The Road to the Sea
First published in Two Complete Science-Adventure Books, Spring 1951, as ‘Seeker of the Sphinx’

Collected in Tales of Ten Worlds


 

 

I’m amused to see that I predicted not only the invention of ultra-portable music players, but also the fact that they would quickly become such a public menace they would be banned. The second part of this prophecy, alas, has not yet been fulfilled.


 

 

The first leaves of autumn were falling when Durven met his brother on the headland beside the Golden Sphinx. Leaving his flyer among the shrubs by the roadside, he walked to the brow of the hill and looked down upon the sea. A bitter wind was toiling across the moors, bearing the threat of early frost, but down in the valley Shastar the Beautiful was still Warm and sheltered in its crescent of hills. Its empty quays lay dreaming it1 the pale, declining sunlight, the deep blue of the sea washing gently against their marble flanks. As he looked down once more into the hauntingly familiar streets and gardens of his youth, Durven felt his resolution failing. Re was glad he was meeting Hannar here, a mile from the city, and not among the sights and sounds that would bring his childhood crowding back upon him.

Hannar was a small dot far down the slope, climbing in his old unhurried, leisurely fashion. Durven could have met him in a moment with the flyer, but he knew he would receive little thanks if he did. So he waited fri the lee of the great Sphinx, sometimes walking briskly to and fro to keep Warm.

-Once or twice he went to the head of the monster and stared up at the still face brooding upon the city and the sea. He remembered how as a child in the gardens of Shastar he had seen the crouching shape upon the sky line,

- and had wondered if it was alive.

Hannar looked no older than he had seemed at their last meeting, twenty years before. His hair was still dark and thick, and his face unwrinkled, for few things ever disturbed the tranquil life of Shastar and its people. It Seemed bitterly unfair, and Durven, grey with the years of unrelenting toil, felt a quick spasm of envy stab through his brain.

Their greetings were brief, but not without warmth. Then Hannar walked over to the ship, lying in its bed of heather and crumpled gorse bushes. He rapped his stick upon the curving metal and turned to Durven.

‘It’s very small. Did it bring you all the way?’

‘No: only from the Moon. I came back from the Project in a liner a hundred times the size of this.’

‘And where is the Project — or don’t you want us to know?’

‘There’s no secret about it. We’re building the ships out in space beyond Saturn, where the sun’s gravitational gradient is almost flat and it needs little thrust to send them right out of the solar system.

Hannar waved his stick toward the blue waters beneath them, the coloured marble of the little towers, and the wide streets with their slowly moving traffic.

‘Away from all this, out into the darkness and loneliness — in search of what?’

Durven’s lips tightened into a thin, determined line.

‘Remember,’ he said quietly, ‘I have already spent a lifetime away from Earth.’

‘And has it brought you happiness?’ continued Hannar remorselessly. Durven was silent for a while.

‘It has brought me more than that,’ he replied at last. ‘I have used my powers to the utmost, and have tasted triumphs that you can never imagine. The day when the First Expedition returned to the solar system was worth a lifetime in Shastar.’

‘Do you think,’ asked Hannar, ‘that you will build fairer cities than this beneath those strange suns, when you have left our world forever?’

‘If we feel that impulse, yes. If not, we will build other things. But build we must; and what have your people created in the last hundred years?’

‘Because we have made no machines, because we have turned our backs upon the stars and are content with our own world, don’t think we have been completely idle. Here in Shastar we have evolved a way of life that I do not think has ever been surpassed. We have studied the art of living; ours is the first aristocracy in which there are no slaves. That is our achievement, by which history will judge us.’

‘I grant you this,’ replied Durven, ‘but never forget that your paradise was built by scientists who had to fight as we have done to make their dreams come true.’

‘They have not always succeeded. The planets defeated them once; why should the worlds of other suns be more hospitable?’

It was a fair question. After five hundred years, the memory of that first failure was still bitter. With what hopes and dreams had Man set out for the planets, in the closing years of the twentieth century — only to find them not merely barren and lifeless, but fiercely hostile! From the sullen fires of the Mercurian lava seas to Pluto’s creeping glaciers of solid nitrogen, there was nowhere that he could live unprotected beyond his own world; and to his own world, after a century of fruitless struggle, he had returned.

Yet the vision had not wholly died; when the planets had been aban

doned, there were still some who dared to dream of the stars. Out of that dream had come at last the Transcendental Drive, the First Expedition —and now the heady wine of long-delayed success.

‘There are fifty solar-type stars within ten years’ flight of Earth,’ Durven replied, ‘and almost all of them have planets. We believe now that the - possession of planets is almost as much a characteristic of a G-type star as its spectrum, though we don’t know why. So the search for worlds like Earth was bound to be successful in time; I don’t think that we were particularly lucky to find Eden so soon.’

‘Eden? Is that what you’ve called your new world?’

‘Yes; it seemed appropriate.’

‘What incurable romantics you scientists are! Perhaps the name’s too well chosen; all the life in that first Eden wasn’t friendly to Man, if you remember.’

Durven gave a bleak smile.

‘That, again, depends on one’s viewpoint,’ he replied. He pointed toward Sbastar, where the first lights had begun to glimmer. ‘Unless our ancestors had eaten deeply from the Tree of Knowledge, you would never have had

-this.’

‘And what do you suppose will happen to it now?’ asked Hannar bitterly. ~When you have opened the road to the stars, all the strength and vigour of - e race will ebb away from Earth as from an open wound.’

‘I do not deny it. It has happened before, and it will happen again. Shastar go the way of Babylon and Carthage and New York. The future is built

ii the rubble of the past; wisdom lies in facing that fact, not in fighting inst it. I have loved Shastar as much as you have done — so much so that

- w, though I shall never see it again, I dare not go down once more into streets. You ask me what will become of it, and I will tell you. What we doing will merely hasten the end. Even twenty years ago, when I was t here, I felt my will being sapped by the aimless ritual of your lives. n it will be the same in all the cities of Earth, for every one of them apes star. I think the Drive has come none too soon; perhaps even you would me if you had spoken to the men who have come back from the and felt the blood stirring in your veins once more after all these - tunes of sleep. For your world is dying, Hannar; what you have now may hold for ages yet, but in the end it will slip from your fingers. The re belongs to us; we will leave you to your dreams. We also have - ed, and now we go to make our dreams come true.’

The last light was catching the brow of the Sphinx as the sun sank into - sea and left Shastar to night but not to darkness. The wide streets were ous rivers carrying a myriad of moving specks; the towers and

acles were jewelled with coloured lights, and there came a faint sound Wind-borne music as a pleasure boat put slowly out to sea. Smiling a e, Durven watched it draw away from the curving quay. It had been e hundred years or more since the last merchant ship had unloaded its o, but while the sea remained, men would still sail upon it.

