After ringing off, Paul Rivers reseated himself on the bed, this time with afeeling of satisfaction. I can’t leave here, he said to himself grimly, but with any kind of luck my thoughts can!
Mekkis gazed out the window of the main passenger lounge of the ship at the planet Earth, which now grew larger by the minute. There it is, he breathed. My bale. Tenneessee.
Actually he could not clearly see it, since the globe had become partially hidden behind cloud- formations. But imagination filled in what the eye could not see.
He ordered another drink and, before lapping it, said to his creeches, “A toast, as they say on Earth. A toast to the new emperor of Tennessee, Percy X” “A toast,” echoed the creeches. But only Mekkis drank.
V
Joan Hiashi sat with her back against the wall of the cave, studying the features of the huge black man who crouched near her frying fish in a skillet over a small electric heating unit.
“Percy?” she said softly.
“Yes.” The Neeg-part leader did not look at her; he concentrated on what he held in his hand.
“Why did you stop that man from shooting me?” “A thousand reasons and none,” Percy said gruffly. “You and I studied Buddhism together; Buddha taught us not to harm any living being. Christ said the same thing. All those pacifist bastards agreed on it, so who am I to argue with them?”
The bitter irony in his voice—she did not remember it from the days when they had both been studying to be ministers, each in his own faith. He had changed. Of course. And she had, too.
“I know it isn’t that simple now,” Percy added, turning the fish over “We live in a universe of murderers. You can’t keep out of it, stay neutral, wait for the next world; they won’t let you, baby.”
“I know what you must have gone through,” she began. But Percy broke in harshly.
“You do? You don’t know a damn thing about me. But I know all about you; I know all the worms you’ve kissed. I know all the lies you’ve told—I knew when you first started out to come here, to trap me for the Gany military governor. Your mind is like a clear mountain stream to me. That’s my curse, baby; I can see it all. Nobody can lie to me.”
“If you know,” she said carefully, “then you know why I did what I did. You know I had to do it. So you can forgive me.”
“Sure, I forgive you. For everything. Not quite; except for one thing. That I can’t forgive.”
“What’s that?”
“For you being alive, baby,” he said, still not looking at her.
After they had eaten they made love, there in the soft sand on the floor of the cave. Joan thought, as she lay breathing deeply, afterward, that it had been good to make love to a man who hadn’t crawled to anyone. She had forgotten what it felt like. “Is this what I really came here for, subconsciously?” she asked him as she toyed with his stiff, wirelike hair.
“I don’t know. I can read you but I can’t make excuses for you.”
She pulled away from him with a jerk, feeling hurt and puzzled.
“What’s the matter, wik girl?” he growled. “Don’t you know you’re supposed to love your enemies?” “Stop throwing religion at my head.” She thought, now, how fine Percy would look on TV, what a great show she could build around him—if she could get back into favor with the Gany Bureau of Cultural Control. Then, abruptly, she realized that Percy was
looking into her mind and seeing these thoughts, and she felt a moment of panic. How do you not think something? Just the effort of trying not to think it brings it more strongly into your mind!
“Once awik, always a wik; right?” he said to her, fixing her with an unblinking stare.
“No, that’s not true.”
“Don’t lie to me.” He leaped to his feet, stood huge and black and dangerous as a bull in the ring, then began pacing restlessly back and forth, speaking in an intense monotone, now and then stopping to wave his arms, point a quivering finger, grimace savagely or shake his fist. “What’s the word ‘Neeg’ mean, wik girl? Is it a race or is it a religion?”
“A race.”
“It’s a religion, like being a Jew. Being white; that’s also a religion. I can tell you in just one word what the white religion is.”
“What?” Joan said guardedly.
“Hypocrisy.” There was a long silence while Percy waited for this to sink in. Or perhaps he waited for a reply. But she said nothing. “What’s the matter, wik girl?” he demanded. “Don’t you know how to talk? Are you just going to sit there and take it when I call you a hypocrite?” Bending, he picked up his rocket dart pistol from the floor of the cave and leveled it at Joan’s head.
“You’d kill me, just like that?”
“I saved your life; now it’s mine, to do with as I please.”
“I didn’t come here to do you any harm. I just wanted to collect folksongs for—”
“I don’t know any songs,” Percy said curtly.
“Maybe it would help your movement if I broadcast some of your music on my show.”
“I told you I don’t know any songs!” He waved his rocket dart pistol in emphasis. “I’ve seen your show, and you know what I think of it?” He spat in the dust. “It’s white jazz you play and that’s the same thing as nothing—meaningless noise, a big fake. You, don’t believe in what you play, do you? You have nothing but contempt for the people who like it and contempt for yourself for playing it.”
“It’s a living,” she said tightly.
“I don’t know why I don’t shoot you; I’d be doing you a favor. God, I’d rather be dead than a gutless white jellyfish like you.” But he did not shoot, and she knew why. He had begun to enjoy tormenting her, searching with his telepathic ability through all the hidden parts of her mind, the places she herself never ventured into. “I think it’s gratitude, that’s what it is; I’m pathetically grateful to you for all you’ve done for my people, down through the ages—you’ve kept my people out of your world, kept them from becoming like you. Thank you, wik white girl; thank you. Thank—”
“Will you cut it out?” she snapped, angry at last. “Backtalk? So there is some spirit in you. Maybe you’ve got a little Neeg blood in you. Listen; I think there’s hope for you, white wik girl. I’m going to do you a favor. I’m going to let you join me. I’m going to give you a chance to quit lying, get up off your belly and be an authentic human being. What do you say?’ ’ “I don’t know,” she said.
“That’s just it; you don’t know. But I’m willing to teach you; I’m willing to spend my priceless time and
patience working with you on the remote chance there might be some trace of real color hidden away in all that white mush you call your ‘personality.’ Listen; I know how you got brought up—don’t you think I know what your people have done to you? I know how they had you fixed, like their dogs and cats; I know how they taught you to say ‘thank you’ when someone with money, occupation script or UN bills, steps on your face. I know how rotten you feel inside, empty and impotent and helpless. No wonder you need to pile up so much money to make people pretend to like you; no wonder you need all that fame to prove to yourself that you exist. Listen; I’m going to put a gun into your hands and give you a chance to kill a few of those white crunks that did this to you.” Abruptly he thrust his gun butt first into her hand, stood back and grinned.
“Suppose,” Joan said presently, “I shoot you instead.”
“No. You don’t have the guts. But evidently he caught something deep in her mind, something marginal which even she could not perceive; as abruptly as he had given her the gun he yanked it back to his own possession. “Lincoln,” he called, and his second-in-command appeared; he had, Joan realized, been listening and watching all this time. ‘ ‘Take this white worm-kisser out of my sight. If I see it again I’ll probably crush it under my heel.”
As Lincoln led her away she asked him, shaken and disturbed, “What’s wrong with him? Why does he rave on like that?”