A storyteller and song-maker, David, had become a friend, or at least seemed to recognise me. He was still to an extent in possession himself, and I asked him to watch what went on around him, and report to me when I returned from a journey to the nearest city. This stood on a great river near an inland sea where the tides' movements were minimal - the Crescent City. Again a river made an arm around it, but only on one side. The open side had streets and gardens laid out crossways to it, like the strings of a lyre. The music of this city was like the harmonies of lyre music, but before I reached it I could hear the discords, a grating shrillness that told me what I would find when I got there.
It was very beautiful, built of white and yellow stone, with intricate patterns everywhere on pavements, walls, roofs. The predominant colours of the clothes of the people were rust and grey, and these shone out against the green foliage, a brilliant sky. The Natives here were similar in build to those of the Round City, but they were yellow of skin, and their hair was always jetty black. I never saw these as they were, they really were, for by the time I reached them, the process of falling away was well developed. Again I sought out one who seemed more aware of what was happening than the others. The songs and tales had reached here, and these Natives, too, had watched the Giants leave in the enormous crystalline spacecraft which were already beginning to seem like dreams... I asked my friend to assemble others, to persuade them to be patient, not to take hasty decisions, not to panic or be fearful. I said these things with every sense of their absurdity.
I decided to return to the Round City. If the songs and tales had reached the Crescent City, they must have spread to all the others, and that was a beginning. Meanwhile, I felt more and more a sense of urgency, of danger - I had to get back to the Round City, and quickly. I knew this, but not why until I got near it.
I walked towards it from the other side to that where I had come at first. Again it was through light open forest. As I got near where the Stones would begin, there were walnuts and almonds, apricots, pomegranates. The animals were thick here, but all seemed apprehensive, and stood looking in towards the city. They shook their heads, as if to dismiss unwelcome sound: they were already hearing what I could not, but soon did, as I reached the space where the Stones began. There was now a harshness in the harmonies that lapped out from the city, and my ears hurt. I had the beginnings of a headache, and as I entered the Stones I felt sick. The air was ominous, threatening. Whether the disposition of the Stones had ceased to fit the needs of Canopus because of the starry discordance, or whether the harmonies of the Round City had been disrupted by the Giants' leaving, and their abodes being taken over by those who had no place there, I did not know. But whatever the reasons, by the time I reached the inner side, the pain of the sounds seemed worse than when I entered, and as I looked up, I saw birds flying in towards the Stones swerve aside to get away from what rose at that place up into the sky whose deep blue seemed marred, hostile.
Everywhere in the Round City the Natives were hustling and jostling about in groups which continually formed and re-formed. They were always in movement, looking for something, someone; they moved from street to street, from one garden to another, from the outskirts in towards the centre, and when they had reached it and had run everywhere over that place, they looked around wildly, uneasily, and their eyes, which now all had the lost restless look that seemed the strongest thing in them, were never still, always searching, always dissatisfied. These groups took little notice of each other, but pushed and elbowed, as if they had all become strangers, or even enemies. I saw fights and scuffles, children squabbling and trying to hurt each other, heard voices raised in anger. Already the golden-brown walls were defaced with scribblings and dirt. Children in ones and twos and groups stood by the walls, smearing them with mud from the flowerbeds, in the most earnest, violent attempts - at what? Interrupted, they at once turned back to their - task, for that is what it obviously seemed to them. But they, too, were searching, searching, and that was the point of all their activity. If enough people rushed around, hurrying, from place to place, if children, and some adults, daubed mud over the subtle patternings of the still glowing walls, if enough of them met each other, ran around each other, pushed each other, and then gazed hungrily into each other's faces - if enough of these activities were accomplished - then what was lost would be found! That was how it seemed to me, the outsider, clutching on to the Signature for my very life.
But these poor creatures already did not know what had been lost.
The leak, the depletion, was very great by now: must be so, for look at the results!
Were there none left unaffected? Not even enough to be prepared to listen?
I looked into faces for a gleam of sense, I began conversations, but always those brown haunted eyes that so recently had been open and friendly, turned from me, as if they had not seen me, could not hear me. I looked for the storytellers and singers who had been entrusted with as much of the information as they could bear. I found one, and then another, who looked at me doubtfully, and when I asked if people liked their songs, hesitated and seemed struck as if they nearly remembered. Then I saw David sitting on the ledge of a fountain that had rubbish in it, and he was half singing, half talking: "Hear me now, hear this tale of the far off times, when the Great Ones were among us, and taught us all we knew. Hear me tell of the wisdom of the great days." But he was talking of no more than thirty days before.
As he spoke, groups of people did pause in their hurrying and searching, and listened a moment, as if something in them was being touched, reached - and I went forward to stand beside him, and using him as a focal point, called out, "Friends, friends, I have something to tell you... do you remember me? I am Johor, Emissary from Canopus..." They stared. They turned away. It was not that they were hostile: they were not able to take in what I said.
I sat beside David the storyteller, who had become silent, and was sitting with his strong brown arms around his knees, musing, thoughtful.
"Do you remember me, David?" I asked. "I have talked with you many times, and as recently as a month ago. I asked you to watch what happened here, and tell me when I got back. I've been in the Crescent City."
He spread his white teeth in a great smile, one every bit as warm and attractive as before, but his eyes held no recognition.
"We are friends, you and I," I said, and sat with him for a time. But he got up and wandered off, forgetting I was there.
As for me, I stayed where I was, watching the turmoil, thinking. It was clear that things were worse than had been foreseen on Canopus. My own link with Canopus was quite lost, even with the aid of the Signature. I had to make decisions on my own account, and with insufficient information. For instance, I did not know what was happening in the Sirian territories. Where had the rebellious Giants gone? I had no means of finding out. Was the degradation of the Natives complete, or was it partially reversible? What was the situation in all the other cities?
For some hours I took no action, but observed the general restlessness, which grew worse. I then moved among the poor brutes, and saw that the by now very strong vibrations of the city and its environing Stones were causing real physical damage. They clutched their heads as they ran, or let out short howls or screams of pain, but always with a look of incredulity and wonder, for pain had not often been their lot. In fact most never knew it at all. Occasionally one might break a limb; and then there was the rare epidemic; but these happened so seldom that they were talked of as distant contingencies. Headaches, toothaches, sickness, bone aches, joint aches, disorders of the eyes and ears - all the sad list of ailments of the physical body afflicted by the Degeneracy: these were unknown to them. Again and again I watched one stagger, and clutch his head, and groan; or put hands to his stomach, or heart, and always with the look of: What's this? What is happening to me?