There was little more to say; and presently Hannar stood alone upon the hill, his head tilted up toward the stars. He would never see his brother again; the sun, which for a few hours had gone from his sight, would soon have vanished from Durven’s forever as it shrank into the abyss of space.

Unheeding, Shastar lay glittering in the darkness along the edge of the sea. To Hannar, heavy with foreboding, its doom seemed already almost upon it. There was truth in Durven’s words; the exodus was about to begin.

Ten thousand years ago other explorers had set out from the first cities of mankind to discover new lands. They had found them, and had never returned, and Time had swallowed their deserted homes. So must it be with Shastar the Beautiful.

Leaning heavily on his stick, Hannar walked slowly down the hillside toward the lights of the city. The Sphinx watched him dispassionately as his figure vanished into the distance and the darkness.

It was still watching, five thousand years later.


Brant was not quite twenty when his people were expelled from their homes and driven westward across two continents and an ocean, filling the ether with piteous cries of injured innocence. They received scant sympathy from the rest of the world, for they had only themselves to blame, and could scarcely pretend that the Supreme Council had acted harshly. It had sent them a dozen preliminary warnings and no fewer than four positively final ultimatums before reluctantly taking action. Then one day a small ship with a very large acoustic radiator had suddenly arrived a thousahd feet above the village and started to emit several kilowatts of raw noise. After a few hours of this, the rebels had capitulated and begun to pack their belongings. The transport fleet had called a week later and carried them, still protesting shrilly, to their new homes on the other side of the world.

And so the Law had been enforced, the Law which ruled that no community could remain on the same spot for more than three lifetimes. Obedience meant change, the destruction of traditions, and the uprooting of ancient and well-loved homes. That had been the very purpose of the Law when it was framed, four thousand years ago; but the stagnation it had sought to prevent could not be warded off much longer. One day there would be no central organisation to enforce it, and the scattered villages would remain where they were until Time engulfed them as it had the earlier civilisations of which they were the heirs.

It had taken the people of Chaldis the whole of three months to build new homes, remove a square mile of forest, plant some unnecessary crops of exotic and luxurious fruits, re-lay a river, and demolish a hill which offended their aesthetic sensibilities. It was quite an impressive perform ance, and all was forgiven when the local Supervisor made a tour of inspection a little later. Then Chaldis watched with great satisfaction as the transports, the digging machines, and all the paraphernalia of a mobile and mechanised civilization climbed away into the sky. The sound of their departure had scarcely faded when, as one man, the village relaxed once more into the sloth that it sincerely hoped nothing would disturb for another century at least.

Brant had quite enjoyed the whole adventure. He was sorry, of course, to lose the home that had shaped his childhood; and now he would never climb the proud, lonely mountain that had looked down upon the village of his birth. There were no mountains in this land — only low, rolling hills and fertile valleys in which forests had run rampant for millennia, since agriculture had come to an end. It was warmer, too, than in the old country, for they were nearer the equator and had left behind them the fierce winters of the North. In almost every respect the change was for the

- good; but for a year or two the people of Chaldis would feel a comfortable glow of martyrdom.

These political matters did not worry Brant in the least. The entire sweep of human history from the dark ages into the unknown future was considerably less important at the moment than the question of Yradne and her feelings toward him. He wondered what Yradne was doing now, and tried to think of an excuse for going to see her. But that would mean meeting her parents, who would embarrass him by their hearty pretence that his call was simply a social one.

He decided to go to the smithy instead, if only to make a check on Jon’s

movements. It was a pity about Jon; they had been such good friends only

a short while ago. But love was friendship’s deadliest enemy, and until

- Yradne had chosen between them they would remain in a state of armed eutrality.

The village sprawled for about a mile along the valley, its neat, new houses arranged in calculated disorder. A few people were moving around

no particular hurry, or gossiping in little groups beneath the trees. To rant it seemed that everyone was following him with their eyes and

ing about him as he passed — an assumption that, as it happened, was rfectly correct. In a closed community of fewer than a thousand highly telligent people, no one could expect to have any private life.

- he smithy was in a clearing at the far end of the village, where its

eneral untidiness would cause as little offence as possible. It was surunded by broken and half-dismantled machines that Old Johan had not

t around to mending. One of the community’s three flyers was lying, its

e ribs exposed to the sunlight, where it had been dumped weeks ago

- th a request for immediate repair. Old Johan would fix it one day, but in


The wide door of the smithy was open, and from the brilliantly lit interior e the sound of screaming metal as the automatic machines fashioned

me new shape to their master’s will. Brant threaded his way carefully ast the busy slaves and emerged into the relative quiet at the back of the


7 Old Johan was lying in an excessively comfortable chair, smoking a pipe d looking as if he had never done a day’s work in his life. He was a neat

little man with a carefully pointed beard, and only his brilliant, ceaselessly roaming eyes showed any signs of animation. He might have been taken for a minor poet — as indeed he fancied himself to be — but never for a village blacksmith.

‘Looking for Jon?’ he said between puffs. ‘He’s around somewhere, making something for that girl. Beats me what you two see in her.’

Brant turned a slight pink and was about to make some sort of reply when one of the machines started calling loudly for attention. In a flash Old Johan was out of the room, and for a minute strange crashings and bangings and much bad language floated through the doorway. Very soon, however, he was back again in his chair, obviously not expecting to be disturbed for quite a while.

‘Let me tell you something, Brant,’ he continued, as if there had been no interruption. ‘In twenty years she’ll be exactly like her mother. Ever thought of that?’

Brant hadn’t, and quailed slightly. But twenty years is an eternity to youth; if he could win Yradne in the present, the future could take care of itself. He told Johan as much.

‘Have it your own way,’ said the smith, not unkindly. ‘I suppose if we’d all looked that far ahead the human race would have died out a million years ago. Why don’t you play a game of chess, like sensible people, to decide who’ll have her first?’

‘Brent would cheat,’ answered Jon, suddenly appearing in the entrance and filling most of it. He was a large, well-built youth, in complete contrast to his father, and was carrying a sheet of paper covered with engineering sketches. Brant wondered what sort of present he was making for Yradne.

‘What are you doing?’ he asked, with a far from disinterested curiosity.

‘Why should I tcj~ you?’ asked Jon good-naturedly. ‘Give me one good reason.

Brant shrugged his shoulders.

‘I’m sure it’s not important — I was only being polite.’

