“More mischief, I’ll warrant,” Karr said confidingly.
“Do you men want supper?” Jelka asked.
Joseph looked to the others, who shrugged. “All right,” he said, “but I’ll pour us drinks first We’ll be in the moon room.”
He looked down to young Mileja. “You want to go and help grandma, peach?”
She nodded and ran across.
Karr watched her, then looked back at Joseph. “To think she won’t remember Chung Kuo.”
“And maybe thaf s a good thing,” Joseph answered, putting out a hand and ushering them through into the small dome -the moon room - at the side of the house. “It was not a great place to live in latter years. Whereas this ...” Chen nodded. “Maybe so. But we should remember Master Tuan’s warning. This is no paradise. Not unless we make it so. We must learn from what went before.” ‘1 agree,” Joseph said, following the two through the gate and into the dimly-lit interior, “which is why Hannah’s work is so important Why, I was telling young Mileja earlier about what happened, and even as I was telling her, I wondered how much was real and how much I had made up, it seemed so dreamlike.”
Karr nodded sombrely, then gestured to their surroundings. “All those years ago, when I was a blood beneath the Net, how could I have imagined this? To stand in the light of another star, with Chung Kuo gone, abandoned to a host of plants!” “Intelligent plants,” Chen corrected him with a grin. “But come now, first things first. Joseph, have you any of that brandy left?”
The landing pad at Fermi, which normally held few more than three or four craft, was packed tonight. More than forty ships had come, from Ganymede and the planet below, which, in accordance with Joseph’s wish, they had named Last Quarters. As they gathered in the rooms about the hall where the performances would be given, there was a great sense of reunion. It was a busy life, transforming a world, and though they often saw each other on screens to discuss business, these kinds of occasion had been rare of late, so there was an air of genuine celebration.
The Osu were there, and Dcuro Ishida and his family - more than sixty in all, now that his nephews had begun to produce their own offspring. Emily, now wheelchair bound, sat amongst them, talking animatedly, while behind her, Daniel, Hannah’s husband, stood silently, his intelligent eyes taking in everything.
At Joseph and Jelka’s arrival, there was a great hubbub of noise. Friends flocked to greet them and shake their hands or slap their backs, for in Joseph both K. and Kim lived on, looking out through the larger man’s eyes, instilling in his spirit the generosity and sympathy those other men had exhibited throughout their lives.
“Is Ben here?” Joseph asked, wanting to see his old friend. “He is rehearsing,” Chen answered him, appearing at Joseph’s elbow, “can’t you hear?”
There was the sound, behind the murmur of the crowd, of strings and woodwind, starting and stopping. A faint, unfamiliar noise. Hearing it, Joseph shivered. It had been so long since he had seen an orchestra play. So long since he had sat and listened to another read aloud. Such civilised pleasures. Nor were they to be considered simply luxuries: these were things that made life more than mere existence. He looked about him, proud to be part of this great experiment, this great family of beings who now carried the story of humankind forward into a new age. It was not often he thought thus, for there was always too much to do day by day on a practical level, but right now it struck him powerfully. They had been given another chance. A chance to get it right; to learn from past mistakes and create the social structures and institutions that would enhance their lives, not subjugate them.
If only Master Tuan were here to see this, he thought wistfully. But he knew that that had been the price. Old Tuan had sacrificed himself - and his race - to give them this undeserved opportunity.
He had once said as much to Jelka and she had frowned deeply, asking him just why he felt it “undeserved”, and he had referred her to man’s long history. But she, in reply, had spoken of their friends, of the good people who now shared this life with him; had argued that all they had ever needed was new air for them to become new creatures.
And so they worked towards that; to make themselves new creatures, adapting themselves to suit this Eden of a planet and not the other way about, for that had always been the mistake mankind had made - to think that all of creation could be adapted for their use.
People before machines. That had become their creed. Machines were necessary, of course, yet they were also secondary. They took care to use machines purely as tools, utilising them in the same way that one might use a knife or a hoe, not letting the machines use them. For that path, too, mankind had erroneously followed in the past; mechanising and desensitising themselves until they were little better than automatons. As for education, their children were taught to care for the world and the creatures that surrounded them and to appreciate the balance of all things. They were taught the ancient Tao, and, through Li Yuan, learned that their natures were a balance of both the animal and the intellectual and that it was their duty to nurture both, yes and treasure them.
Joseph smiled at the thought of what they had accomplished, smiled at the thought that there was so much more to come. As . for himself, he had never been so happy. He had only to look at Jelka, and at Sampsa and young Mileja, to know that he was blessed. And he knew he was not alone in feeling that. There was no discontent here, no, not even in the face of hardship and suffering - and there had been much of that these past years. And why? Because no one here was alone. Because every single person knew that they would rely on someone to help them in their need.
It would not always be so, of course. Individual men and women were often weak. Yet if one built a world in which such weakness could be channelled and not allowed to fester into resentment and bitterness, then maybe this time they would have a chance - a real chance - to build a society free of levels and hierarchies, free of greed and corruption and all the shades of human pettiness that feed upon the soul.
It was not much to ask, and at the same time, a great deal. More than anyone had ever asked before.
“Joseph?”
He turned at Jelka’s gentle nudge. “Sorry. I was miles away ...”
She gestured towards the doors at the far end of the room, which were now open.
People were moving slowly into the hall beyond.
“I think it’s time.”
Joseph smiled and took her arm. “Then let’s go.”
Sitting right at the front of the hall, directly below the orchestra, Kao Chen
reached into his pocket and took out his handkerchief to wipe his eyes. Beside
him Wang Ti had
LAST QUARTERS
tears streaming down her face, and, looking along the line, Chen saw that not a single one of them was unaffected.
He looked again, past Ben’s back, at the sea of arms that rose and fell in time with the haunting melody, and felt something in him break, so that he let out a loud sob. But no one seemed to care.
It was beautiful. The most beautiful thing he had ever heard. And it felt... well, as if Ben had somehow caught the very thread, the delicate woven pattern of his feelings, and transcribed that into music somehow, so that as the music played, he too was played, like an instrument All of his hopes and fears, all of the baggage that he had brought here from Chung Kuo - all of that was expressed in the music.
And more. Much more. For he felt at that moment that Ben’s music somehow touched him and connected him with everything about him. He felt... absorbed by it And as it finished, he found himself on his feet, part of the great roar that went up from every throat in the hall.