"Tomorrow three million persons attend the Pamalisthen Drones. You will appear, make yourself known. Television will convey your face and your words elsewhere on Pao."
Beran chewed his lips, angry both at his own uneasiness and at Palafox's indomitable affability. "What exactly is the program?"
"It is of the utmost simplicity. The Drones commence at an hour after dawn and continue until noon. At this time is the pause. There will be a rumor-passing, and you will be expected. You will appear wearing Black. You will speak." Palafox handed Beran a sheet of paper. "These few sentences should be sufficient."
Beran dubiously glanced down the lines of script. "I hope events work out as you plan. I want no bloodshed, no violence."
Palafox shrugged. "It is impossible to foretell the future. If things go well, no one will suffer except Bustamonte."
"And if things go poorly?"
Palafox laughed. "The ocean bottom is the rendezvous for those who plan poorly."
CHAPTER XV
ACROSS THE Hyaline Gulf from Eiljanre was Mathiole, a region of special and peculiar glamour. In the folktales of early Pao, when episodes of fantasy and romance occurred, Mathiole was inevitably the locale.
To the south of Mathiole was the Pamalisthen, a verdant plain of farms and orchards arranged like pleasure-glades. Here were seven cities, forming the apices of a great heptagon; and at the very center was Festival Field, where drones took place. Among all the numerous gatherings, convocations and grand massings of Pao, the Pamalisthen Drones were accorded the highest prestige.
Long before dawn, on the Eighth Day of the Eighth Week of the Eighth Month, Festival Fields began to fill. Small fires flickered by the thousands; a susurration rose from the plain.
With dawn came throngs more: families gravely gay, in the Paonese fashion. The small children wore clean white smocks, the adolescents school uniforms with various blazons on the shoulders, the adults in the styles and colors befitting their place in society.
The sun rose, generating the blue, white and yellow of a Paonese day. The crowds pressed into the field: millions of individuals standing shoulder to shoulder, speaking only in hushed whispers, but for the most part silent, each person testing his identification with the crowd, adding his soul to the amalgam, withdrawing a sense of rapturous strength.
The first whispers of the drone began: long sighs of sound, intervals of silence between. The sighs grew louder and the silences shorter, and presently the drones were in full pitch--not-quite-inchoate progression, without melody or tonality: a harmony of three million parts, shifting and fluctuating, but always of definite emotional texture. The moods shifted in a spontaneous but ordained sequence, moods stately and abstract, in the same relationship to jubilation or woe that a valley full of mist bears to a fountain of diamonds.
Hours passed, the drones grew higher in pitch, rather more insistent and urgent. When the sun was two-thirds up the sky, a long black saloon-flyer appeared from the direction of Eiljanre. It sank quietly to a low eminence at the far end of the field. Those who had taken places here were thrust down into the plain, barely escaping the descending hull. A few curious loitered, peering in through the glistening ports. A squad of neutraloids in magenta and blue debarked and drove them off with silent efficiency.
Four servants brought forth first a black and brown carpet, then a polished black wooden chair with, black cushioning.
Across the plain, the drones took on a subtly different character, perceptible only to a Paonese ear.
Bustamonte, emerging from the black saloon, was Paonese. He perceived and understood.
The drones continued. The mode changed once more as if Bustamonte's arrival were no more than a transient trifle--a slight more pungent, even, then the original chord of dislike and mockery.
Down the ordained progression of changes went the drones. Shortly before noon the sound ceased. The crowd quivered and moved; a sigh of satisfied achievement rose and died. The crowd changed color and texture, as all who could do so squatted to the ground.
Bustamonte grasped the arms of his chair to rise. The crowd was in its most receptive state, sensitized and aware. He clicked on his shoulder microphone, stepped forward to speak.
A great gasp came from the plain, a sound of vast astonishment and delight.
All eyes were fixed on the sky over Bustamonte's head, where a great rectangle of rippling black velvet had appeared, bearing the blazon of the Panasper Dynasty. Below, in mid-air, stood a solitary figure. He wore short black trousers, black boots, and a rakish black cape clipped over one shoulder. He spoke; the sound echoed over all Festival Field.
"Paonese: I am your Panarch. I am Beran, son to Aiello, scion of the ancient Panasper Dynasty. Many years I have lived in exile, growing to my maturity. Bustamonte has served as Ayudor. He has made mistakes--now I have come to supersede him. I hereby call on Bustamonte to acknowledge me, to make an orderly transfer of authority. Bustamonte, speak!"
Bustamonte had already spoken. A dozen neutraloids ran forward with rifles, knelt, aimed. Lances of white fire raced up to converge on the figure in black. The figure seemed to shatter, to explode; the crowd gasped in shock.
The fire-lances turned against the black rectangle, but this appeared impervious to the energy. Bustamonte swaggered truculently forward. "This is the fate meted to idiots, charlatans and all those who would violate the justice of the government. The impostor, as you have seen..."
Beran's voice came down from the sky. "You shattered only my image, Bustamonte. You must acknowledge me: I am Beran, Panarch of Pao."
"Beran does not exist!" roared Bustamonte. "Beran died with Aiello!"
"I am Beran. I am alive. Here and now you and I will take truth-drug, and any who wishes may question us and bring forth the truth. Do you agree?"
Bustamonte hesitated. The crowd roared. Bustamonte turned, spoke terse orders to one of his ministers. He had neglected to turn off his microphone; the words were heard by three million people. "Call for police-craft. Seal this area. He must be killed."
The crowd-noise rose and fell, and rose again, at the implicit acknowledgement. Bustamonte tore off the microphone, barked further orders. The minister hesitated, seemed to demur. Bustamonte turned, marched to the black saloon. Behind came his retinue, crowding into the craft.
The crowd murmured, and then as if by a single thought, decided to leave Festival Field. In the center, at the most concentrated node, the sense of constriction was strongest. Faces twisted and turned; from a distance the effect was rapid pale twinkling.
A milling motion began. Families were wedged apart, pushed away from each other. Then shouts and calls were the components of a growing hoarse sound. The fear became palpable; the pleasant field grew acrid with the scent.
Overhead the black rectangle disappeared, the sky was clear. The crowd felt exposed; the shoving became trampling; the trampling became panic.
Overhead appeared the police craft. They cruised back and forth like sharks; the panic became madness; screams became a continuous shrieking. But the crowd at the periphery was fleeing, swarming along the various roads and lanes, dispersing across the fields. The police craft swept back and forth indecisively; then turned and departed the scene.
Beran seemed to have shrunk, collapsed in on himself. He was pallid, bright-eyed with horror. "Why could we not have foreseen such an event? We are as guilty as Bustamonte!"
"It serves no purpose to become infected with emotion," said Palafox.
Beran made no response. He sat crouched, staring into space.