‘Don’t overdo it,’ said the smith. ‘The last time you were polite to Jon, you had a black eye for a week. Remember?’ He turned to his son, and said brusquely: ‘Let’s see those drawings, so I can tell you why it can’t be done.’

He examined the sketches critically, while Jon showed increasing signs of embarrassment. Presently Johan snorted disapprovingly and said: ‘Where are you going to get the components? They’re all nonstandard, and most of them are sub-micro.’

Jon looked hopefully around the workshop.

‘There aren’t very many of them,’ he said. ‘It’s a simple job, and I was wondering...

.... if I’d let you mess up the integrators to try to make the pieces? Well, we’ll see about that. My talented son, Brant, is trying to prove that he possesses brains as well as brawn, by making a toy that’s been obsolete for about fifty centuries. I hope you can do better than that. Now when I was your age...’

His voice and his reminiscences trailed off into silence. Yradne had drifted in from the clangorous bustle of the machine shop, and was watching them from the doorway with a faint smile on her lips.

It is probable that if Brant and Jon had been asked to describe Yradne, it would have seemed as if they were speaking of two entirely different people. There would have been superficial points of resemblance, of course. Both would have agreed that her hair was chestnut, her eyes large and blue, and her skin that rarest of colours — an almost pearly white. But to Jon she seemed a fragile little creature, to be cherished and protected; while to Brant her self-confidence and complete assurance were so obvious that he despaired of ever being of any service to her. Part of that difference in outlook was due to Jon’s extra six inches of height and nine inches of girth, but most of it came from profounder psychological muses. The person one loves never really exists, but is a projection focused through the lens of the mind onto whatever screen it fits with least distortion. Brant and Jon had quite different ideals, and each believed that Yradne embodied them. This would not have surprised her in the least, for few things ever did.

‘I’m going down to the river,’ she said. ‘I called for you on the way, Brant, but you were out.’

That was a blow at Jon, but she quickly equalised.

‘I thought you’d gone off with Lorayne or some other girl, but I knew I’d find Jon at home.’

Jon looked very smug at this unsolicited and quite inaccurate testimonial. He rolled up his drawings and dashed off to the house, calling happily over his shoulder: ‘Wait for me — I won’t be long!’

Brant never took his eyes off Yradne as he shifted uncomfortably from one foot to the other. She hadn’t actually invited anyone to come with her, and until definitely ordered off, he was going to stand his ground. But he remembered that there was a somewhat ancient saying to the effect that if two were company, three were the reverse.

- Jon returned, resplendent in a surprising green cloak with diagonal explosions of red down the sides. Only a very young man could have got away with it, and even Jon barely suceeded. Brant wondered if there was ime for him to hurry home and change into something still more startling, Jut that would be too great a risk to take. It would be flying in the face of he enemy; the battle might be over before he could get his reinforcements.

‘Quite a crowd,’ remarked Old Johan unhelpfully as they departed. ‘Mind [I come along too?’ The boys looked embarrassed, but Yradne gave a gay [ttle laugh that made it hard for him to dislike her. He stood in the outer Ioorway for a while, smiling as they went away through the trees and own the long, grass-covered slope to the river. But presently his eyes eased to follow them, as he lost himself in dreams as vain as any that can ~me to man — the dreams of his own departed youth. Very soon he turned is back upon the sunlight and, no longer smiling now, disappeared into ie busy tumult of the workshop.

Now the northward-climbing sun was passing the equator, the days would soon be longer than the nights, and the rout of winter was complete. The countless villages throughout the hemisphere were preparing to greet the spring. With the dying of the great cities and the return of man to the fields and woods, he had returned also to many of the ancient customs that had slumbered through a thousand years of urban civilisation. Some of those customs had been deliberately revived by the anthropologists and social engineers of the third millennium, whose genius had sent so many patterns of human culture safely down the ages. So it was that the spring equinox was still welcomed by rituals which, for all their sophistication, would have seemed less strange to primitive man than to the people of the industrial cities whose smoke had once stained the skies of Earth.

The arrangements for the Spring Festival were always the subject of much intrigue and bickering between neighbouring villages. Although it involved the disruption of all other activities for at least a month, any village was greatly honoured to be chosen as host for the celebrations. A newly settled community, still recovering from transplantation, would not, of course, be expected to take on such a responsibility. Brant’s people, however, had thought of an ingenious way of regaining favour and wiping out the stain of their recent disgrace. There were five other villages within a hundred miles, and all had been invited to Chaldis for the Festival.

The invitation had been very carefully worded. It hinted delicately that, for obvious reasons, Chaldis couldn’t hope to arrange as elaborate a ceremonial as it might ha-i wished, and thereby implied that if the guests wanted a really good time they had better go elsewhere. Chaldis expected one acceptance at the most, but the inquisitiveness of its neighbours had overcome their sense of moral superiority. They had all said that they would be delighted to come; and there was no possible way in which Chaldis could now evade its responsibilities.

There was no night and little sleep in the valley. High above the trees a row of artificial suns burned with a steady, blue-white brilliance, banishing the stars and the darkness and throwing into chaos the natural routine of all the wild creatures for miles around. Through lengthening days and shortening nights, men and machines were battling to make ready the great amphitheatre needed to hold some four thousand people. In one respect at least, they were lucky: there was no need for a roof or any artificial heating in this climate. In the land they had so reluctantly left, the snow would still be thick upon the ground at the end of March.

Brant woke early on the great day to the sound of aircraft falling down from the skies above him. He stretched himself wearily, wondering when he would get to bed again, and then climbed into his clothes. A kick with his foot at a concealed switch and the rectangle of yielding foam rubber, an inch below floor level, was completely covered by a rigid plastic sheet that had unrolled from within the wall. There was no bed linen to worry about because the room was kept automatically at body temperature. In many such ways Brant’s life was simpler than those of his remote ancestors —

simpler through the ceaseless and almost forgotten efforts of five thousand years of science.

The room was softly lit by light pouring through one translucent wall, and was quite incredibly untidy. The only clear floor space was that concealing the bed, and probably this would have to be cleared again by nightfall. Brant was a great hoarder and hated to throw anything away. This was a very unusual characteristic in a world where few things were of value because they could be made so easily, but the objects Brant collected were not those that the integrators were used to creating In one corner a small tree trunk was propped against the wall, partly carved into a vaguely anthropomorphic shape. Large lumps of sandstone and marble were scattered elsewhere over the floor, until such time as Brant decided to work on them. The walls were completely covered with paintings, most of them

- abstract in character. It would have needed very little intelligence to deduce that Brant was an artist; it was not so easy to decide if he was a good one.

