“Were you watching?” And he let out a guffaw, which reminded me of the beach, the three whipped wretches, the buccaneers.
“I was indeed.”
“Well, Sirius?”—and I have never seen such a triumphant sneer. There was nothing in this vulgarian, all crude contempt, of the urbane gentleman of science I had just been watching.
“It is not Sirius,” I said quietly, as I had done before, “who is master of this planet.”
But while his gaze did meet mine, it was only with the surface of his attention. He was enclosed in his conceit, and his pleasure at his cleverness. And yet, as this boasting animal swaggered there, laughing, I knew that what I was seeing was—defeat.
“Tafta,” I said, “you are very sure of yourself.”
“We have just had a directive from home,” he said. “From Shammat. Shammat of Puttiora…” And he laughed, because the planet Shammat was now master of the Empire of Puttiora, and he was identifying himself this master. “The directive was to test the degree of imperviousness among these Rohandans to the truth of their situation. I tested it. And believe me, Sirius, it is absolute.”
“You are wrong. It only seems to be so.”
“If any leader of any nation of Rohanda stood up and told them the truth, the full truth, of their real situation, do you know what would happen? They would not believe him. They would kill him. Or lock him up as a madman.”
“So it seems now.”
He was looming and swaggering above me, smiling and ascendant, drunk with power and with confidence. And, just as had happened so often before, his great brown hairy hands came out, one on either side of my head, where my allyrium earrings hung. His fingers itchingly stroked the things, while his eyes glittered. But he had forgotten their purposes… And, as I remembered how much he had forgotten, how far he was from any real understanding, I felt some strength come back into me, and this repelled his leeching and sucking at me. His hands fell away.
“What pretty earrings,” said he, in a different voice, a half-mutter, thick and dreamlike, and into his eyes came an anxious look.
“Yes, Shammat, they are.”
Now stood at a distance from each other. He seemed to shrink and diminish as I watched him. He was now only the poor beast Shammat, the doomed one, and I was sorry for him.
I said, “It was foolish of you to follow that order from your Home Planet. Very foolish.”
“Why? What do you know…” As I walked away from him I heard him come running after me, and felt his hot carnivorous breath on my cheek.
Without turning I said, “Goodbye, Tafta.”
I heard him cursing me as he stood there impotent on the street’s edge. And then he was coughing and gasping and retching in the fumes of the machines. And so I left him.
I bought myself a mask of the kind worn by these unfortunates in their streets, to protect themselves from the poisons manufactured by their machines, and which often made them blind, or ill, or silly, and I went walking around and about that city, unable to bring myself yet to summon my Traveller, for I was thinking of Klorathy, of Canopus. I wanted—I am afraid this was the truth—some sort of reassurance; for while I had been showing firmness and confidence with Tafta, I could not help feeling myself undermined by the familiar dry sorrow at the waste of it, the dreadful squandering waste of it all. I remembered Nasar and how he had learned to contain his pain on behalf of this sad place, and I was thinking of the things he had said, and how much I had learned. I was wishing I might see him again. How much it would reassure me to see him, and to exchange a few words. What would he be thinking now, my old friend Nasar—my old friend Canopus?
I was on the edge of the city, looking at a building, and thinking that it pleased me. It was simple enough, a dwelling place, and built of the local stone. There was nothing remarkable about it, yet it drew me. It was built on a small rocky hill that rose clear from the city’s dirty fumes. I saw that on the steps stood a young man, wearing the familiar uniform of tight trousers and singlet, but I could not see his face, for though he was turned towards me, he was wearing a mask. Nasar, Nasar, was ringing in my mind, and I said aloud: “Nasar, I am sure that it is you.”
We were like two snouted creatures, and he took off his mask, and I took off mine. We went higher up the hill, to be more above the fumes, since our eyes had at once begun to redden and water.
“Well, Sirius.”
“Did you build this place? Are you an architect?”
“I am an architect among other things.”
We stood looking the building, side by side. It was really very pleasant. The horrible dissonances of the rest of the city seemed to disappear, and only this house remained.
“Those who live here will be sane?”
“I am living here. I suppose I am saner than most,” said he, on the familiar note Nasar note, and I laughed.
“Ah, Canopus, but why, why, why?”
“Are you still asking why, Ambien?”
“Don’t you?”
He hesitated, and I rccognised in this something I knew welclass="underline" he was not able to communicate what he was thinking to me, Sirius. I was not up to it! He said: “Ambien, has it not occurred to you that there are useful questions, and those that are not? Not at all! Not in the slightest degree!”
“It is hard to accept.”
“Won’t you accept it from Nasar—who knows all about useless rebellions?” And he laughed again, looking into my eyes, so that we remembered our time together in Koshi.
“Perhaps I am not strong enough for that truth.”
“Then so much the worse for you. And we none of us have any choice… or do you want to remain of those who make up any kind of solution or answer for themselves, and take refuge in it, because they are too weak for patience?”
And I could not help laughing, thinking of the long ages of his patience.
But as I laughed, I began to cough, and he was coughing, too.
He put back his mask and so did I. Again two snouted monsters, we faced each other, Nasar and I.
“Ambien, listen to me.”
“When did I ever do anything else?”
“Good. After watching us at work for the long time you have been involved with us, are you still able to believe that we deal in failure?”
“No.”
“Remember that then. Remember it.”
He made a jaunty little gesture of farewell, and went up the steps into his house.
I then left Rohanda, without going back to its moon.
The Four were waiting for me.
This time it was not possible to put them off. They had to have some sort of information.
After a good deal of thought, I dispatched this message to Klorathy. (We always used their term, Shikasta, for Rohanda in such exchanges.)
Private letter sent through the Diplomatic Bag.
In haste. Have just been looking through our reports from Shikasta. In case—which is unlikely, I know—you have not got this information, Shammat called a meeting of all its agents in one place. This in itself seems to us symptomatic of something long suspected by us—and I know, too. Conditions on Shikasta are affecting Shammatans even more than Shikastans, or affecting them faster. Their general mentation seems to be deteriorating rapidly. They suffer from hectivity, acceleration, arrhythmictivity. Their diagnosis of situations, as far as they are capable and within the limits of their species, is adequate. Adequate for certain specific situations and conditions. The conclusions they are drawing from analyses are increasingly wild. That Shammat should order this meeting, exposing its agents to such danger, shows the Mother Planet is affected; as much as that the local agents should obey an obviously reckless order.