He decided that these bloody Nihilists weren’t going to make him hurry over his breakfast, as shabby as the food was. He’d get provender along the way, by some means or other. Of that he had no doubt. But the coffee was surprisingly good, and the black bread as tasty as meat, certainly rich in vitamins. A few other people at nearby tables were talking loudly about the Lies, going from one item to another, finally speculating on the identity of the Cronacian maniac-saboteur who had blown up the petrol station.
‘Anyone who would destroy such a precious fluid as motorcar gasoline ought to be crucified in the otherwise empty fuselage of an airliner flying in circles at ten thousand metres,’ said one inspired enthusiast, whose shoes had also been stolen but who was without a spare pair — though this didn’t seem to bother him as he sat in his bare feet. ‘I wept when I heard the Lies. Imagine, so much petrol less for us to use. I suppose he’s crossed the frontier by now.’ He picked up a huge glass of Nihilitz and drank half of it.
‘After committing such an awful crime,’ said his friend, ‘I’d keep away from the frontier. All the guards would be waiting for me there — if I’d done it, which I haven’t,’ he added quickly, shying away from the other man, who lifted a hand as if to flatten him. ‘No, I’d get to Nihilon City and lie low till I saw an opportunity of escaping.’
‘Maybe he came through here, then,’ said the tall man, looking around.
‘Unless he took to the mountains,’ said his friend. ‘North or south, there are tracks. He could have reached the railway and jumped on to the Trans-Nihilon Express. It only goes at twenty kilometres an hour.’
The big man finished his Nihilitz: ‘Perhaps he spent the night in this motel.’
‘He wouldn’t have the nerve,’ said his friend.
Benjamin poured half of his Nihilitz into the mug, and swallowed some. When the other men finished their discussion, and staggered blind drunk to their cars, he opened his linen-backed map which had been compiled forty years ago and was known to be hopelessly out of date. It had been with him during his travels and military operations of the civil war, and faint pencil lines, indicating the various attacks and retreats in which he and his small force had been involved, were still visible. He marked the position of the Alphabet Motel, and noticed that the road would now descend towards Amrel, the last town whose defence he had been charged with so many years ago.
It would be strange seeing that fortressed and buttressed place again, set high over the bridge that he had neglected to destroy for the mere price of a bus to get his men (and himself) to safety. But his return to Damascony — now Nihilon — was no sentimental journey. During the last twenty-five years he had wondered about the fate of that noble and gentle legislator President Took after the armies of his benign republic had been defeated. Rumour said he had shot himself in his office. Hearsay made up a story of him being killed by one of his supporters. It was alleged that he had starved himself to death. But no proof had been put forward, no corpse ever found. The Nihilists simply did not mention him. His books were forgotten, his works destroyed, his statues smashed, his laws revoked and laughed at. President Took had lived in a plain and simple way, even denying himself friends so that they would not suffer after the catastrophic end which he must clearly have foreseen.
Benjamin remembered how the Nihilists came to power after gaining a small majority in a general election, a victory not accepted, in all his wisdom, by President Took, but one which, as was to be expected, led directly to civil war. The first consideration of the Nihilists, when they had won the election, deposed President Took and renamed the country Nihilon, was to stay in power. They then called themselves the Conservative Nihilists, so that they would never be confused with that left-wing nihilism which would only destroy everything and have done with it. They wanted, said the Conservative Nihilists, to preserve nihilism, to put it into a shrine as it were, and make it last for centuries. So they went on to call it Benevolent Nihilism. Under it, all men and women were equal before the law, though until they were brought before the law they were treated with total nihilistic inequality.
Benjamin also recalled the spectacular election campaign which brought the Nihilists to power. By prearrangement, by advanced publicity and television advertisements, the whole population was invited to witness the destruction of ten bridges, three power stations, twenty banks, and a dozen railway stations. Because no private houses were harmed it was a great success. Countless cars had been driven from cliff tops, with fervent fanatical party supporters in black track-suits at the wheels shouting ‘Long Live Nihilism!’ as they vanished into space. By these activities and various accidents, thousands of ardent Nihilists had lost their lives. Without such losses they would never have won the election, though it also weakened them in the civil war that was to come, which unfortunately did not stop them winning in the end.
Benjamin still heard their election cries over every medium of show and noise. ‘Vote Nihilist! Positive Nihilism is the answer to all our troubles!’ Out of boredom and indecision the people had believed them, and had invited a disaster from which even now, to judge by all he had seen, they had not yet recovered, whatever was said about a space programme.
During his long absence it often seemed that he loved Nihilon more than his own country, even perhaps because of the wild path it had taken. He loved the landscape, and the people who, after all, had invited nihilism into their hearts. If you love someone, he told himself, then it must be that you also love their faults, though he could hardly suppose that a desire for nihilism was one of his.
He had bought a large bag of provisions from the fairground shop, but had been forced to take four bottles of Nihilitz with it as liquid refreshment. There were clouds behind, but blue sky in front, though as if to deny a good day’s trip the road to Amrel quickly deteriorated on its descent and became a rough track marked by the occasional wrecked car or lorry, heaps of rusty petrol cans, old tyres, inner tubes, and, in one case, a complete but dilapidated engine. The land was bare and rocky, except for a few cork or oak trees, and on higher ground to left and right solitary houses could be seen in the distance, wood smoke curling from their chimneys.
His route was no more than a dotted line on the map, and if the chassis of the car hadn’t been strong it would have shaken to bits in the first few kilometres. He passed two cars lying upside down quite close to each other. Their two drivers sat on a nearby flat-topped rock, drinking from a bottle of Nihilitz. The noise of his engine drowned their singing. In subsequent fair and free elections, Benjamin ruminated, they had gladly voted Nihilism again. Such a system took intolerable loads off their minds, though it made him sad to know that people were incapable of facing up to the responsibility of their own possible happiness.
The land was flat, a plateau across which the road could hardly be made out, so he kept his direction by a compass fastened to the dashboard, aiming its needle towards a large group of rocks several kilometres ahead. For the first time since his present entry into Nihilon he felt a sense of wellbeing and freedom, able at last to enjoy the wide landscape spreading on every side.