He picked his way through the debris and went in search of food. There was no kitchen; some historians maintained that it had survived until as late as AD 2500, but long before then most families made their own meals about as often as they made their own clothes. Brant walked into the main living room and went across to a metal box set in the wall at chest level. At its centre was something that would have been quite familiar to every human being for the last fifty centuries — a ten-digit impulse dial. Brant called a four-figure number and waited. Nothing whatsoever happened. Looking a little annoyed, he pressed a concealed button and the front of the apparatus slid open, revealing an interior which should, by all the rules, have contained an appetising breakfast. It was completely empty.

Brant could call up the central food machine to demand an explanation, but there would probably be no answer. It was quite obvious what had happened — the catering department was so busy preparing for the day’s ~ overload that he’d be lucky if he got any breakfast at all. He cleared the circuit, then tried again with a little-used number. This time there was a gentle purr, a dull click, and the doors slid open to reveal a cup of some - dark, steaming beverage, a few not-very-exciting-looking sandwiches, and a large slice of melon. Wrinkling up his nose, and wondering how long mankind would take to slip back to barbarism at this rate, Brant started on his substitute meal and very soon polished it off.

His parents were still asleep as he went quietly out of the house into the wide, grass-covered square at the centre of the village. It was still very early a-nd there was a slight chill in the air, but the day was clear and fine, with that freshness which seldom lingers after the last dew has gone. Several air,craft were lying on the green, disgorging passengers, who were milling ~- around in circles or wandering off to examine Chaldis with critical eyes. As Brant watched, one of the machines went humming briskly up into the sky,

- leaving a faint trail of ionisation behind it. A moment later the others followed; they could carry only a few-dozen passengers and would have to make many trips before the day was out.

Brant strolled over to the visitors, trying to look self-assured yet not so aloof as to discourage all contacts. Most of the strangers were about his own age — the older people would be arriving at a more reasonable time.

They looked at him with a frank curiosity which he returned with interest. Their skins were much darker than his, he noticed, and their voices were softer and less modulated. Some of them even had a trace of accent, for despite a universal language and instantaneous communication, regional variations still existed. At least, Brant assumed that they were the ones with accents; but once or twice he caught them smiling a little as he spoke.

- Throughout the morning the visitors gathered in the square and made their way to the great arena that had been ruthlessly carved out of the forest. There were tents and bright banners here, and much shouting and laughter, for the morning was for the amusement of the young. Though Athens had swept like a dwindling but never-dying beacon for ten thousand years down the river of time, the pattern of sport had scarcely changed since those first Olympic days. Men still ran and jumped and wrestled and swam; but they did all these things a good deal better now than their ancestors. Brant was a fair sprinter over short distances and managed to finish third in the hundred metres. His time was just over eight seconds, which was not very good, because the record was less than seven. Brant would have been much amazed to learn that there was a time when no one in the world could have approached this figure.

Jon enjoyed himself hugely, bouncing youths even larger than himself onto the patiptt turf, and when the morning’s results were added up, Chaldis had scored more points than any of the visitors, although it had been first in relatively few events.

As noon approached, the crowd began to flow amoeba-like down to Five Oaks Glade, where the molecular synthesisers had been working since the early hours to cover hundreds of tables with food. Much skill had gone into preparing the prototypes which were being reproduced with absolute fidelity down to the last atom; for though the mechanics of food production had altered completely, the art of the chef had survived, and had even gone forward to victories in which Nature had played no part at all.

The main feature of the afternoon was a long poetic drama — a pastiche put together with considerable skill from the works of poets whose very names had been forgotten ages since. On the whole Brant found it boring, though there were some fine lines here and there that had stuck in his memory:


For winter’s rains and ruins are over,

And all the season of snows and sins...


Brant knew about snow, and was glad to have left it behind. Sill’ however, was an archaic word that had dropped out of use three or four thousand years ago; but it had an ominous and exciting ring.

He did not catch up with Yradne until it was almost dusk, and the dancing had begun. - High above the valley, floating lights had started to burn,

- flooding the woods with everchanging patterns of blue and red and gold. In twos and threes and then in dozens and hundreds, the dancers moved out

~ into the great oval of the amphitheatre, until it became a sea of laughing,

- whirling forms. Here at last was something at which Brant could beat Jon

- handsomely, and he let himself be swept away on the tide of sheer physical enjoyment.

The music ranged through the whole spectrum of human culture. At one

moment the air pulsed to the throb of drums that might have called from

some primeval jungle when the world was young; and a little later, intricate

[ tapestries of quarter tones were being woven by subtle electronic skills. The stars peered down wanly as they marched across the sky, but no one saw

- them and no one gave any thought to the passage of time.

Brant had danced with many girls before he found Yradne. She looked very beautiful, brimming over with the enjoyment of life, and she seemed

- in no hurry to join him when there were so many others to choose from. But at last they were circling together in the whirlpool, and it gave Brant

- no small pleasure to think that Jon was probably watcing them glumly from afar.

- They broke away from the dance during a pause in the music, because ~Yradne announced that she was a little tired. This suited Brant admirably, ~nd presently they were sitting together under one of the great trees, watching the ebb and flow of life around them with that detachment that

-comes in moments of complete relaxation.

I It was Brant who broke the spell. It had to be done, and it might be a long time before such an opportunity came again.

‘Yradne,’ he said, ‘why have you been avoiding me?’

She looked at him with innocent, open eyes.

‘Oh, Brant,’ she replied, ‘what an unkind thing to say; you know it isn’t e! I wish you weren’t so jealous: you can’t expect me to be following u around all the time.’

-~ ‘Oh, very well!’ said Brant weakly, wondering if he was making a fool of bimself. But he might as well go on now he had started.

‘You know, some day you’ll have to decide between us. If you keep tting it off, perhaps you’ll be left high and dry like those two aunts of urs.’

- Yradne gave a tinkling laugh and tossed her head with great amusement t the thought that she could ever be old and ugly.

‘Even if you’re too impatient,’ she replied, ‘I think I can rely on Jon.

ye you seen what he’s given me?’ ‘No,’ said Brant, his heart sinking.

‘You are observant, aren’t you! Haven’t you noticed this necklace?’

On her breast Yradne was wearing a large group of jewels, suspended ~om her neck by a thin golden chain. It was quite a fine pendant, but there as nothing particularly unusual about it, and Brant wasted no time in saying so. Yradne smiled mysteriously and her fingers flickered toward her throat. Instantly the air was suffused with the sound of music, which first mingled with the background of the dance and then drowned it completely.

‘You see,’ she said proudly, ‘wherever I go now I can have music with me. Jon says there are so many thousands of hours of it stored up that I’ll never know when it repeats itself. Isn’t it clever?’

