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48 chapters
Prologue
Prologue
Penfield twirled the stem of his port-glass between thumb and finger. “I don’t agree,” he said. “It’s nothing but egocentric vanity to consider our form of life as unique among those on the millions of worlds that must exist.” “How do you know they exist?” said Hodge. “Observation,” said McCall. “The astronomers have proved that other stars beside our sun have planets.” “You’re playing into his hands,” observed Penfield, the heavy eyebrows twitching as he cracked a nut. “The statistical approach
18 minute read
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II
“But is it a genuine Blue Star?” asked Pyax. He turned toward Dr. Remigorius, who should know if anyone. “Ah! Of that I cannot say. We have been deceived before. It is certain that the old woman has practised veritable witcheries; the Center of Veierelden found a record of a conviction against her in the church there. The only surety is in the test; and that is a test that only Friend Rodvard here can make. If it should be genuine, our game’s won.” The lower lip of Pyax hung open among his pimpl
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II
II
All three of them were waiting, with that man of Count Cleudi’s—the olive-skinned one with such intense eyes—what was his name? Lalette curtsied; Uncle Bontembi smiled. Said Cleudi; “Mathurin, the baskets. I commenced to think we should miss the pleasure of your company tonight, charming Demoiselle Lalette, and my heart was desolated.” “Oh,” she said, (thinking—what if they knew?). “But here is Uncle Bontembi who will tell you that to be desolate of heart is to serve evil and not true religion,
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II
She remained in the chair, with her head drooping and slightly to one side, so he could see only the angle of cheek and chin. “The bed,” he said. “I am so weary,” said she, “that it’s not needed. Do you take it and let me rest here. I’ll turn my back if you wish to undress.” (The thought went tingling through his mind that after this afternoon—so long ago, now—they needed no more be modest with each other.) It almost reached his lips, but instead; “No, you shall have the bed; you need it,” and h
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II
II
It would be the morning after his wedding breakfast on new wine and old bread with fear for a sauce, that she should come to the Office of Pedigree again—with her bands of light hair, fine chin line and cheekbones, and the pointed coronet badge in her hat that showed her a baron’s daughter. All morning Rodvard had been dozing and drowsing; she greeted him gaily; “Have you found more of this matter with which the stem of Stojenrosek is to confound Count Cleudi, or has the weather been too fine fo
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III
III
Under Remigorius’ order, Rodvard did not go home to the pensionnario at sun-turning as usual, but took his repast for a pair of coppers on small beer and cheese at a tavern near his labor. He had been there not often, but it seemed to him that the place bubbled with talk beyond custom, and he wondered if the cause were some tale of Count Cleudi’s witching and Lalette’s escape, a speculation dispelled on his return, for there came to him young Asper Poltén from the next cabinet with: “Did you kno
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5 NIGHT; GENEROSITY; TREASON
5 NIGHT; GENEROSITY; TREASON
She was less cooing than before, having learned of the closing of the city gates and the price on Lalette. (For the first time she knows what it is to be a conspirator, Rodvard thought.) There was a self-sacrificing debate over where to sleep, for the singer had only the one bed and tried to insist that the pair use it, or at least share it with her. In the end Rodvard composed himself across a pile of old garments on the floor. They smelled, he felt ill-used, and went to sleep wondering rather
20 minute read
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They had to take his mother’s bed, not meant for more than one, so that for the first time they lay close wrapped in each other’s arms with a night before them; and this, with the sharp memory of the peril shared on the rooftops hand in hand, was a little more than either could quite bear unmoved, even though the boy was in a corner of the room. They began kissing and holding each other very tight; presently deep breaths said Laduis was asleep. She did not resist (nor desire to). Afterward, Rodv
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III
III
By this time it was clear to both Rodvard and Lalette that as the boy had said, they were certainly in the house of a follower of the Prophet of Mancherei. Though they did not speak of it, the thought gave them both an inner qualm, not over being found there, but at the thought of what might be done to their inner selves by one of these insidious probers in secret thoughts, who had so misused their own Prophet. But a mouse cannot choose the smell of the hole he hides in; they glanced at each oth
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II
