He slowed, remembering suddenly what he had told the Han. Now, why had he done that? What was it about the man that had made him trust him? It was hard to say. Call it gut instinct. All he had really known was that it seemed somehow right. He shivered, recalling how it had felt to unburden himself—how much better he had felt afterward. As if... well, as if he had been waiting for someone like the Han to come along. As if the gods had sent the man to him.
He smiled, amused by the absurdity of the thought. As if such things as gods existed in the first place! And if they did, they would be laughing at him for his foolishness, not sending him a friend. Even so, he felt better today. Cleaner, somehow. Clearer in his mind. As if he had taken the first step.
He stopped. Up ahead, to his right, was an opening in the wall. Light from within spilled out over the entrance ramp and onto the walkway and the broader track. Above the opening an illuminated sign read workpoint 5. The past was the past. This was his life now, this narrow, predetermined track. And maybe it was better. Maybe this, in the end, was his destiny. To be fallen. To be cast down out of the blazing light. Maybe. And yet something in him still kicked against that fate. In the depths of him that light, transformed, still burned. It was not that he wanted it all back. No, for he had come to hate his past, to despise the person he had been. It was something else. Something which he would know only when he came face-to-face with it. Even so, it was true. He had taken the first step.
Ebert turned, looking back into the blue-black shadows of the walkway, and nodded to himself. If he had learned one thing these past few years, it was patience. Patience and a strange humility. It was as the sage Lao Tzu had said: When those who understand me are few, then I am of great value. The sage wears coarse wool, but inside it he holds on to jade. He smiled, then turned back, the smile remaining on his narrow lips as he crossed the ramp and stepped up into the glare of Work-point 5.
devore walked around the table a second time and then turned, looking back at the merchant.
“Is this it?”
The Han spread his hands and made a vague shrugging motion. “That’s it.
You thought it would be bigger?”
DeVore turned back, looking down at the slender black case that rested on the table’s surface. He had indeed thought it would be bigger. Why, it was no larger than—than a wei chi board! He laughed, surprised, he realized, for the third time in twenty-four hours. First Auden had arrived from nowhere with his news, then he had been beaten by the Program. And now this.
He glanced past the merchant at Auden, then met the man’s eyes again.
“There’s no more, then?”
The merchant shook his head. “That is it, Shih Culver. The core. All you have to do is attach it to your system and let your experts reprogram it. We sealed it back on Chung Kuo. It has been in isolation throughout its journey. I have had two men sitting guard on it around the clock. I can guarantee that there has been no opportunity to contaminate the core.” DeVore stared at the man a moment longer, then nodded, satisfied. He turned, indicating to his assistant that he should settle with the man. The merchant hesitated, then, realizing he had been dismissed, bowed low and backed away, following the assistant from the room. When he was gone, Auden came across.
“What exactly is it, Howard?”
DeVore smiled. “It’s a key, Will. A key to our friend Ward. This, you see, is the computer system they used to have for the Recruitment Program—the place Ward was sent to when he first came up out of the Clay. It’s the place he got the information from for the Aristotle File. But, more important than that, the core holds more than a decades stored information on the boy. Intensive studies of him over long periods. The whole of his personality reconstruction is in here, for instance. If anything can give us a clue as to how Ward thinks, this will.” Auden whistled, impressed. He had heard of the Aristotle File. Everyone in Security had. It was the great unspoken secret of their age. From old information stored in this slender case the boy, Ward, had put together the true history of the world—a history that differed in almost every respect from that propagated by their Han masters and taught in every school throughout the System. A history in which, until a mere two centuries ago, the Hung Moo—the West—had been the masters. As for Ward, well, Auden knew only what others had told him— that the young man was a genius; perhaps the only true scientific genius in the System. And not yet twenty! Auden laughed. “You plan to duplicate him, then, Howard?”
DeVore looked at him strangely, then shook his head. “No. From what I’ve seen of him, I don’t think it could be done. That kind of creativity . . . well, it’s beyond duplication. But maybe we can learn what makes him tick in other ways. Maybe we can succeed where Old Man Lever failed and persuade him to come and work for us, neh?” “And the box will tell us all that?”
DeVore smiled and turned, caressing the surface of the case gently, almost tenderly, as if he were touching a living thing. “That and much more, Will. That and much, much more.”
ebert unclipped the harness at his waist and shrugged the canister off his back; then, holding the door of the locker open with one foot, he slid the squat canister in and snapped the thin wand of the spray hose into the two holding clips set into the wall. That done, he let the door spring back and turned, looking about him at the workpoint. After the cool silence of the workfloor the brightness, the bustling noise of this place, oppressed him. Given the choice he would have worked straight through, but the guild allowed no choice. Two breaks a shift, they said, so two breaks they took. He peeled off his gloves and threw them into the plastic bin, then went across to join the line at the ch’a trolley. It was just after two, more than halfway through the shift, and he was feeling weary—the way he always did at first when he switched to nights. It hadn’t helped that he’d only had four hours sleep in the last thirty-six, but he’d rectify that when he got back. Shen Li would understand.
He waited patiently as the men in front of him chose from the trolley, then took his turn, taking a bulb of ch’a and a heat-sealed packet of wheatcake biscuits.
A long, low bench was set against the wall at the far end of the workpoint. He went across and sat, at a slight distance from the dozen or so other sweepers. In eighteen months he had barely exchanged a word with them; even so, they had accepted him. Passing him in the rows, they would nod or grunt, and he would return the greeting silently. He was odd, sure, but then most of them were odd who did this work. Besides, there was the mask. That, more than anything, singled him out—explained, better than words, why he had to be alone.
He pulled the tab off the bulb and sipped. Despite the packaging the ch’a here was always good. It was HoloGens own brew, chosen, it was said, by the man himself. By Culver.
Culver. . . Ebert leaned forward, staring at the gridded floor between his feet. He alone here knew who Culver really was. He alone understood just what was happening at HoloGen. But the knowledge was worthless, because he himself was dead. Or as good as. Hadn’t the Seven said as much when they’d sentenced him in his absence? And Culver—DeVore—knew that. He sipped again, then set the bulb down between his feet and took the wheatcakes from his pocket, snapping the packet open with a strangely impatient gesture.