‘Perhaps it is,’ said Brant grudgingly, ‘but it isn’t exactly new. Everyone used to carry this sort of thing once, until there was no silence anywhere on Earth and they had to be forbidden. Just think of the chaos if we all had them!’

Yradne broke away from him angrily.

‘There you go again — always jealoUs of something you can’t do yourself. What have you ever given me that’s half as clever or useful as this? I’m going — and don’t try to follow me!’

Brant stared open-mouthed as she went, quite taken aback by the violence of her reaction. Then he called after her, ‘Hey, Yradne, I didn’t mean...’ But she was gone.

He made his way out of the amphitheatre in a very bad temper. It did him no good at all to rationalise the cause of Yradne’s outburst. His remarks, though rather spiteful, had been true, and sometimes there is nothing more annoying than the truth. Jon’s gift was an ingenious but trivial toy, interesting only because it now happened to be unique.

One thing she had said still rankled in his mind. What was there he had ever given Yradne? He had nothing but his paintings, and they weren’t really very good. She had shown no interest in them at all when he had offered her some of his best, and it had been very hard to explain that he wasn’t a portrait painter and would rather not try to make a picture of her. She had never really understood this, and it had been very difficult not to hurt her feelings. Brant liked taking his inspiration from Nature, but he never copied what he saw. When one of his pictures was finished (which occasionally happened), the title was often the only clue to the original source.

The music of the dance still throbbed around him, but he had lost all interest; the sight of other people enjoying themselves was more than he could stand. He decided to get away from the crowd, and the only peaceful place he could think of was down by the river, at the end of the shining carpet of freshly planted glow-moss that led through the wood.

He sat at the water’s edge, throwing twigs into the current and watching them drift downstream. From time to time other idlers strolled by, but they were usually in pairs and took no notice of him. He watched them enviously and brooded over the unsatisfactory state of his affairs.

It would almost be better, he thought, if Yradne did make up her mind to choose Jon, and so put him out of his misery. But she showed not the slightest sign of preferring one to the other. Perhaps she was simply enjoying herself at their expense, as some people — particularly Old Johan —

maintained; though it was just as likely that she was genuinely unable to choose. What was wanted, Brant thought morosely, was for one of them to do something really spectacular which the other could not hope to match.

‘Hello,’ said a small voice behind him. He twisted around and looked over his shoulder. A little girl of eight or so was staring at him with her head slightly on one side, like an inquisitive sparrow.

‘Hello,’ he replied without enthusiasm. ‘Why aren’t you watching the dance?’

‘Why aren’t you in it?’ she replied promptly.

‘I’m tired,’ he said, hoping that this was an adequate excuse. ‘You shouldn’t be running around by yourself. You might get lost.’

‘I am lost,’ she replied happily, sitting down on the bank beside him. ‘I like it that way.’ Brant wondered which of the other villages she had come from; she was quite a pretty little thing, but would look prettier with less chocolate on her face. It seemed that his solitude was at an end.

She stared at him with that disconcerting directness which, perhaps fortunately, seldom survives childhood. ‘I know what’s the matter with you,’ she said suddenly.

‘Indeed?’ queried Brant with polite scepticism.

‘You’re in love!’

Brant dropped the twig he was about to throw into the river, and turned to stare at his inquisitor. She was looking at him with such solemn sympathy that in a moment all his morbid self-pity vanished in a gale of laughter. She seemed quite hurt, and he quickly brought himself under control.

‘How could you tell?’ he asked with profound seriousness.

‘I’ve read all about it,’ she replied solemnly. ‘And once I saw a picture play and there was a man in it and he came down to a river and sat there just like you and presently he jumped into it. There was some awful pretty music then.’

Brant looked thoughtfully at this precocious child and felt relieved that she didn’t belong to his own community.

‘I’m sorry I can’t arrange the music,’ he said gravely, ‘but in any case the river isn’t really deep enough.’

‘It is farther along,’ came the helpful reply. ‘This is only a baby river here

— it doesn’t grow up until it leaves the woods. I saw it from the. flyer.’

‘What happens to it then?’ asked Brant, not in the least interested, but thankful that the conversation had taken a more innocuous turn. ‘I suppose it reaches the sea?’

She gave an unladylike sniff of disgust.

‘Of course not, silly. All the rivers this side of the hills go to the Great Lake. I know that’s as big as a sea, but the real sea is on the other side of the hills.’

Brant had learned very little about the geographical details of his new home, but he realised that the child was quite correct. The ocean was less

than twenty miles to the north, but separated from them by a barrier of low hills. A hundred miles inland lay the Great Lake, bringing life to lands that had been desert before the geological engineers had reshaped this continent. %The child genius was making a map out of twigs and patiently explaining these matters to her rather dull pupil.

‘Here we are,’ she said, ‘and here’s the river, and the hills, and the lake’s over there by your foot. The sea goes along here — and I’ll tell you a secret.’

‘What’s that?’

‘You’ll never guess!’

‘I don’t suppose I will.’

Her voice dropped to a confidential whisper. ‘If you go along the coast —it isn’t very far from here — you’ll come to Shastar.’

Brant tried to look impressed, but failed.

‘I don’t believe you’ve ever heard of it!’ she cried, deeply disappointed.

‘I’m sorry,’ replied Brant. ‘I suppose it was a city, and I know I’ve heard of it somewhere. But there were such a lot of them, you know — Carthage and Chicago and Babylon and Berlin — you simply can’t remember them all. And they’ve all gone now, anyway.

‘Not Shastar. It’s still there.’

‘Well, some of the later ones are still standing, more or less, and people often visit them. About five hundred miles from my old home there was quite a big city once, called..

‘Shastar isn’t just any old city,’ interrupted the child mysteriously. ‘My grandfather told me about it: he’s been there. It hasn’t been spoiled at all and it’s still full of wonderful things that no one has any more.’

Brant smiled inwardly. The deserted cities of Earth had been the breeding places of legends for countless centuries. It would be four — no, nearer five

— thousand years since Shastar had been abandoned. If its buildings were still standing, which was of course quite possible, they would certainly have been stripped of all valuables ages ago. It seemed that Grandfather had been inventing some pretty fairy stories to entertain the child. He had Brant’s sympathy.

Heedless of his scepticism, the girl prattled on. Brant gave only half his mind to her words, interjecting a polite ‘Yes’ or ‘Fancy that’ as occasion demanded. Suddenly, silence fell.

He looked up and found that his companion was staring with much annoyance toward the avenue of trees that overlooked the view.

‘Goodbye,’ she said abruptly. ‘I’ve got to hide somewhere else — here comes my sister.’

