He released her hand and she left. C’william closed the door behind her. The room became hushed.
“Sit down for a minute while I get things ready. Or look around the room if you prefer.”
“Sir Catmaster—” said Rod.
“No title, please. I am an underperson, made out cats. You may call me C’william.”
“C’william, please tell me first. I miss C’mell. I’m worried about her. Am I falling in love with her? Is that what falling in love means?”
“She’s your wife,” said the Catmaster. “Just temporarily and just in pretense, but she’s still your wife. It’s Earthlike to worry about one’s mate. She’s all right.”
The old c’man disappeared behind a door which had an odd sign on it: HATE HALL.
Rod looked around.
The first thing, the very first thing, which he saw was a display cabinet full of postage stamps. It was made of glass, but he could see the soft blues and the inimitable warm brick reds of his Cape of Good Hope triangular postage stamps. He had come to Earth and there they were! He peered through the glass at them. They were even better than the illustrations which he had seen back on Norstrilia. They had the temper of great age upon them and yet, somehow, they seemed to freight with them the love which men, living men now dead, had given them for thousands and thousands of years. He looked around, and saw that the whole room was full of odd riches. There were ancient toys of all periods, flying toys, copies of machines, things which he suspected were trains. There was a two-story closet of clothing, shimmering with embroidery and gleaming with gold. There was a bin of weapons, clean and tidy — models so ancient that he could not possibly guess what they had been used for, or by whom. Everywhere, there were buckets of coins, usually gold ones. He picked up a handful. They had languages he could not even guess at and they showed the proud imperious faces of the ancient dead. Another cabinet was one which he glanced at and then turned away from, shocked and yet inquisitive: it was filled with indecent souvenirs and pictures from a hundred periods of men’s history, images, sketches, photographs, dolls and models, all of them portraying grisly, comical, sweet, friendly, impressive or horrible versions of the many acts of love. The next section made him pause utterly. Who would have ever wanted these things? Whips, knives, hoods, leather corsets. He passed on, very puzzled. The next section stopped him breathless. It was full of old books, genuine old books. There were a few framed poems, written very ornately. One had a scrap of paper attached to it, reading simply, “My favorite.” Rod looked down to see if he could make it out. It was ancient Inglish and the odd name was “E. Z. C. Judson, Ancient American, A.D. 1823-1866” Rod understood the words of the poem but he did not think that he really got the sense of it. As he read it, he had the impression that a very old man, like the Catmaster, must find in it a poignancy which a younger person would miss:
Rod shook his head as if to get away from the cobwebs of an irrecoverable tragedy. “Maybe,” he thought to himself, “that’s the way people felt about death when they did not die on schedule, the way most worlds have it, or if they do not meet death a few times ahead of time, the way we do in Norstrilia. They must have felt pretty sticky and uncertain.” Another thought crossed his mind and he gasped at the utter cruelty of it. “They did not even have Unselfing rounds that far back! Not that we need them any more, but imagine just sliding into death, helpless, useless, hopeless. Thank the Queen we don’t do that!” He thought of the Queen, who may dead for more than fifteen thousand years, or who might be lost in space, the way many Old North Australians believed, and sure enough! there was her picture, with the words “Queen Elizabeth II.” It was just a bust, but she was a pretty and intelligent-looking woman, with something of a Norstrilian look to her. She looked smart enough to know what to do if one of her sheep caught fire or if her own child came, blank and giggling, out of the traveling vans of the Garden of Death.
Next there were two glass frames, neatly wiped free of dust. They had matched poems by someone who was listed as “Anthony Bearden, Ancient American, A.D. 1913-1949.” The first one seemed very appropriate to this particular place, because it was all about the ancient desires which people had in those days. It read:
The other one might almost have been written about his arrival on Earth, his not knowing what could happen or what should happen to him now.
NIGHT, AND THE SKY UNFAMILIAR
There was a slight sound.
Rod turned around to face the Catmaster.
The old man was unchanged. He still wore the lunatic robes of grandeur, but his dignity survived even this outré effect.
“You like my poems? You like my things? I like them myself. Many men come in here to take things from me, but they find that title is vested in the Lord Jestocost, and they must do strange things to obtain my trifles.”
“Are all these things genuine?” asked Rod, thinking that even Old North Australia could not buy out this shop if they were.
“Certainly not,” said the old man. “Most of them are forgeries — wonderful forgeries. The Instrumentality lets me go to the robot-pits where insane or worn-out robots are destroyed. I can have my pick of them if they are not dangerous. I put them to work making copies of anything which I find in the museums.”
“Those Cape triangles?” said Rod. “Are they real?”
“Cape triangles? You mean the letter stickers. They are genuine, all right, but they are not mine. Those are on loan from the Earth Museum until I can get them copied.”