From the city to Sedad Vix by the shore is a fair twelve leagues, through the most fertile fields in all Dossola, now jumping with new green, orchards blooming in a row and pale yellow jonquils. Another time Rodvard had found the trip after they crossed the high bridge pure pleasure; but now he felt having missed his sleep, and the travel-mate in the opposite seat was a good-looking pregnant woman, who said she was going to join her husband, and babbled on about his position in the royal orchest
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A pretty maid brought him breakfast in bed. She gave him a cheerful morning greeting but embarrassed him by hoping in her thought that he would not make love to her. Her mind held some memory of how the last man in this room had done so, but she shied from the thought of the outcome so much that instead of decently avoiding her look Rodvard was tempted to pry deeper, but there was hardly time. She said it would be near to noon when Count Cleudi rose and that his apartment was in one of the pavil
16 minute read
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Outside the hall it was a shock to come into bright flowers and green. The sun was just plunging down behind the low green hills westward, the birds singing sleep-songs and everything in perfect peace, not a leaf in movement. Tuolén the butler tapped Rodvard on the shoulder and when they were together in his cabinet, brought forth a bottle of Kjermanash ceriso, held it up to contemplate the ruby glow against the falling light and poured into goblets of crystal. “You found it diverting, Ser Berge
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III
Let conscience die. The hours wheeled timeless past as they so often do when there is a change in outer circumstance so sharp that landmarks vanish. Let conscience die; was it true? Rodvard thought of the high ideals of service with which he had joined the Sons of the New Day—was any purpose as good as another? Lalette; his mind shot off on a sudden tangent of tenderness toward her, who fairly desired to be a good partner, it might be for her own interest, but still making two instead of one aga
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“But where does this intrigue lead?” asked Rodvard. “Could not your Blue Star give you a clue?” said Mathurin. They sat on a green bank behind the hall of conference, many-colored tulips waving in the light breeze about them, and Rodvard carefully tore one of the long leaves to ribbons as he answered: “No. There may have been something about Aggermans in it, but he was not thinking of his central purpose at all, only about how it would be a nasty joke and a revenge. What—” (it was behind his lip
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III
III
A tray had been left in his room as usual, but Rodvard hardly ate from it before flinging himself down to lie supine, watching the pattern of light through the shutters as it slowly ticked across the wall, trying to resolve the problem that beset him. Brunivar with his noble aspect and surely, his noble mind. “Free will and the love of humankind,” the Baron had said, and they called it the doctrine of the apostate Prophet. Yet for what else had he himself joined the Sons of the New Day? What els
16 minute read
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He woke with scaly tongue, head spinning in the fumes of the fired-wine and body burning with unfulfilled desires, to the clink of silver on porcelain, as the maid Damaris bore in his breakfast tray. She was already in costume, a milkmaid and not badly done; her eyes and feet were dancing. “Oh, where did you get the lovely Kjermanash mask?” she asked as he propped himself up among the pillows, and giving him the tray, went to run her fingers lovingly over the white silk where it hung across the
6 minute read
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He woke with a headache at the top of his spine, which ran around inside his head to the place over his eyes; nose feeling as though driven with a wooden plug. Mathurin’s decent black clothes were horribly stained and scratched. Down the way he had come—not at all far from where he had crossed the wall, now that one could see by the light of morning—the footprints lay, a fingerlength deep into the soft ground. At once he was oppressed by the thought that only too easily could his path from the v
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She was fat and one eye looked off at the wrong angle, but Rodvard was in a state not to care if she had worn on her brow the mark of evil. He flopped on the straw-bed. There was only one window, at the other end; the couple whispered under it, after which the housewife set a pot on the fire. Rodvard saw a big striped cat that marched back and forth, back and forth, beside the straw-bed, and it gave him a sense of nameless unease. The woman paid no attention, only stirring the pot as she cast in
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Rodvard did not come back that evening, nor the next, and no word from him of any kind. Lalette felt unhappy and listless after so long indoors; above her she could hear from time to time Mme. Kaja’s footsteps come and go, and when the door was opened, often one of her pupils in song, flatted usually and more frequently than not, off key. The boy Laduis soon held little more for her, and in any case with the spring festival now rushing on so fast, had to be taken from his academy to run errands