She was gone as suddenly as she had arrived. Her family must have a busy time looking after her, Brant decided: but she had done him a good turn by dispelling his melancholy mood.

Within a few hours, he realised that she had done very much more than that.

*

Simon was leaning against his doorpost watching the world go by when Brant came in search of him. The world usually accelerated slightly when it had to pass Simon’s door, for he was an interminable talker and once he had trapped a victim there was no escape for an hour or more. It was most unusual for anyone to walk voluntarily into his clutches, as Brant was doing now.

The trouble with Simon was that he had a first-class mind, and was too lazy to use it. Perhaps he might have been luckier had he been born in a more energetic age; all he had ever been able to do in Chaldis was to sharpen his wits at other people’s expense, thereby gaining more fame than popularity. But he was quite indispensable, for he was a storehouse of knowledge, the greater part of it perfectly accurate.

‘Simon,’ began Brant without any preamble. ‘I want to learn something about this country. The maps don’t tell me much — they’re too new. What was here, back in the old days?’

Simon scratched his wiry beard.

‘I don’t suppose it was very different. How long ago do you mean?’

‘Oh, back in the time of the cities.’

‘There weren t so many trees, of course. This was probably agricultural land, used for food production. Did you see that farming machine they dug up when the amphitheatre was being built? It must have been old; it wasn’t

- even electric.’

‘Yes,’ said Brant impatiently. ‘I saw it. But tell me about the cities around here. According to the map, there was a place called Shastar a few hundred miles west of us along the coast. Do you know anything about it?’

‘Ah, Shastar,’ murmured Simon, stalling for time. ‘A very interesting place; I think I’ve even got a picture of it around somewhere. Just a moment while I go and see.’

He disappeared into the house and was gone for nearly five minutes. In that time he made a very extensive library search, though a man from the ~-. age of books would hardly have guessed this from his actions. All the records Chaldis possessed were in a metal case a metre on a side; it contained, locked perpetually in subatomic patterns, the equivalent of a

~ billion volumes of print. Almost all the knowledge of mankind, and the whole of its surviving literature, lay here concealed.

It was not merely a passive storehouse of wisdom, for it possessed a librarian. As Simon signalled his request to the tireless machine, the search

• went down, layer by layer, through the almost infinite network of circuits. It took only a fraction of a second to locate the information he needed, for

- he had given the name and the approximate date. Then he relaxed as the

-. mental images came flooding into his brain, under the lightest of selfhypnosis. The knowledge would remain in his possession for a few hours only — long enough for his purpose — and would then fade away. Simon had no desire to clutter up his well-organised mind with irrelevancies, and

- to him the whole story of the rise and fall of the great cities was a historical digression of no particular importance. It was an interesting, if a regrettable, episode, and it belonged to a past that had irretrievably vanished.

Brant was still waiting patiently when he emerged, looking very wise.

‘I ~uldn’t find any pictures,’ he said. ‘My wife has been tidying up again. But I’ll tell you what I can remember about Shastar.’

Brant settled himself down as comfortably as he could; he was likely to be here for some time.

‘Shastar was one of the very last cities that man ever built. You know, of course, that cities arose quite late in human culture — only about twelve thousand years ago. They grew in number and importance for several thousand years, until at last there were some containing millions of people. It is very hard for us to imagine what it must have been like to live in such places — deserts of steel and stone with not even a blade of grass for miles. But they were necessary, before transport and communication had been perfected, and people had to live near each other to carry out all the intricate operations of trade and manufacture upon which their lives depended.

‘The really great cities began to disappear when air transport became universal. The threat of attack in those far-off, barbarous days also helped to disperse them. But for a long time...’

‘I’ve studied the history of that period,’ interjected Brant, not very truthfully. ‘I know all about...’

.... for a long time there were still many small cities which were held together by cultural rather than commercial links. They had populations of a few score thousand and lasted for centuries after the passing of the giants. That’s why Oxford and Princeton and Heidelberg still mean something to us, while far larger cities are no more than names. But even these were doomed when the invention of the integrator made it possible for any community, however small, to manufacture without effort everything it needed for civilised living.

‘Shastar was built when there was no longer any need, technically, for cities, but before people realised that the culture of cities was coming to its end. It seems to have been a conscious work of art, conceived and designed as a whole, and those who lived there were mostly artists of some kind. But it didn’t last very long; what finally killed it was the exodus.’

Simon became suddenly quiet, as if brooding on those tumultuous centuries when the road to the stars had been opened up and the world was torn in twain. Along that road the flower of the race had gone, leaving the rest behind; and thereafter it seemed that history had come to an end on Earth. For a thousand years or more the exiles had returned fleetingly to the solar system, wistfully eager to tell of strange Suns and far planets and the great empire that would one day span the galaxy. But there are gulfs that even the swiftest - ships can never cross; and such a gulf was opening now between Earth and her wandering children. They had less and less in common; the returning ships became ever more infrequent, until at last generations passed between the visits from outside. Simon had not heard of any such for almost three hundred years.

It was unusual when one had to prod Simon into speech, but presently Brant remarked: ‘Anyway, I’m more interested in the place itself than its history. Do you think it’s still standing?’

‘I was coming to that,’ said Simon, emerging from his reverie with a start. ‘Of course it is; they built well in those days. But why are you so interested, may I ask? Have you suddenly developed an overwhelming passion for archaeology? Oh, I think I understand!’

Brant knew perfectly well the uselessness of trying to conceal anything from a professional busybody like Simon.

‘I was hoping,’ he said defensively, ‘that there might still be things there worth going to find, even after all this time.’

‘Perhaps,’ said Simon doubtfully. ‘I must visit it one day. It’s almost on our doorstep, as it were. But how are you going to manage? The village will hardly let you borrow a flyer! And you can’t walk. It would take you at least a week to get there.’

But that was exactly what Brant intended to do. As, during the next few days, he was careful to point out to almost everyone in the village, a thing wasn’t worth doing unless one did it the hard way. There was nothing like making a virtue out of a necessity.


Brant’s preparations were carried out in an unprecedented blaze of secrecy. He did not wish to be too specific about his plans, such as they were, in case any of the dozen or so people in Chaldis who had the right to use a flyer decided to look at Shastar first. It was, of course, only a matter of time before this happened, but the feverish activity of the past months had

- prevented such explorations. Nothing would be more humiliating than to stagger into Shastar after a week’s journey, only to be coolly greeted by a neighbour who had made the trip in ten minutes.

On the other hand, it was equally important that the village in general,

- and Yradne in particular, should realise that he was making some excep

— tional effort. Only Simon knew the truth, and he had grudgingly agreed to keep quiet for the present. Brant hoped that he had managed to divert attention from his true objective by showing a great interest in the country

~ to the cast of Chaldis, which also contained several archaeological relics of some importance.

