“No. It is not.”
The Denebian’s words were spoken with such absolute conviction that the bureaucrat was taken aback. “Why not?”
“There is for all species a minimum sustainable population. Once the population falls below a certain number, it is doomed. It lacks the plasticity necessary to survive the normal variations in its environment. Say, for example, that you have a species of bird reduced to a dozen specimens. You protect them, and they increase in number to a thousand. But they are still, genetically, only a dozen individuals expressed in a myriad of clones. Their genome is brittle. One day the sun will rise wrong and they will all die. A disease, say, that kills one will kill all. Any number of things.
“Your haunts cannot exist in very large numbers, or their existence would be known for certain. Korda think otherwise, but he is a fool. It does not matter if a few individuals have lingered on beyond their time. As a race, they are dead.”
Korda chose that moment to return. “You can go in now,” he said. “The Committee wishes to speak with you. I think you’ll be pleased with what they have to say.” Only one who knew Korda well could have caught that overpolite edge to his voice that meant he had just suffered one of his rare defeats.
With a curt bow to the bureaucrat, Vasli glided away. Korda stared after him.
“I didn’t know haunts were one of your interests,” the bureaucrat remarked.
“They are my only interest,” Korda said unguardedly. Then, catching himself, “My only hobby, I mean.”
But the words were out. Revelation cascaded into the past like a line of dominoes toppling. A thousand small remarks Korda had made, a hundred missed meetings, a dozen odd reversals of policies, all were explained. The bureaucrat carefully did not let his face change expression. “So what is it?” Korda asked. “Just what do you want?”
“I need a flier. The Stone House is acting balky, and I’ve been waiting on them for weeks. If you could pull a few strings, I could wrap this affair up in a day. I know where Gregorian is now.”
“Do you?” Korda looked at him sharply. Then, “Very well, I’ll do it.” He touched a data outlet. “Tomorrow morning at Tower Hill, it’ll be waiting for you.”
“Thank you.”
Korda hesitated oddly, looking away and then back again, as if he couldn’t quite put something into words. Then, in a puzzled tone, he asked, “Why are you staring at my feet?”
“Oh, no reason,” the bureaucrat said. “No reason at all.” But even as he deactivated the surrogate, he was thinking, Lots of people have luxury goods from other star systems. The robot freighters crawl between the stars slowly but regularly. Gre-gorian’s father isn’t alone in wearing outsystem boots. Boots of red leather.
The paintbox was silent when he emerged from the gate. Through the open doorway he could see that evening had come, the pearly gray light failing toward dusk. The bouncer sat in a rickety chair, staring out into the rain. The tunnels leading back into the earth were lightless holes.
For an instant of mingled fear and relief the bureaucrat thought the place closed permanently. Then he realized how early it was still; the women would not be on duty yet.
“Excuse me,” he said to the bouncer. The man looked up incuriously; he was a round little dandy, curly-haired and balding, a ridiculous creation. “I’m looking for someone who works here. The—” He hesitated, realizing that he knew the women here only by the nicknames the young soldiers used for them, the Pig, the Goat, and the Horse. “The tall one with short hair.”
“Try the diner.”
“Thanks.”
In a shadowy doorway alongside the diner the bureaucrat waited for the Horse to emerge. He felt like a ghost — sad, voiceless, and unseen, a melancholy pair of eyes staring into the world of the living. He lacked the stomach to wait in the light.
Occasionally people emerged from the diner, and because a plank overhang sheltered the boardwalk there from the rain, they would usually pause to gather themselves together before braving the weather. Once, Chu stopped not an arm’s length away, engrossed in light banter with her young rooster. ” — all alike,” she said. “You think that just because you’ve got that thing between your legs, you’re hot stuff. Well, there’s nothing special about having a penis. Hell, even I have one of them.”
He laughed unsurely.
“You don’t believe me? I’m perfectly serious.” She took out a handful of transition notes. “You care to place a little money on that? Why are you shaking your head? Suddenly you believe me? Tell you what, I’ll give you a chance to get your money back. Double or nothing, mine is bigger than yours.”
The rooster hesitated, then grinned. “Okay,” he said. He reached for his belt.
“Hold on, my pretty, not out here.” Chu took his arm. “We’ll compare lengths in private.” She led him away.
The bureaucrat felt a wry amusement. He remembered when Chu had first shown him the trophy she’d cut from the false Chu, the day it had returned from the taxidermist. She’d opened the box and held it up laughing. “Why would you want to save such a thing?” he had asked.
“It’ll get me the young fish.” She’d swooped it through the air, the way a child would a toy airplane, then lightly kissed the air before its tip and returned it to the box. “Take my word for it. If you want to catch the sweet young things, there’s nothing like owning a big cock.”
Eventually the Horse emerged from the diner, alone. She paused to put up the hood on her raincoat. He stepped from the shadows, and coughed into his hand. “I want to hire your services,” he said. “Not here. I have a place in the old boatyard.”
She looked him up and down, then shrugged. “All right, but I’ll have to charge you for the travel time.” She took his hand and waggled the tattooed finger. “And I can’t spend all night withyou. There’s a midnight mass at the church, a service for the dead.”
“Fine,” he said.
“It’s the last service, and I don’t want to miss it. They’ll be chanting for everyone who ever died in Clay Bank. I got people I want to remember.” She took his arm. “Lead the way.” She was a homely woman, her face harsh and weathered as old wood. Under other circumstances he could imagine their being friends.
They trudged down the river road in silence. The bureaucrat wore a poncho his briefcase had made for him. After a time his speechlessness began to feel oppressive. “What’s your name?” he asked awkwardly.
“You mean my real name or the name I use?”
“Whichever.”
“It’s Arcadia.”
At the houseboat the bureaucrat lit a candle and placed it in its sconce, while Arcadia stamped the mud from her feet. “I’ll sure be glad when this rain ends!” she remarked.
The bundle he’d bought from the scavengers that morning was still on the nightstand. While he was gone, somebody had pulled the covers back from his bed and placed a single black crow’s feather at its center. He brushed it to the floor.
Arcadia found a hook for her raincoat. She pushed up her census bracelet to rub her wrist. “I’ve got a rash from this. You know what I think? I think adamantine is going to be a fetish item in a year or two. People will pay good money to have these things put on them.”
Thrusting the bundle at her, the bureaucrat said, “Here. Take off all your clothes and change into this.”
She looked at the bundle with interest, shrugged again. “All right.”
Til be right back.”
He took a pair of gardening shears from his briefcase and went out into the rain. It was pitch-dark outside, and it took him a long time to clip the large armful of flowers he needed.