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There was a high hall of entry with upholstered chairs, whose members were tortured spirals of wood; and a pair of gigantic silver candlesticks from the floor, rhinanthus plants in form. A respectful doorman came to take her furs, but they were only festival imitations without weight, and she kept them. Pyax said; “At our festival we do not wear masks indoors,” so she removed her headdress, and drew a glance of admiration when he saw the dark hair flowing across the white. The inner door opened
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IV
IV
She woke again to see complete spotted sunlight bright across the wall, wondering for the first sleepy seconds where she was. It was a footstep that had roused her; she turned her head and saw Gaidu Pyax looking down, with spots on his costume. “The greeting of the morning,” he said. “It is spring.” “Oh,” was all Lalette could say, pulling the covers close around her neck, and then; “Well, I greet you.” The smile she had once thought rather pleasant became fixed. “I have come to keep the spring
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She came awake with a start, and the sense that something dreadful had happened. It must be late morning; the widow was gone from the other side of the bed and Laduis’ cot was empty and neatly made up. There was— All at once the whirl at the back of her mind resolved itself into a pattern. There were two things in it, a picture of a strange room where men talked before a fire while a sea beat on a rocky shore, and running through it as though the picture were transparent, an appeal so naked and
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The conventicle was held at the back of a warehouse; people sat on bales of wool, or leaned against them. Guards against the provosts had been set at the door. One, who was addressed as “Initiate” pronounced a discourse of which Lalette hardly understood a word, it was so abstract. She could hardly keep her eyes open; the descent into doze and the jerk back were agonizing. A desiccated woman who breathed through her nose was seated on the next bale. At the end of the discourse, she took Lalette’
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IV
IV
She was roused by feet beating in rhythm and the sound of distant shouts; a big round spot of light swung slowly from side to side across the door. Last night had shown her a jug and a basin beneath the let-down leaf that formed a writing table, but the water was so cold it gave her goose-pimples. The new dress would need taking in at the shoulders, so after trying it, she returned to the old before stepping toward the deck along a passage that held three more doors like her own. Two men in yoke
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It was a strange book, cast in the form of a marvellous tale about a young man whose troubles were manifold, and only because he sought at each step to control his actions by reason, as he had been taught; it seemed that reason forever deceived him, because something would arise that was not comprehended in his philosophy, but was born from the natural constitution of an imperfect world. Thus reason always led him into doing evil, from which he would only be rescued by rejecting reason for affec
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“I will tell you plainly, demoiselle,” said Captain Mülvedo, “that if it were not for Ser Brog saying how he saw with his own eyes that this young man moved to the rail without your urging, I should have been most skeptic. As things stand, I must acquit you of acts direct. As for others, as employment of the Art, they are a matter for a court of Deacons, and since you are bound to Mancherei, you’ll be beyond such jurisdiction.” He stared at her gloomily. “As captain of this ship, and therefore j
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All movement ceased. Sickness dropped from her like a veil, and from beneath burst such a joy of spirit as Lalette had rarely known, so that she could have sung herself a song, as she almost leaped from her place to put on the new dress. There was no mirror and she had to feel the strands of her hair into the demoiselle’s knot, hoping the result would not look too recklessly wild. Outside the deckhouse, shouts and confused, orderly trampings were toward, but no one came to call for her until lon
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16 THE EASTERN SEA: SYSTOLE
16 THE EASTERN SEA: SYSTOLE
The queasiness had gone from Rodvard’s stomach and the illness from his head, but all his senses were more alive than jets of flame. Every rut gave him agony in the jolting mule-cart, he could not draw away from pain long enough for anger or fear. Yet shortly the very keenness of his hurt anaesthetized all down to no more than an aching tooth; and now the senses, oversharpened by witchery, began to report the world around him. They were passing two people afoot, then another cart, to none of whi
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When next he knew, there was a sour smell of wine, it was dark and dripping sounded. He could not think through the curtain of headache; the scampering was undoubtedly rat, but why? Where was added to why with slowly gathering memory—still on the ship certainly, since the bare boards on which he lay heaved with a slow and even beat. The right side of his neck was sore, and the opposite soreness was on his head. He thought: ah, for why am I so punished? and heaved himself upon an elbow to find a
