Nothing. Recollection extended to the Carfaunge spaceport. Events before were like voices remembered from a dream. Why was he here at Gaswin? To earn money.
How long must he remain? He had forgotten, or perhaps the words had not registered. Pardero began to feel a suffocating agitation, a claustrophobia of the intellect. He lay down on the moor, beat his forehead, cried out in frustration.
Time passed. Pardero rose to his knees, gained his feet and slowly returned to the camp.
A week later Pardero learned of the camp doctor and his function. The next morning, during sick call, he presented himself to the dispensary. A dozen men sat on the benches while the doctor, a young man fresh from medical school, summoned them forward, one at a time. The complaints, real, imaginary, or contrived, were usually related to the work: backache, allergic reaction, congestion of the lungs, an infected lychbug sting. The doctor, young in years but already old in guile, sorted out the real from the fictitious, prescribing remedies for the first and irritant salves or vile-flavored medicines for the second.
Pardero was signaled to the desk and the doctor looked him up and down. "What's wrong with you?"
"I can't remember anything."
"Indeed." The doctor leaned back in his chair. "What is your name?"
"I don't know. Here at the camp they call me Pardero. Can you help me?"
"Probably not. Go back to the bench and let me finish up the sick call; it'll be just a few minutes."
The doctor dealt with his remaining patients and returned to Pardero. "Tell me haw far back you remember."
"I arrived at Carfaunge. I remember a spaceship. I remember the depot - but nothing before."
"Nothing whatever?"
"Nothing."
"Do you remember things you like, or dislike? Are you afraid of anything?"
"No."
"Amnesia typically derives from a subconscious intent to block out intolerable memories."
Pardero gave his head a dubious shake. "I don't think this is likely."
The doctor, both intrigued and bemused, uttered an uneasy half-embarrassed laugh. "Since you can't remember the circumstances, you aren't in a position to judge."
"I suppose that's true... Could something be wrong with my brain?"
"You mean physical damage? Do you have headaches or head pains? Any sensation of numbness or pressure?"
"No."
"Well, it's hardly likely a tumor would cause general amnesia in any event...
Let me check my references..." He read for a few moments. "I could try hypnotherapy or shock. Candidly, I don't think I'd do you any Amnesia generally cures itself if left alone."
"I don't think I can cure myself. Something lies on my brain like a blanket. It suffocates me. I can't tear it loose. Can't you help me?"
There was a simplicity to Pardero's manner which appealed to the doctor. He also sensed strangeness: tragedy and drama beyond his conjecture.
"I would help you if I could," said the doctor. "With all my soul I would help you. But I wouldn't know what I should be doing. I'm not qualified to experiment on you."
"The police officer told me to go to the Connatic's Hospital on Numenes."
"Yes, of course. This is best for you; I was about to suggest it myself."
"Where is Numenes? How do I go there?"
"You must go by starship. The fare is a little over two hundred ozols. That is what I have been told. You earn three and a half ozols a day - more if you exceed your quota. When you have two hundred and fifty ozols, go to Numenes.
That is my best advice."
1. Numerous systems of chronometry create confusion across Alastor Cluster and the Gaean Reach, despite attempts at reform. In any given locality, at least three systems of reckoning are in daily use: scientific chronometry, based upon the orbital frequency of the K-state hydrogen electron; astronomic time - 'Gaean Standard Time' - which provides synchronism across the human universe; and local time.
Chapter 2
Pardero worked with single-minded energy. Without fail he collected a half measure over his quota, and sometimes a total of two measures, which first excited jocular comment among his fellow workers, then sardonic sneers, and finally a cold, if covert, hostility. To compound his offenses Pardero refused to participate in the social activities of the camp, except to sit staring into the holovision screen, and thereby was credited with assumptions of superiority, which was indeed the case. He spent nothing at the commissary; despite all persuasions he refused to gamble, although occasionally he watched the games with a grim smile, which made certain of the players uneasy. Twice his locker was ransacked by someone who hoped to avail himself of Pardero's earnings, but Pardero had drawn no money from his account. Woane made one or two halfhearted attempts at intimidation, then decided to chastise the haughty Pardero, but he encountered such ferocious retaliation that he was glad to regain the sanctuary of the mess hall; and thereafter Pardero was strictly ignored.
At no time could Pardero detect any seepage through the barrier between his memory and his conscious mind. Always as he worked he wondered: "What kind of man am I? Where is my home? What do I know? Who are my friends? Who has committed this wrong against me?" He expended his frustration on the colucoid creeper and became known as a man possessed by as inner demon, to be avoided as carefully as possible.
For his part Pardero banished Gaswin to the most remote corner of his mind; he would take away as few memories as possible. The work he found tolerable; but he resented the name Pardero. To use a stranger's name was like wearing a stranger's clothes - not a fastidious act. Still the name served as well as any other; it was a minor annoyance.
More urgently unpleasant was the lack of privacy. He found detestable the close intimacy of three hundred other men, most especially at mealtimes, when he sat with his eyes fixed on his plate, to avoid the open maws, the mounds of food, the mastication. Impossible to ignore, however, were the belches, grants, hisses, and sighs of satiety. Surely this was not the life he had known in the past! What then had been his life?
The question produced only blankness, a void without information. Somewhere lived a person who had launched him across the Cluster with his hair hacked short and as denuded of identification as an egg. Some times when he pondered this enemy he seemed to hear wisps of possibly imaginary sound - echos of what might have been laughter, but when he poised his head to listen, the pulsations ceased.
The onset of darkness continued to trouble him. Often he felt urges to go forth into the dark - an impulse which he resisted, partly from fatigue, partly from a dread of abnormality. He reported his nocturnal restlessness to the camp doctor, who agreed that the tendency should be discouraged, at least until the source was known. The doctor commended Pardero for his industry, and advised the accumulation of at least two hundred and seventy-five ozols before departure, to allow for incidental expenses.
When Pardero's account reached two hundred and seventy-five ozols, he claimed his money from the bursar, and now, no longer an indigent, he was free to pursue his own destiny. He took a rather mournful leave of the doctor, whom he had come to like and respect, and boarded the transport for Carfaunge. He left Gaswin with a twinge of regret. He had known little pleasure here; still the place had given him refuge. He barely remembered Carfaunge, and the spaceport was no more than the recollection of a dream.