The Star (34 page)
Narrow, endless belts, fitted with handholds every few feet were strung across the face of the honeycomb. Leon grabbed one of these, and let it tow them swiftly past the great mosaic of hexagons. Twice they changed direction, switching from one belt to another, until at last they must have been a full quarter of a mile from the point where they had started.
Leon released his grip, and they drifted to rest beside one cell no different from all the myriads of others. But as Lora saw the expression on Leon’s face, she knew why he had brought her here, and knew that her battle was already lost.
The girl floating in her crystal coffin had a face that was not beautiful, but was full of character and intelligence. Even in this centuries-long repose, it showed determination and resourcefulness. It was the face of a pioneer, of a frontierswoman who could stand beside her mate and help him wield whatever fabulous tools of science might be needed to build a new Earth beyond the stars.
For a long time, unconscious of the cold, Lora stared down at the sleeping rival who would never know of her existence. Had any love, she wondered, in the whole history of the world, ever ended in so strange a place?
At last she spoke, her voice hushed as if she feared to wake these slumbering legions.
‘Is she your wife?’
Leon nodded.
‘I’m sorry, Lora. I never intended to hurt you…’
‘It doesn’t matter now. It was my fault, too,’ She paused, and looked more closely at the sleeping woman. ‘And your child as well?’
‘Yes; it will be born three months after we land.’
How strange to think of a gestation that would last nine months and three hundred years! Yet it was all part of the same pattern; and that, she knew now, was a pattern that had no place for her.
These patient multitudes would haunt her dreams for the rest of her life; as the crystal trap door closed behind her, and warmth crept back into her body, she wished that the cold that had entered her heart could be so easily dispelled. One day, perhaps, it would be; but many days and many lonely nights must pass ere that time came.
She remembered nothing of the journey back through the labyrinth of corridors and echoing chambers; it took her by surprise when she found herself once more in the cabin of the little ferry ship that had brought them up from Thalassa. Leon walked over to the controls, made a few adjustments, but did not sit down.
‘Goodbye, Lora,’ he said. ‘My work is done. It would be better if I stayed here.’ He took her hands in his; and now, in the last moment they would ever have together, there were no words that she could say. She could not even see his face for the tears that blurred her vision.
His hands tightened once, then relaxed. He gave a strangled sob, and when she could see clearly again, the cabin was empty.
A long time later a smooth, synthetic voice announced from the control board, ‘We have landed; please leave by the forward air lock.’ The pattern of opening doors guided her steps, and presently she was looking out into the busy clearing she had left a lifetime ago.
A small crowd was watching the ship with attentive interest, as if it had not landed a hundred times before. For a moment she did not understand the reason; then Clyde’s voice roared, ‘Where is he? I’ve had enough of this!’
In a couple of bounds he was up the ramp and had gripped her roughly by the arm. ‘Tell him to come out like a man!’
Lora shook her head listlessly.
‘He’s not here,’ she answered. ‘I’ve said goodbye to him. I’ll never see him again.’
Clyde stared at her disbelievingly, then saw that she spoke the truth. In the same moment she crumpled into his arms, sobbing as if her heart would break. As she collapsed, his anger, too, collapsed within him, and all that he had intended to say to her vanished from his mind. She belonged to him again; there was nothing else that mattered now.
For almost fifty hours the geyser roared off the coast of Thalassa, until its work was done. All the island watched, through the lenses of the television cameras, the shaping of the iceberg that would ride ahead of the
Magellan
on her way to the stars. May the new shield serve her better, prayed all who watched, than the one she had brought from Earth. The great cone of ice was itself protected, during these few hours while it was close to Thalassa’s sun, by a paper-thin screen of polished metal that kept it always in shadow. The sunshade would be left behind as soon as the journey began; it would not be needed in the interstellar wastes.