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Rodvard was motioned to the bow of the craft, from which floated a banner with a device much resembling a dove, but it was in the false heraldry of grey on white, and hard to make out. Spray was salt on his face; as they reached a stone dock a ladder was lowered down, and he would have waited for the grey man, but the latter motioned him imperiously to go up first. The pierside street hummed with an activity that to Rodvard seemed far more purposeful than that of languid Netznegon, with horses a
14 minute read
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They sat down again. One of them said; “Be seated,” and the pair stared at him unmoving with those impassive eyes. The inspection lasted a good three or four minutes; Rodvard itched and hardly dared to squirm. One of them addressed him: “You bear a Blue Star.” (It was not a question, but a statement; Rodvard did not feel an answer called for, therefore made none.) “Be warned,” said the second Initiate, “that it is somewhat less potent here than elsewhere, since it is the command of the God of lo
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The lodging assigned was in a room over the shop of a tailor named Gualdis, at a corner where three streets ran together. The man had a fat wife and three daughters, one of whom brought from a cookshop on the corner a big dish of lentils and greens with bits of sausage through it, from which they all ate together. The girls chartered profusely, curious as so many magpies about Rodvard and how life was lived in Dossola, for they were too young to remember when Prince Pavinius had turned from Gran
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Rodvard had no meal at noon (lacking money), his eyeballs ached from toiling under lamplight, and the others had finished their eating when he reached the Gualdis’ shop. The dame’s voice was not very pleasant (the Blue Star told him she hoped he was not going to be as much trouble as—something he could not make out). But Leece and Vyana, the oldest daughter, reheated for him some of the stew in a casserole, and made to entertain him by asking him about his work. (When he told them it was casting
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“Listen,” said Leece. “Oh, hear. I am not ignorant. If you really desire that I should come no more, I will not. I am not one to intrude.” “Lovely Leece,” he said, “it is for you, not I,” (yet knowing it was for himself) and drew her hand to his lips, folding her fingers round the kiss he placed in the palm. She looked at him intently. “There is a cold breeze,” she said, and stepping to the door, closed it before she ran across the room with little quick steps to throw back the covers and slip i
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The linen stitching was very tedious. Five or six of them, all novices like herself, sat in a circle and went round the edges of napkins, drawing three threads, stitching them home, drawing three threads, bringing them home again, while the mattern or Mircella or one of the older girls read slowly from the First Book of the Prophet, pausing now and again to make exposition of the meaning of a passage. Talking was discouraged. At noon there was always the same meal of pulse with fresh greens or f
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Without a knock the door opened, Leece slipped in and stood with her back to it, looking down. Rodvard began hastily to make good his jacket-laces. “It was my fault,” she said in a thin voice, then hurriedly; “What I did was contrary to the law of love. Do you want me to bring your breakfast in the morning?” Her eyes were veiled, but one could guess what lay behind them (and one must—one must tread the right measure). “Yes.” “You are still angry with me.” He ran across the room and seized her in
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She turned to face him under the dead tree. “You do not want me any more. How did you find me? Where did you come from?” (He thought: out of one pattern-dance of compulsions and into another.) “I do want you or I would not have come. I could not help it. Did you not receive my letter?” “I suppose you have some story to cover your utter desertion.” “I swear I left with Dr. Remigorius a letter for you, telling how I was called to Sedad Vix on the most urgent of affairs; and then things happened. I
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Questions whirled in Rodvard’s mind, but the larger of the pair said; “Hurry,” and gripped him by the elbow like the guard who had brought him in, dragging along the corridor. “Wait!” said Rodvard, resisting. “There is another—” “We must hurry,” said Demadé Slair. “You do not know how desperate a business this is. We have had to kill.” “No. I will not leave her. She is my sweetheart; my witch.” “You have her here? Of the two of you, she is the more important! Where is she?” “At the third cell he
