New Celebrations: The Adventures of Anthony Villiers (21 page)

6

T
HE NASHUITE EMPIRE IS VAST.
There are enough planets within its nebulous and fluid borders that merely to number and name them all would be the occupation of months, the hobby of years. Most of these planets, of course, are uninteresting, undistinguished, and uninhabited. However, the only man to attempt to visit those remaining, the legendary Kazumatsu Ohno, died at the age of seventy-three of nervous exhaustion and chronic acute diarrhea with his life’s work only half done. Now, that is vast.

The Nashuite Empire is diverse. It contains planets occupied by single families, and planets that are population sinks to rival Old Earth. Each planet is an individual. Each has its own history. Each joined the Empire in its own way, in its own time, under its own particular conditions. Within the Empire there are free planets, and trusts, and fiefs, and satrapies, and provinces, and semi-autonomic dependencies. Diversity for every taste.

Through all human history the practice of governments has been to gather information, to assess it, to make reasonable predictions from it, and finally to act. This is patently impossible for the Nashuite Empire. In many cases there simply is no information. Where there is information it is often inaccurate or dated. In consequence it has been necessary to invent non-statistical methods of self-description as a basis for policy. Chief amongst these is the pantograph.

In the Central Administrative Offices on Nashua there is an immense building filled with pantographs, three-dimensional homologues of the distribution patterns of the Empire. The pantograph is based on the two ancient principles that the present implies the future, and that the part implies the whole. The rest is wave mechanics.

The flaw of the pantograph is that cultures and occupations and migration patterns and the rest do not exist in isolation. They interconnect and interconnect and interconnect. To treat them separately is to be inevitably inaccurate. Still, no one has yet invented a better descriptive device, and some day the Universal Pantograph will be complete and for the first time man will know definitely what is going to happen next.

In 1457, the first pantograph to come into private hands was delivered to one Clifford Morgenstern, who put it to very different use. This pantograph described the present and future distribution of artistic traditions. However, Morgenstern cared nothing for what these might be. Instead, he chose to regard the pantograph as a form of fluid art in itself and he wrote a book defining the effective use of color within the model.

It was this book that disturbed and stimulated Fillmore Djaha. He cared nothing for pantography or color selection, and still the book spoke to him. It said, grandly, gloriously, that not only was change possible, it was inevitable. In those days, in the Tanner Trust, that was exciting news.

* * *

Sir Thomas Edmund Fanshawe-IV pedaled a wobbly bicycle up the path that led from the road to the occupied campsite. Pressed into the job of Mercury, but lacking Mercury’s winged paraphernalia, his motto was necessarily, “I Will Contrive.” He was an excellent contriver, which is to say that while he might tend to wobble, he would arrive.

He ran out of momentum before he reached the camp, stepped down in time, and wheeled the bicycle the final forty feet. A fire was burning, but no one was in sight. He leaned his bicycle against a rock and when he turned again a short, spare young man was standing by the nearer tent closing his jacket.

Sir Thomas said, “Lord Charteris, I believe.”

Villiers said, “Sir Thomas, your memory is excellent. We only met once and then fleetingly.”

And not under the best of circumstances.”

“And not under the best of circumstances. I trust I am no longer suspected of being a bad influence, or am I to be investigated again?”

“You have been, milord.”

“Ah.”

“As before, I believe you were found to be a tolerable vagary.”

This did not conflict so greatly with Villiers’ self-image that he felt need to protest. Neither did he smile, however. But then it was not his way to encourage flattery.

He said to the silver-haired executive: “Have a seat, sir. May I offer you a drink? Hot, cold, alcoholic . . .”

“Water would be excellent,” Sir Thomas said.

Villiers brought him cold water. “If your entourage is small, Sir Thomas, I can offer you all a place by our fire and a hot meal.” He cocked his head at the sky. “It is my estimate that we should have no rain tonight. However, if you wish more conventional accommodations, I believe there is a resort several miles distant.”

“I saw it,” Sir Thomas said. “As I passed on my bicycle. As it happens, however, I traveled to Duden by Navy courier, and hence necessarily alone.”

Villiers had once traveled aboard a Navy courier and would not easily be induced to repeat the experience. Villiers was right-handed. His pilot was left-handed. They had been fitted into the wrong seats and for two weeks had clashed elbows.

