He stopped talking. It had been a long speech for Charley; and none of us could think of anything to say. The last of the senior officers, all except Ian, had gone past us now, in and out of the room, and the casket was alone. Then Pel spoke.
"I'm sorry," he said, and he sounded sorry. "But even if what you say is all true, it only proves what I always said about Ian. Kensie had two mens' feelings, but Ian hasn't any. He's ice and water with no blood in him. He couldn't bleed if he wanted to. Don't tell me any man torn apart emotionally by his twin brother's death could sit down and plan to handle a situation so cold-bloodedly and efficiently."
"People don't always bleed on the outside where you can see - " Charley broke off, turning his head.
We looked where he was looking, down the corridor behind us, and saw Ian coming, tall and alone. He strode up to us, nodded briefly at us, and went past into the room. We saw him walk to the side of the casket.
He did not speak to Kensie, or touch the casket gently as the soldiers passing through the lobby had done. Instead he closed his big hands, those hands that had killed three armed men, almost casually on the edge of it, and looked down into the face of his dead brother.
Twin face gazed to twin face, the living and the dead. Under the lights of the room, with the motionless towering figure of Ian, it was as if both were living, or both were dead - so little difference there was to be seen between them. Only, Kensie's eyes were closed and Ian's opened; Kensie' slept while Ian waked. And the oneness of the two of them was so solid and evident a thing, there in that room, that it stopped the breath in my chest.
For perhaps a minute or two Ian stood without moving. His face did not change. Then he lifted his gaze, let go of the casket and turned about. He came walking toward us, out of the room, his hands at his sides, the fingers curled into his palms.
"Gentlemen," he said, nodding to us as he passed, and went down the corridor until a turn in it took him out of sight.
Charley left us and went softly back into the room. He stood a moment there, then turned and called to us.
"Pel," he said, "come here."
Pel came; and the rest of us after him.
"I told you," Charley said to Pel, "some people don't bleed on the outside where you can see it."
He moved away from the casket and we looked at it. On its edge were the two areas where Ian had laid hold of it with his hands while he stood looking down at his dead brother. There was no mistaking the places, for at both of them, the hollow metal side had been bent in on itself and crushed with the strength of a grip that was hard to imagine. Below the crushed areas, the cloth lining of the casket was also crumpled and rent; and where each fingertip had pressed, the fabric was torn and marked with a dark stain of blood.
Epilogue
"…So," said the third Amanda, at last, "you see how it really was ."
Hal Mayne nodded. He lifted his head suddenly to see her staring penetratingly at him.
"Or," she said, "do you see something more than I see, even in this?"
He opened his mouth to deny that, and found he could not.
"Maybe," he said. Loneliness and a need to explain himself swept through him without warning, like a heavy tide. "You've got to understand I'm a poet. I… I handle things all the time I don't understand. I'm almost like someone in total darkness, feeling things, sensing things, but never seeing shapes I can describe to other people."
She breathed slowly, in and out.
"So," she said, "there was something more to this interest of yours in the ap Morgans and the Graemes, all along."
"Yes … no!" he said, almost explosively. "You still don't understand. I can't prove anything, but I can feel… connections."
His hands moved, reached out almost as if by their own wills, to grasp at the empty air in front of him.
"Connections," he said, "between the past and the present. Between Cletus and Donal and many others, not related at all. Connections between you and the other two Amandas, and between the ap Morgans and the Graemes - and between all these things and the movement of the Splinter Culture cross-breeds - the New Kind, as they're calling themselves now - and the rest of the human race on all the worlds. I'm Jumbling in the dark, but I'm getting there… I can feel myself getting there!"
She had relaxed. She still watched him, but no longer accusingly.
"So that's why you have to head back now, to Earth and the Final Encyclopedia," she said.
"Yes." He looked at her starkly. "I had to leave to save my life. But now, I have to go back. Everything on Coby, on Harmony, even everything here, keeps pointing me back there."
He reached for her hand. She let him take it, but without returning the pressure of his fingers.
"Amanda," he said urgently. "Come back with me. I don't mean just because I want you with me. I mean because that's where all things are finally coming together. That's where it all ends - or starts. You should be there - just as I have to be there. Amanda, come with me."
She sat still for a moment, then her eyes went past him. Gently, she withdrew her hand from his.
"If you're right, then I will come," she said. "But not now, Hal. Not now. In my own good time."