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It was after sunset bell when they came upstream to Netznegon city, its gated towers rising dark against the west like the worn teeth of giants. Rodvard stood near the prow, hearing the measured cry of seamen at the sweeps; through all he felt the golden note of glory returning. Dossola (he murmured to himself)—Dossola strong and fair, how shall I contribute to your greatness and so find my own? He felt himself making a poem of it, but in a rush of emotion so intense that he could not bring the
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Rodvard left the Hall of Presence alone, more than a little prideful at being a partaker in great deeds at last, and wondering what the old companions at the Office of Pedigree would say, who had so looked down on and baited him, when they knew he was one of the writers before the great assembly of the nation. Silver spadas were in his pouch; the new clothes were neat; it was the finest day of winter. He felt he must tell someone of his delight in all; lifted his head as he strode, and so stridi
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When they were out, he turned to look at Lalette. She had sagged down, with her face in the pillow, and now without moving, she said as before; “Rodvard.” He went across the room and put an arm around her. “What is it?” “My mother. She is with the court, and she knows the patterns. If that man takes her, he will have her throat cut.” (The fate of many thousands, and the guarantee of the future, with the Art not in the hands of ignorant peasants, but women of intelligence and good will—balanced a
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II
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“The session will recess,” said the kronzlar Escholl. He rose and swept the courtroom with his curious lacklustre eye, that never seemed to be settled on anything. “I will go over the evidence with you, Bergelin.” The legist on his right, the Zigraner, frowned; he on the left leaned his chin on his hand and his elbow on the table. The accused, a man with a coronet badge, iron-grey hair and heavy dewlaps, looked disconcerted. Rodvard gathered his papers and followed the president of the court to
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They paced slowly through the dead garden, along a walk so narrow that shoulders sometimes touched. Lalette could hear the tiny tinkle of the chain that bound Slair’s sword to his hip when that touch came; she knew he was stirred, and the rousing of emotion was not unpleasant to her. Beyond the slate roofs of the town the sun was sinking redly through striations of cloud; all things lay in a peace that was the peace of the end of the world. He turned his head. “Demoiselle,” he said, “what will y
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“Friend Ber-ge-lin! Friend Ber-ge-lin!” The voice from below-stairs brought back to a consciousness of unhappiness the mind that had lost itself in the sweet cadences and imagined worlds of Momoroso. Rodvard sprang up and threw open the door. “What will you have?” “Someone to see you.” Down the hall another door closed. It would be the little old man who asked so many questions and went almost a-tiptoe, as though always prepared to look through a keyhole. From the stairhead, Rodvard could see in
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Rodvard sprang up as she was led into the room, hurrying to get her one of the comfortless chairs from the row against the wall. The guard leered at him (with a thought so nasty that) Rodvard’s tongue stumbled as he said; “She wants to—tell me something in private.” The guard laughed, glanced at the barred window and slammed the door. Maritzl said; “Rodvard, I do not want to go to the throat-cutter.” “What can I do?” said he. Her hands clenched, fingers entwined in fingers. “Take me away. You ar
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Rodvard came in late, and had had no supper save some bread and cheese caught at an inn with the two people’s guards who accompanied him, Demadé Slair having left long before. Lalette was arranging her hair before the mirror, with a candle on either side, and did not turn round. (At the sight of her lifted graceful arms, a wave of tenderness swept over him.) “Lalette,” he said, almost lilting the word. “Good evening.” She still did not turn, and the voice was formal. He hurried across the room i
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She had gone quietly to sleep; Rodvard had to rouse her with the finger-touch behind the right ear that wakens without shock. Even then, she tried for a moment to draw him close until he whispered; “We must hurry.” Beyond the window there was only cold wintry starshine and little enough of that; but Rodvard had hoped for snow or rain. Lalette gathered her smallest of bundles; he led along the balcony three windows down, to where the trellis was, and stepped off backward into night, resting a mom
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Epilogue
Epilogue
In view of the speed with which the low-hung clouds were driving past the window, there would evidently be no business with ducks that day. Hodge helped himself to more coffee. “I wonder what happened to them afterward,” he said. “Does it matter?” said Penfield. “When an emotional problem is solved, the others become unreal.” “You don’t consider poverty a real problem?” asked McCall. “Only in a social and relative sense. Go look at the natives in the hill-country of any Latin-American state. The
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