If this is true, he thought, then in our materialism we have been guilty of no sin, as the theologians tell us we have been — unless the original sin of which we hear so much was, in all truth, this same materialism. But it could not have been, for if our brother humans had not attempted to better their condition, they never would have reached the mental capacity to conceive that great religion we admire so much. They still would be worshiping, if they worshiped at all, some nonsense spirit represented by an awkward structure formed of mud and sticks and bones, crouching in their caves against an unreasoned fear of dark, gibbering of omens.
Our human brothers stumbled many times along their way, they followed fearfully and uncertainly that three-million-year-long road — and here we have stumbled along, as bumbling as they, as uncertain as they, for no more than a thousand years. If, at this juncture of our venture and our purpose, we should stumble badly, commit a great mistake, we have done no more than they did many times before and, as was the case with them, we will recover from it.
The task that we must do, that we must work toward with all our strength and faith, is to make sure that Vatican survives, that the structure we built still will stand in place so that, even if we stumble, we can pick ourselves up and go ahead, finally steady to our purpose.
I am aware that many of the humans of Vatican and End of Nothing view with some disdain our robotic inclination to take the long view, to think of a century as nothing, even of a millennium as inconsequential, if such wasting of time (as they term it) will enable us to pick up and carry on.
He halted his walking and stood upon the brick-paved path, lifting his bowed head to stare toward the east, to where the brittle glitter of the Milky Way, so distant from him, yet to which he was so closely tied, the home of Man, shimmered in the sky.
Out there, toward the east, somewhere in those tangled hills above Decker's cabin, he had been told, was a place that was frequented by an Old One. Perhaps the one who had brought Decker home. Perhaps one that had been watching over Decker. Why should one of them, he wondered, watch principally over Decker?
Perhaps, he told himself, it would be only proper for someone from Vatican, perhaps himself, to go out to talk with Decker's Old One. It would be no more than simple courtesy to return a visit.
Forty-nine
— All this time, Jill asked of Whisperer, you have been in the equation world?
— Yes. I sent you back. I did not come myself. I remained and talked with them.
— You can talk with them? I knew when I was there you were able…
— I can talk with them, said Whisperer.
— Can you tell us what they are?
— They are elderly philosophers.
— That sounds familiar, said Tennyson. Earth had its full share of philosophers and I imagine that it still does, and most of them, it always seemed to me, were elderly. Slow-spoken, deliberate men conscious of their wisdom and never allowing you to ignore that wisdom.
— These are used-up philosophers, said Whisperer.
— Used-up?
— Too old to be of any further use. Behind the times, perhaps. Mumbling in their beards. No longer with their fellows. Restricted to small space. They spend their days in games.
— Like old Earth codgers, playing checkers or horseshoes -
— No, not like that. Not like that at all. They set up problems and they run them through. Sometimes it takes them long, for the problems are not easy.
— Problems? asked Jill. You say they are given problems. But you also say they are out of it.
— No one gives them anything. They think up the problems for themselves. Hypothetical problems. The kind of problems that no one else would waste their time on. Maybe ethical problems, maybe moral, maybe something else. They tried to explain them to me, but-
— Then all this business of equations and diagrams, those are really problems. Not just talk, but problems.
— They are problems, said Whisperer. Maybe some talk, but mostly problems. They do not need to really talk. They commune among themselves. They know each other so well.
— Wait, said Tennyson. Could these people be retired? You know what retired means?
— I'm not sure I do.
— When a human has worked for the greater portion of his estimated time, he is retired. He no longer has to work. He has time for himself. He can do anything he wants to.
— Yes, that's it, said Whisperer.
— So we found an old folks' home. A bunch of oldsters, fiddling away their time.
— No, not fiddling away their time. In their own minds, they still have work to do. That's why they work so hard. The greatest sorrow for them is that the problems they work on are not immediate problems, not functional problems, not real work. Real work is what they thirst for, but they are not allowed to do it.
— Where are the others of them? Those who are not retired?
— Otherwere. Near or far, I cannot tell. They work on real problems.
— But the retired ones, the ones you talked with. They do chores as well? They can think as well? They have capabilities?
— They sent me out, said Whisperer. Where, I do not know. No geography. No coordinates. I skated on a magnetic flux and I danced with ions, I warmed myself on a red dwarf star in blackness.
— They really sent you? Not just showed it to you? They sent the atoms of you?
— They sent the atoms of me.
— Why? asked Jill.
— Because they knew I wanted to. They read the wishes of me. Or maybe only to show me the skill of them. This I do not think, for I was made to understand that it was but a small thing that they did. A kindness to me, knowing what I wanted. And I talked to them of Heaven.
— Heaven?
— You want to go to Heaven, do you not? Could I be mistaken?
— No, you're not, said Tennyson. No, you're not mistaken. But there are no coordinates, no data…
— You must talk with me again of it, show it in your minds. You tell me the story that you know. Everything you know of this Heaven place.
— And then?
— I'll talk with them again. Tell them how badly you wish to go. How you so much deserve to go. They'll try, I know. This would be real work for them, not just the games they play. They'll be glad of it. The equations will flash and the diagrams will build and they'll search their data and their memories.