The amount of food and equipment one needed for a two or three weeks’ absence was really astonishing, and his first calculations had thrown Brant into a state of considerable gloom. For a while he had even thought of

- trying to beg or borrow a flyer, but the request would certainly not be granted — and would indeed defeat the whole object of his enterprise. Yet

- it was quite impossible for him to carry everything he needed for the journey.

The solution would have been perfectly obvious to anyone from a less- mechanised age, but it took Brant some little time to think of it. The flying machine had killed all forms of land transport save one, the oldest and most versatile of all — the only one that was self-perpetuating and could manage very well, as it had done before, with no assistance at all from man.

Chaldis possessed six horses, rather a small number for a community of its size. In some villages the horses outnumbered the humans, but Brant’s people, living in a wild and mountainous region, had so far had little opportunity for equitation. Brant himself had ridden a horse only two or three times in his life, and then for exceedingly short periods.

The stallion and five mares were in the charge of Treggor, a gnarled little man who had no discernible interest in life except animals. His was not one of the outstanding intellects of Chaldis, but he seemed perfectly happy running his private menagerie, which included dogs of many shapes and sizes, a couple of beavers, several monkeys, a lion cub, two bears, a young crocodile, and other beasts more usually admired from a distance. The only sorrow that had ever clouded his placid life arose from the fact that he had so far failed to obtain an elephant.

Brant found Treggor, as he expected, leaning on the gate of the paddock. There was a stranger with him, who was introduced to Brant as a horse fancier from a neighbouring village. The curious similarity between the two men, extending from the way they dressed even to their facial expressions, made this explanation quite unnecessary.

One always feels a certain nervousness in the presence of undoubted experts, and Brant outlined his problem with some diffidence. Treggor listened gravely and paused for a long time before replying.

‘Yes,’ he said slowly, jerking his thumb toward the mares, ‘any of them would do — if you knew how to handle ‘em.’ He looked rather doubtfully at Brant.

‘They’re like human beings, you know; if they don’t like you, you can’t do a thing with them.’

‘Not a thing,’ echoed the stranger, with evident relish.

‘But surely you could teach me how to handle them?’

‘Maybe yes, maybe no. I remember a young fellow just like you, wanted to learn to ride. Horses just wouldn’t let him get near them. Took a dislike to him — and that was that.’

‘Horses can tell,’ interjected the other darkly.

‘That’s right,’ agreed Treggor. ‘You’ve got to be sympathetic. Then you’ve nothing to worry about.’

There was, Brant decided, quite a lot to be said for the less-temperamental machine after all.

‘I don’t want to ride,’ he answered with some feeling. ‘I only want a horse to carry my gear. Or would it be likely to object to that?’

His mild sarcasm was quite wasted. Treggor nodded solemnly.

‘That wouldn’t be any trouble,’ he said. ‘They’ll all let you lead them with a halter — all except Daisy, that is. You’d never catch her.’

‘Then do you think I could borrow one of the — er, more amenable ones

— for a while?’

Treggor shuffled around uncertainly, torn between two conflicting desires. He was pleased that someone wanted to use his beloved beasts, but nervous lest they come to harm. Any damage that might befall Brant was of secondary importance.

‘Well,’ he began doubtfully, ‘it’s a bit awkward at the moment....’

Brant looked at the mares more closely, and realised why. Only one of them was accompanied by a foal, but it was obvious that this deficiency would soon be rectified. Here was another complication he had overlooked.

‘How long will you be away?’ asked Treggor.

‘Three weeks, at the most: perhaps only two.’

Treggor did some rapid gynaecological calculations.

‘T

hen you can have Sunbeam,’ he concluded. ‘She won’t give you any

trouble at all — best-natured animal I’ve ever had.’

‘Thank you very much,’ said Brant. ‘I promise I’ll look after her. Now

- would you mind introducing us?’


‘I don’t see why I should do this,’ grumbled Jon good-naturedly, as he

- adjusted the panniers on Sunbeam’s sleek sides, ‘especially since you won’t

- even tell me where you’re going or what you expect to find.’

Brant couldn’t have answered the last question even had he wished. In his more rational moments he knew that he would find nothing of value in Shastar. Indeed, it was hard to think of anything that his people did not already possess, or could not obtain instantly if they wished. But the journey itself would be the proof — the most convincing he could imagine — of his

• love for Yradne.

There was no doubt that she was quite impressed by his preparations,

-. a-nd he had been careful to underline the dangers he was about to face. It

- would be very uncomfortable sleeping in the open, and he would have a most monotonous diet. He might even get lost and never be seen again. Suppose there were still wild beasts — dangerous ones — up in the hills or in -~ the forests?

- Old Johan, who had no feeling for historical traditions, had protested at indignity of a blacksmith having anything to do with such a primitive Survival as a horse. Sunbeam had nipped him delicately for this, with great skill and precision, while he was bending to examine her hoofs. But he had I rapidly manufactured a set of panniers in which Brant could put everything - he needed for the journey — even his drawing materials, from which he

; refused to be separated. Treggor had advised on the technical details of the

- ess, producing ancient prototypes consisting largely of string. It was still early morning when the last adjustments had been completed; Bra-nt had intended making his departure as unobtrusive as possible, and his complete success was slightly mortifying. Only Jon and Yradne came to see him off.

They walked in thoughtful silence to the end of the village and crossed the slim metal bridge over the river. Then Jon said gruffly: ‘Well, don’t go and break your silly neck,’ shook hands, and departed, leaving him alone with Yradne. It was a very nice gesture, and Brant appreciated it.

Taking advantage of her master’s preoccupation, Sunbeam began to browse among the long grass by the river’s edge. Brant shifted awkwardly from foot to foot for a moment, then said halfheartedly:

‘I suppose I’d better be going.’

‘How long will you be away?’ asked Yradne. She wasn’t wearing Jon’s present: perhaps she had grown tired of it already. Bra-nt hoped so — then realised she might lose interest equally quickly in anything he brought back for her.

‘Oh, about a fortnight — if all goes well,’ he added darkly.

‘Do be careful,’ said Yradne, in tones of vague urgency, ‘and don’t do anything rash.’

‘I’ll do my best,’ answered Brant, still making no move to go, ‘but one has to take risks sometimes.’

This disjointed conversation might have lasted a good deal longer had Sunbeam not taken charge. Brant’s arm received a sudden jerk and he was dragged away at a brisk walk. He had regained his balance and was about to wave farewell when Yradne came flying up to him, gave him a large kiss, and disappeared toward the village before he could recover.

