He rubbed his eyes and thought back upon her beauty. She had seemed so very quiet this time. Though he seldom remembered the words, it seemed that there had been fewer of them. Was it sadness that had marked the tenderness? He recalled a hand upon his brow and something moist that fell onto his cheek.
He shook his head and chuckled. Was he indeed mad, as he had expected lives ago, back in that Strantrian shrine? To consider her as a real person was an act of madness.
On the one hand ...
On the other... How do you explain a recurring dream, anyway? One that persists over a decade? Not the dream, exactly, though. Only the principals and the setting. The dialogue changed, the moods shifted. But each time he was taken with a sense of love and strength into a place of peace. Perhaps he should have seen a psychiatrist. If he had wanted to straighten himself out, that is. But he did not, he decided. Not really. Alone most of the time, who was there for him to harm? Awake when he dealt with others, he was not influenced by them. They gave him comfort and distraction. Why destroy one of the harmless pleasures of life? There seemed no progressive derangement involved.
So he lay there for several hours. He thought about the future. He watched the sky grow light, and one by one he saw the stars put away. He was curious as to the happenings on other worlds. It had been a long while that he had been away from News Central.
When dawn broke the world in two, he rose, sponged himself, trimmed his hair and beard, dressed. He breakfasted, packed his belongings, stowed his pack on his back and started downhill.
Half an hour later, he was passing through the outskirts of town.
As he crossed a street, he heard a bell tolling the same note over and over.
Death, he said; a funeral. And he passed on.
Then he heard sirens. But he continued on, not seeking their source.
He came to the store where he had taken a meal several days earlier. It was closed, and there was a dark remembrance set upon the door.
He walked on, suddenly fearing the worst, knowing it.
He waited for a procession to pass the corner where he stood. A hearse rumbled by, lights on.
They still bury the dead here, he reflected; and, Not what I think, he told himself. Just a death, an ordinary death ... Who am I trying to fool?
He walked on, and a man crossed his path and spat upon it.
Again? What have I become?
He walked the streets, wending his slow way to the airfield.
If I am responsible, how can they know so soon? he asked himself.
They cannot, not for sure ...
But then he thought of himself as they knew him. What? A god-touched being dropped into their midst. Mutual apprehension would prevail, along with the awe. He had stayed too long, that day, centuries ago. Now every moment's pleasure was refined, drained, siphoned, lessened by each bellnote. Every new moment here was closed to pleasure.
He moved along the street, cutting toward his right.
A young boy drew attention to him: "There he is!" he cried. "That's H!"
He could not deny it--but the tone made him wish he were catching his air car elsewhere.
He walked on, and the boy--along with several adults-- followed him.
But she lived, he told himself. I made her live ...
Big victory.
He passed a vehicle repair shop, and the men in blue uniforms who worked there sat in the front of the building, their chairs tilted back against the brick wall. They did not move. They sat there and smoked and stared at him as he passed by, silent.
The bells continued to ring. People moved out of doors and side passages to stare at him as he passed along the streets.
I stayed too long, he decided. It's not as if I wanted to shake anybody's hand. I never have this problem in a large city any more. They move me about in robot-controlled units, which they sterilize afterward; they give me a whole ward to myself, which they sterilize afterward; I only see a few people--immediately after catharsis; and I depart the way I arrived. It's been years since I visited a town this small for a job like this. I got careless. It's all my fault. It would have been all right if I hadn't talked too long after dinner. It _would_ have been all right. I got careless.
He saw a casket being loaded onto a hearse. Around the corner, another hearse waited.
Then it's not a plague ... yet? he decided. At that stage, people start burning bodies. They stay off the streets.
He glanced back, already knowing from the sounds they made what it was that he would see.
The individuals following him had become about a dozen. He did not look back again. Among the small noises that they made, he heard "H" spoken, several times.
Vehicles passed him, moving slowly. He did not look at them, consciously, though it seemed that there were many eyes fixed upon him.
He reached the center of town, passing along a small square situated there, a statue of some local hero/patriot/ benefactor turning green at its center.
He heard someone call out something in a language that he did not understand. He began to hurry; and now the sound of footfalls became more distinct at his back, as if the crowd had grown.
What were the words that had been spoken? he wondered.
He passed a church, and the sound of its bell was very loud as he moved before it. From behind him, he heard a woman utter an oath.
The touch of fear grew stronger. The sun had dropped a beautiful day about him, but he no longer took pleasure in its presence.
He turned to his right and headed toward the field, about three quarters of a mile distant. Now their voices rose, still not addressed to him, but talking about him. He heard the word "murderer" spoken.
He hurried, and as he moved he saw faces at windows. He heard curses at his back. No, it would not do to run. He crossed a street, and a vehicle swung toward him, then rushed away. He heard the strident cry of a bird, crouched beneath the eave of a house that he passed.
He had done it, they knew. People had died, and it had been traced back to him. The other day he had been a hero. Now he was a villain. And that damned primitive, superstitious aura that covered the town! All those references to gods, the talismans, the good luck charms--they added up to something, something that made him hurry his pace. Now, in their minds, he felt himself to be associated with demons rather than gods.
... If only he had not dwelled so long over his dinner, if he had fled from passers-by ...
I was lonely, he told himself. If I had been as wary as I was in the old days, it could have been avoided, there would have been no infection. I was lonely.
He heard someone call out, "H!" but he did not turn.
A child, standing beside a garbage can in an alleyway, shot him with a squirt gun as he passed.
He wiped his face. The bells continued their mournful clanging.
When he paused at a thoroughfare, someone flicked a cigarette butt in his direction. He stepped on it and waited. His followers massed behind him. Someone pushed him. It felt like an elbow in his kidney, though it could have been the heel of a hand. They jostled him, and he heard the word "killer" repeated several times.
He had encountered things of this nature previously. His past experience did not hearten him, however.
"What're you going to do now, mister?" someone called.
He did not answer.
"Infect more people?"
He did not answer.
Then he heard a woman coughing, suddenly, spasmodically, at his back.
He turned, now that he was clean and could help.
A woman had collapsed upon her knees and she was spitting blood.
"Let me through," he said, but they did not.
Held back by a wall of shoulders, he watched her die or go into a coma. She looked dead to him.
He tried to walk away, hoping that they would not notice, now that their attention was focused elsewhere. He moved to the next corner, crossed, began to run.
They were again at his back.
Running had been a mistake, for now he felt the first blow that was not administered by a hand. Someone had thrown something.