“Was the passage long?” Villiers asked.

“Twenty-six days,” Sir Thomas said.

“You have my sympathy.”

“Fanshawe-IV!” Fred said in delight, striding down out of the long-shadowed woods. “So you tracked me down way out here. Is something wrong?”

Sir Thomas stood and salaamed. “Nothing whatever, milord,” he said. “Merely that in a temporary shortage of messengers, I was pressed into service.”

“A message from my father.”

Sir Thomas said, “Yes.”

“Well, I’m sorry for your trouble, Sir Thomas. If it’s the usual thing, it wasn’t worth the effort. I’m afraid that we can’t offer you much here, but it is a pleasure to have you as a guest.”

“No,” Sir Thomas said. “I’m afraid that won’t be possible, milord. I was about to thank Lord Charteris for his invitation when you arrived, but I intend to return to Pewamo Central tonight. If I am fortunate, I may be able to rendezvous with the courier that brought me to Duden.”

“ 
‘Een rollende steen neemt geen mos mede,’
 ” Fred said.

“Exactly,” Sir Thomas said.

Fred smiled.

Villiers said, “What happened to David?” To Sir Thomas’ questioning eyebrow he said, “A young Big Beaver recruit. We’re taking him in hand.”

Fred looked around in surprise. Then he said, “He’s adept at disappearances. He was with me only a moment ago.”

“Not since you first spoke,” Villiers corrected.

“He’s shy. I don’t believe he said more than ten words in the day.”

Sir Thomas asked, “Are you sure of him?”

“Quite,” Villiers said. “I checked him out this morning.”

At Sir Thomas’ question, Fred had begun a protest that was momentarily halted by Villiers’ answer. He sighed, then pointed his left forefinger at Sir Thomas and said, “Won’t you ever let go?”

Then he swung and pointed his right forefinger at Villiers. He shook his head. “Tony, was that necessary?”

Villiers said, “As a
Segosta Savoda
—curiosity alone.”

“Are you really?” Sir Thomas asked. “I only managed to reach
Elimosa Segosta
, but then my health as a boy was not good.” He coughed experimentally. “Yes.” He patted himself on the chest.

“Really, Tony?” Fred asked. Then he held up his hands. “All right, I believe you. It’s you. Sir Thomas, why can’t you be like Villiers and give me a fair chance to go to hell?”

Uncomfortably, Sir Thomas said, “Perhaps someday you’ll understand. I ask nothing but the most routine of precautions.”

Fred rolled his eyes. “Sir Thomas, I don’t want my life directed. I want to make my own decisions. I even want the pleasure of stubbing my toe because I didn’t have sense enough to look where I was going. Why do you think I picked this place for a vacation?”

“I’m sure I don’t know, milord.” Sir Thomas looked about him.

“Well, I’ll tell you. Because I didn’t think you would find me here. That’s why.”

Villiers said quietly, “Fred, take your message off and prepare your reply. Here comes Torve and it’s dinner time, and Sir Thomas has a shuttle to catch.”

Behave badly? Fred was too well-bred. He mentally censured Sir Thomas for being unreasonable—quite rightly—and Villiers for the opposite—again rightly. He set down his pack, took the message, went into his tent, closed the flap and turned on the light.

Sir Thomas said, “Thank you, Lord Charteris. I’m forced to credit you as a man of sense.”

He watched Torve approach the last steep rise into the camp. He said, “That is your tolerable side.”

His eyes widened, then narrowed as Torve successfully negotiated the rise. Insufficient momentum—that was it.

Dust rose as Torve passed them. Villiers raised a hand in welcome. Sir Thomas raised a hand to shoo the dust away.

“And that Trog can stand as a symbol of your vagaries. I find you disturbing, Lord Charteris. You may have to be reconsidered once again. Our previous meeting was, as you say, fleeting. If it had been longer, I might have seen the resemblance.”

“Resemblance?” Villiers asked.

“Between what you are and what he would like to be.”

“You would have seen no resemblance, I think,” Villiers said. “I was a very different person ten years ago.”

“I think not that different.”

“As may be,” Villiers said. “In any case, Sir Thomas, he finds far more pleasure in agrostology than he would ever find as a remittance man, and what is more, he knows it. You have him safe. You have no need to worry.”

