She looks upward in a kind of incredulous wonder that there should be so much sorrow in the world. Where has it all come from? How could she have lived for so many decades without knowing of it?
The leaden light flickers slowly and ceaselessly along the blank stone ceiling overhead.
Dio is in his studio, tiny as an ant in the distance, where he swings beside the shoulder of the gigantic, half-carved figure. The echo of his hammer drifts down to Claire and Benarra at the doorway.
The figure is female, seated; that is all they can distinguish as yet. The blind head broods, turned downward; there is something malign in the shapeless hunch of the back and the thick, half-defined arms. A cloud of stone dust drifts free around the tiny shape of Dio; the bitter smell of it is in the air; the white dust coats everything.
"Dio," says Claire into the annunciator. The chatter of the. distant hammer goes on. "Dio."
After a moment the hammer stops. The screen flicks on and Dio's white-masked face looks out at them. Only the dark eyes have life; they are hot and impatient. Hair, brows and beard are whitened; even the skin glitters white, as if the sculptor had turned to stone.
"Yes, what is it?"
"Dio—let's go away for a few weeks. I have such a longing to see Napol again. You know, it's been years."
"You go," says the face. In the distance, they see the small black figure hanging with its back turned to them, unmoving beside the gigantic shoulder. "I have too much to do."
"The rest would be good for you," Benarra puts in. "I advise it, Dio."
"I have too much to do," the face repeats curtly. The image blinks out; the chatter of the distant hammer begins again. The black figure blurs in a new cloud of dust.
Benarra shakes his head. "No use." They turn and walk out across the balcony, overlooking the dark reception hall. Benarra says, "I didn't want to tell you this just yet. The Planners are going to ask Dio to resign his post this year."
"I've been afraid of it," says Claire after a moment. "Have you told them how it will make him feel?"
"They say the Sector will become an Avoided Place. They're right; people already are beginning to have a feeling about it. In another few seasons they would stop coming at all."
Her hands are clasping each other restlessly. "Couldn't they give it to him, for a Project, or a museum, perhaps—?" She stops; Benarra is shaking his head.
"He's got this to go through," he says. "I've seen it coming."
"I know." Her voice is flat, defeated. "I'll help him . . . all I can."
"That's just what I don't want you to do," Benarra says.
She turns, startled; he is standing erect and somber against the balcony rail, with the gloomy gulf of the hall below. He says, "Claire, you're holding him back. He dyes his hair for you, but he has only to look at himself when he has been working in the studio, to realize what he actually looks like. He despises himself . . . he'll end hating you. You've got to go away now, and let him do what he has to."
For a moment she cannot speak; her throat aches. "What does he have to do?" she whispers.
"He has to grow old, very fast. He's put it off as long as he can." Benarra turns, looking out over the deserted hall. In a corner, the old cloth drapes trail on the floor. "Go to Napol, or to Timbuk. Don't call, don't write. You can't help him now. He has to do this all by himself."
In Djuba she acquires a little ring made of iron, very old, shaped like a serpent that bites its own tail. It is a curiosity, a student's thing; no one would wear it, and besides it is too small. But the cold touch of the little thing in her palm makes her shiver, to think how old it must be. Never before has she been so aware of the funnel-shaped maw of the past. It feels precarious, to be standing over such gulfs of time.
In Winthur she takes the waters, makes a few friends. There is a lodge on the crest of Mont Blanc, new since she was last here, from which one looks across the valley of the Doire. In the clear Alpine air, the tops of the mountains are like ships, afloat in a sea of cloud. The sunlight is pure and thin, with an aching sweetness; the cries of the skiers echo up remotely.
In Cair she meets a collector who has a curious library, full of scraps and oddments that are not to be found in the common supply. He has a baroque fancy for antiquities; some of his books are actually made of paper and bound in synthetic leather, exact copies of the originals.
" 'Again, the Alfurs of Poso, in Central Celebes,' " she reads aloud, " 'tell how the first men were supplied with their requirements direct from heaven, the Creator passing down his gifts to them by means of a rope. He first tied a stone to the rope and let it down from the sky. But the men would have none of it, and asked somewhat peevishly of what use to them was a stone. The Good God then let down a banana, which, of course, they gladly accepted and ate with relish. This was their undoing. "Because you have chosen the banana," said the deity, "you shall propagate and perish like the banana, and your offspring shall step into your place . . . ." ' " She closes the book slowly. "What was a banana, Alf?"
"A phallic symbol, my dear," he says, stroking his beard, with a pleasant smile.
In Prah, she is caught up briefly in a laughing horde of athletes, playing follow-my-leader: they have volplaned from Omsk to the Baltic, tobogganed down the Rose Club chute from Danz to Warsz, cycled from there to Bucur, ballooned, rocketed, leaped from precipices, run afoot all night. She accompanies them to the mountains; they stay the night in a hostel, singing, and in the morning they are away again, like a flock of swallows. Claire stands grave and still; the horde rushes past her, shining faces, arrows of color, laughs, shouts. "Claire, aren't you coming?" . . . "Claire, what's the matter?" . . . "Claire, come with us, we're swimming to Linz!" But she does not answer; the bright throng passes into silence.
Over the roof of the world, the long cloud-packs are moving swiftly, white against the deep blue. They come from the north; the sharp wind blows among the pines, breathing of icy fiords.
Claire steps back into the empty forum of the hostel. Her movements are slow; she is weary of escaping. For half a decade she has never been in the same spot more than a few weeks. Never once has she looked into a news unit, or tried to call anyone she knows in Sector Twenty. She has even deliberately failed to register her whereabouts: to be registered is to expect a call, and expecting one is halfway to making one.
But what is the use? Wherever she goes, she carries the same darkness with her.
The phone index glows at her touch. Slowly, with unaccustomed fingers, she selects the sector, the group, and the name: Dio.
The screen pulses; there is a long wait. Then the gray face of an autosec says politely, "The registrant has removed, and left no forwarding information."
Claire's throat is dry. "How long ago did his registry stop?"
"One moment please." The blank face falls silent. "He was last registered three years ago, in the index of November thirty."
"Try central registry," says Claire.
"No forwarding information has been registered."
"I know. Try central, anyway. Try everywhere."
"There will be a delay for checking." The blank face is silent a long time. Claire turns away, staring without interest at the living frieze of color which flows along the borders of the room. "Your attention please."
She turns. "Yes?"
'The registrant does not appear in any sector registry."
For a moment she is numb and speechless. Then, with a gesture, she abolishes the autosec, fingers the index again: the same sector, same group; the name: Benarra.
The screen lights: his remembered face looks out at her. "Claire! Where are you?"
"In Cheky. Ben, I tried to call Dio, and it said there was no registry. Is he—?"