The last day came and went; Lora’s heart was not the only one to feel sadness now as the sun went down and the men from Earth made their final farewells to the world they would never forget—and which their sleeping friends would never remember. In the same swift silence with which it had first landed, the gleaming egg lifted from the clearing, dipped for a moment in salutation above the village, and climbed back into its natural element. Then Thalassa waited.
The night was shattered by a soundless detonation of light. A point of pulsing brilliance no larger than a single star had banished all the hosts of heaven and now dominated the sky, far outshining the pale disc of Selene and casting sharp-edged shadows on the ground—shadows that moved even as one watched. Up there on the borders of space the fires that powered the suns themselves were burning now, preparing to drive the starship out into immensity on the last leg of her interrupted journey.
Dry-eyed, Lora watched the silent glory on which half her heart was riding out toward the stars. She was drained of emotion now; if she had tears, they would come later.
Was Leon already sleeping or was he looking back upon Thalassa, thinking of what might have been? Asleep or waking, what did it matter now…?
She felt Clyde’s arms close around her, and welcomed their comfort against the loneliness of space. This was where she belonged; her heart would not stray again.
Goodbye, Leon—may you be happy on that far world which you and your children will conquer for mankind. But think of me sometimes, two hundred years behind you on the road to Earth
.
She turned her back upon the blazing sky and buried her face in the shelter of Clyde’s arms. He stroked her hair with clumsy gentleness, wishing that he had words to comfort her yet knowing that silence was best. He felt no sense of victory; though Lora was his once more, their old and innocent companionship was gone beyond recall. Leon’s memory would fade, but it would never wholly die. All the days of his life, Clyde knew, the ghost of Leon would come between him and Lora—the ghost of a man who would be not one day older when they lay in their graves.
The light was fading from the sky as the fury of the star drive dwindled along its lonely and unreturning road. Only once did Lora turn away from Clyde to look again at the departing ship. Its journey had scarcely begun, yet already it was moving across the heavens more swiftly than any meteor; in a few moments it would have fallen below the edge of the horizon as it plunged past the orbit of Thalassa, beyond the barren outer planets, and on into the abyss.
She clung fiercely to the strong arms that enfolded her, and felt against her cheek the beating of Clyde’s heart—the heart that belonged to her and which she would never spurn again. Out of the silence of the night there came a sudden, long-drawn sigh from the watching thousands, and she knew that the
Magellan
had sunk out of sight below the edge of the world. It was all over.
She looked up at the empty sky to which the stars were now returning—the stars which she could never see again without remembering Leon. But he had been right; that way was not for her. She knew now, with a wisdom beyond her years, that the starship
Magellan
was outward bound into history; and that was something of which Thalassa had no further part. Her world’s story had begun and ended with the pioneers three hundred years ago, but the colonists of the
Magellan
would go on to victories and achievements as great as any yet written in the sagas of mankind. Leon and his companions would be moving seas, levelling mountains, and conquering unknown perils when her descendants eight generations hence would still be dreaming beneath the sun-soaked palms.
And which was better, who could say?
First published in
Galaxy
, September 1958, as ‘The Stroke of the Sun’
Collected in
Tales of Ten Worlds
Someone else should be telling this story—someone who understands the funny kind of football they play down in South America. Back in Moscow, Idaho, we grab the ball and run with it. In the small but prosperous republic which I’ll call Perivia, they kick it around with their feet. And that is nothing to what they do to the referee.
Hasta la Vista, the capital of Perivia, is a fine, modern town up in the Andes, almost two miles above sea level. It is very proud of its magnificent football stadium, which can hold a hundred thousand people. Even so, it’s hardly big enough to pack in all the fans who turn up when there’s a really important game—such as the annual one with the neighbouring republic of Panagura.
One of the first things I learned when I got to Perivia, after various distressing adventures in the less democratic parts of South America, was that last year’s game had been lost because of the knavish dishonesty of the ref. He had, it seemed, penalised most of the players on the team, disallowed a goal, and generally made sure that the best side wouldn’t win. This diatribe made me quite homesick, but remembering where I was, I merely commented, ‘You should have paid him more money.’ ‘We did,’ was the bitter reply, ‘but the Panagurans got at him later.’ ‘Too bad,’ I answered. ‘It’s hard nowadays to find an honest man who stays bought.’ The Customs Inspector who’d just taken my last hundred-dollar bill had the grace to blush beneath his stubble as he waved me across the border.