“I do worry, sir. It is my occupation to worry.”

“I think he would far rather be himself than be me. If you give him fair allowance for maturity and sense, you might find that he does very well for himself. If you press him too close, the result might be too much like me for your taste.”

Torve, having parked his tricycle, pointed at the upper meadow and said, “I go to think the sun down.”

(In passing, let us note that this was a lie. Torve had no character in the presence of jellied whiteworms. Whiteworms glacé. Whiteworms in sweet cream sauce. When jellied, the opaque white of the worm turns translucent amber, an inner radiance that lends warmth and fire to any sauce. Torve had discovered an opened jar of whiteworms at Green Mountain, and hooked it. He meant to gobble it all in secret shame and could hardly wait to begin crying at his own weakness. This is speaking figuratively, of course. In actual fact, he could hardly wait to lower his nictating membranes, but it comes to the same thing.)

As Torve pointed, Villiers with sudden apprehension saw three figures fleet across the golden lake of grass. A plonk was hanging over the meadow. It took no note of their passage. When they were gone and the lake calm but for wind ripples and memories, it remained.

Villiers bent to Fred’s pack and brought out Volume II of
The Pewamo Reports
. He thumbed through to the section on plonks and unbuttoned his jacket and checked his curdler while he read it.

“Yes,” he said. “Here it is. ‘By nature, the plonk is shy.’ I thought that’s what it said. I’ve wanted to check it all afternoon.”

Sir Thomas said, “Someone is coming.”

Villiers looked around sharply. “Oh, yes. I believe I know him. Admiral Beagle, if I’m not mistaken.”

“It must have been a courtesy promotion. I’m not familiar with the man.”

Villiers closed the green book and replaced it in Fred’s pack. “It’s very strange. That plonk in the meadow has been drifting around here all day. I’ll have to drop a letter and suggest a footnote.”

“They may have meant reserved, rather than
shy.
”

“It’s a possibility, Sir Thomas. The Admiral looks in need of water. Would you draw him some?”

“Certainly,” Sir Thomas said, and turned to fill the cup he still held.

When he turned again, Villiers was nowhere in sight and Admiral Beagle was approaching. The Admiral’s pace and form had never been good. On this final slope, his pace had slowed to less than a walk and his form had disintegrated into a wamble. His breath was harsh and helpless. His color red. His eyes lost. His face a graphic illustration of the principle of osmosis. The only thing neat and orderly about him was the case which he convulsively shifted from left hand to right. Sir Thomas looked again for Villiers, and then stepped forward, cup in hand.

“My dear Admiral,” he said. “Have some water.”

* * *

With a sense of real adventure, Ralph led John and Fillmore down the easy footing of a leaf-filled gully, the meadow out of sight to their left. He turned, hands high, mandolin in one, and motioned for the others to slow.

“Quiet now. Shh.”

Ralph leading?
Ralph?

Well, after all, it was his uncle. But if you doubt, I can prove it to you. Simply bear in mind that if three people see themselves as a group, one will be placed in the center by the other two as they walk.

Imagine John walking between Ralph and Fillmore. Ralph is comfortable. John is relatively comfortable being in the middle with Ralph there to talk to. Fillmore is not comfortable—he feels pushed outside. He lowers his head and drops back a pace and then around to Ralph’s far side. The group stabilizes, John trading the security of the middle for relief at being rid of that twit at his elbow.

Imagine Fillmore walking in the center. Ralph is comfortable. (Ralph is always comfortable.) Fillmore is a trifle uneasy because he isn’t completely sure he belongs in the middle. John is acutely unhappy. He raises his head and picks his own path over rough ground or strides ahead and waits. When the group reforms, Ralph is back in the middle.

So, inevitably Ralph. And after all, it was his uncle.

He motioned up the gully side, and keeping low began to climb. The other two followed. Ralph lifted his head at the top with the care of a fawn trifling with the forbidden. Then he ducked again.

“Can’t see anything,” he said. “But there are rocks ahead and we should be able to see from there.”

They slipped and rustled their way to the rocks and wormed among them. John elbowed Ralph.

“Torve’s sitting in the field,” he said. “I think he’s eating something.”

“I can’t tell,” Ralph said.

Admiral Beagle was intermittently visible through trees below and to their right. He was drinking from a cup and panting.