealth, comfort and safety to dying some unspeakable death in his company.”

  Both Skirl and Maihac laughed and parted friends, and the subject never arose again.

  The Pharsang departed Ocknow and set off toward Yellow Rose Star. “The first objective is Asrubal,” said Maihac. “If we find him at Loorie and deal with him there, so much the better. If not, then it’s on to Fader and the city Romarth.”

  3

  The Pharsang slanted out toward the fringes of the galaxy, the star Yellow Rose shining ever brighter. In due course the Pharsang dropped down upon Nilo-May, and landed at the Loorie spaceport. After the usual precautions against transitional shock, the four debarked, complied with routine formalities and were given the freedom of the town. They found themselves at the head of a long tree-shaded avenue.