The next few weeks were tough, which isn’t the only reason why I’d rather not talk about them. But presently I was back in the agricultural-machinery business—though none of the machines I imported ever went near a farm, and it now cost a good deal more than a hundred dollars a time to get them over the frontier without some busybody looking into the packing cases. The last thing I had time to bother about was football; I knew that my expensive imports were going to be used at any moment, and wanted to make sure that
this
time my profits went with me when I left the country.
Even so, I could hardly ignore the excitement as the day for the return game drew nearer. For one thing, it interfered with business. I’d go to a conference, arranged with great difficulty and expense at a safe hotel or in the house of some reliable sympathiser, and half the time everyone would be talking about football. It was maddening, and I began to wonder if the Perivians took their politics as seriously as their sports. ‘Gentlemen!’ I’d protest. ‘Our next consignment of rotary drills is being unloaded tomorrow, and unless we get that permit from the Minister of Agriculture, someone may open the cases and then…’
‘Don’t worry, my boy,’ General Sierra or Colonel Pedro would answer airily, ‘that’s already taken care of. Leave it to the Army.’
I knew better than to retort ‘Which army?’, and for the next ten minutes I’d have to listen while an argument raged about football tactics and the best way of dealing with recalcitrant referees. I never dreamed—and I’m sure that no one else did—that this topic was intimately bound up with our particular problem.
Since then, I’ve had the leisure to work out what really happened, though it was very confusing at the time. The central figure in the whole improbable drama was undoubtedly Don Hernando Dias—millionaire playboy, football fan, scientific dilettante, and, I am sure, future president of Perivia. Owing to his fondness for racing cars and Hollywood beauties, which has made him one of his country’s best-known exports, most people assume that the ‘playboy’ label describes Don Hernando completely. Nothing, but nothing, could be farther from the truth.
I knew that Don Hernando was one of us, but at the same time he was a considerable favourite of President Ruiz, which placed him in a powerful yet delicate position. Naturally, I’d never met him; he had to be very particular about his friends, and there were few people who cared to meet
me
, unless they had to. His interest in science I didn’t discover until much later; it seems that he has a private observatory which is in frequent use on clear nights, though rumour has it that its functions are not entirely astronomical.
It must have taken all Don Hernando’s charm and powers of persuasion to talk the President into it; if the old boy hadn’t been a football fan too, and smarting under last year’s defeat like every other patriotic Perivian, he would never have agreed. But the sheer originality of the scheme must have appealed to him even though he may not have been too happy about having half his troops out of action for the best part of an afternoon. Still, as Don Hernando undoubtedly reminded him, what better way of ensuring the loyalty of the Army than by giving it fifty thousand seats for the game of the year?
I knew nothing about all this when I took my place in the stadium on that memorable day. If you think I had no wish to be there, you are quite correct. But Colonel Pedro had given me a ticket, and it was unhealthy to hurt his feelings by not using it. So there I was, under the sweltering sun, fanning myself with the programme and listening to the commentary over my portable radio while we waited for the game to begin.
The stadium was packed, its great oval bowl a solid sea of faces. There had been a slight delay in admitting the spectators; the police had done their best, but it takes time to search a hundred thousand people for concealed firearms. The visiting team had insisted on this, to the great indignation of the locals. The protests faded swiftly enough, however, as the artillery accumulated at the check points.
It was easy to tell the exact moment the referee drove up in his armour-plated Cadillac; you could follow his progress by the booing of the crowd. ‘Surely,’ I said to my neighbour—a young lieutenant so junior that it was safe for him to be seen out with me—‘you could change the ref if you feel that way about him?’