She slowed down to a walk when Brant could no longer see her. Jon was still a good way ahead, but she made no attempt to overtake him. A curiously solemn feeling, out of place on this bright spring morning, had overcome her. It was very pleasant to be loved, but it had its disadvantages if one stopped to look beyond the immediate moment. For a fleeting instant Yradne wondered if she had been fair to Jon, to Brant — even to herself. One day the decision would have to be made; it could not be postponed forever. Yet she could not for the life of her decide which of the boys she liked the better; and she did not know if she loved either.

No one had ever told her, and she had not yet discovered, that when one has to ask ‘Am I really in love?’ the answer is always ‘No’.


Beyond Chaldis the forest stretched for five miles to the east, then faded out into the great plain which spanned the remainder of the continent. Six thousand years ago this land had been one of the mightiest deserts in the world, and its reclamation had been among the first achievements of the Atomic Age.

Brant intended to go east until he was clear of the forest, and then to turn toward the high land of the North. According to the maps, there had once been a road along the spine of the hills, linking together all the cities on the coast in a chain that ended at Shastar. It should be easy to follow its track, though Brant did not expect that much of the road itself would have survived the centuries.

He kept close to the river, hoping that it had not changed its path since the maps were made. It was both his guide and his highway through the forest; when the trees were too thick, he and Sunbeam could always wade in the shallow water. Sunbeam was quite co-operative; there was no grass here to distract her, so she plodded methodically along with little prompting.

Soon after midday the trees began to thin out. Brant had reached the frontier that, century by century, had been on the march across the lands that Man no longer wished to hold. A little later the forest was behind him and he was out in the open plain.

He checked his position from the map, and noted that the trees had advanced an appreciable distance eastward since it was drawn. But there was a clear route north to the low hills along which the ancient road had run, and he should be able to reach them before evening.

At this point certain unforeseen difficulties of a technical nature arose. Sunbeam, finding herself surrounded by the most appetising grass she had seen for a long time, was unable to resist pausing every three or four steps to collect a mouthful.

As Brant was attached to her bridle by a rather short rope, the resulting jerk almost dislocated his arm. Lengthening the rope made matters even

- - worse, because he then had no control at all.

Now Brant was quite fond of animals, but it soon became apparent to him that Sunbeam was simply imposing on his good nature. He put up with it for half a mile, and then steered a course toward a tree which seemed to have particularly slender and lissom branches. Sunbeam watched him warily out of the corners of her limpid brown eyes as he cut a fine, resilient switch and attached it ostentatiously to his belt. Then she set off so briskly that he could scarcely keep pace with her.

She was undoubtedly, as Treggor had claimed, a singularly intelligent beast.

The range of hills that was Bra-nt’s first objective was less than two thousand feet high, and the slope was very gentle. But there were numerous annoying foothills and minor valleys to be surmounted on the way to the crest, and it was well toward evening before they had reached the highest point. To the south Brant could see the forest through which he had come, and which could now hinder him no more. Chaldis was somewhere in its midst, though he had only a rough idea of its location; he was

- Surprised to find that he could see no signs of the great clearings that his people had made. To the southeast the plain stretched endlessly away, a level sea of grass dotted with little clumps of trees. Near the horizon Bra-nt could see tiny, creeping specks, and guessed that some great herd of wild animals was on the move.

Northward lay the sea, only a dozen miles away down the long slope and across the lowlands. It seemed almost black in the falling sunlight, except Where tiny breakers dotted it with flecks of foam.

Before nightfall Brant found a hollow out of the wind, anchored Sunbeam to a stout bush, and pitched the little tent that Old Johan had Contrived for him. This was, in theory, a very simple operation, but, as a good many people had found before, it was one that could tax skill and temper to the utmost. At last everything was finished, and he settled down for the night.

There are some things that no amount of pure intelligence can anticipate, but which can only be learned by bitter experience. Who would have gussed that the human body was so sensitive to the almost imperceptible slope on which the tent had been pitched? More uncomfortable still were the minute thermal differences between one point and another, presumably caused by the draughts that seemed to wander through the tent at will. Brant could have endured a uniform temperature gradient, but the unpredictable variations were maddening.

He woke from his fitful sleep a dozen times, or so it seemed, and toward dawn his morale had reached its lowest ebb. He felt cold and miserable and stiff, as if he had not slept properly for days, and it would have needed very little persuasion to have made him abandon the whole enterprise. He was prepared — even willing — to face danger in the cause of love; but lumbago was a different matter.

The discomforts of the night were soon forgotten in the glory of the new day. Here on the hills the air was fresh with the tang of salt, borne by the wind that came climbing up from the sea. The dew was everywhere, hanging thickly on each bent blade of grass — but so soon to be destroyed beyond all trace by the steepening sun. It was good to be alive; it was better to be young; it was best of all to be in love.

They came upon the road very soon after they had started the day’s journey. Bra-nt had missed it before because it had been farther down the seaward slope, and he had expected to find it on the crest of the hill. It had been superbly built, and the millennia had touched it lightly. Nature had tried in vain to obliterate it; here and there she had succeeded in burying a few metres with a light blanket of earth, but then her servants had turned against her and the wind and the rain had scoured it clean once more. In a great jointless band, skirting the edge of the sea for more than a thousand miles, the road still linked the cities that Man had loved in his childhood.

It was one of the great roads of the world. Once it had been no more than a footpath along which savage tribes had come down to the sea, to barter with wily, bright-eyed merchants from distant lands. Then it had known new and more exacting masters; the soldiers of a mighty empire had shaped and hewn the road so skilfully along the hills that the path they gave it had remained unchanged down all the ages. They had paved it with stone so that their armies could move more swiftly than any that the world had known; and along the road their legions had been hurled like thunderbolts at the bidding of the city whose name they bore. Centuries later, that city had called them home in its last extremity; and the road had rested then for five hundred years.

But other wars were still to come; beneath crescent banners the armies of the Prophet were yet to storm westward into Christendom. Later still —centuries later — the tide of the last and greatest of conflicts was to turn here, as steel monsters clashed together in the desert, and the sky itself rained death.

The centurions, the paladins, the armoured divisions — even the desert —all were gone. But the road remained, of all man’s creations the most enduring. For ages enough it had borne his burdens; and now along its whole thousand miles it carried no more traffic than one boy and a horse.

Bra-nt followed the road for three days, keeping always in sight of the sea. He had grown used to the minor discomforts of a nomadic existence, and even the nights were no longer intolerable. The weather had been perfect —long, warm days and mild nights — but the fine spell was coming to an end.

He estimated that he was less than five miles from Shastar on the evening of the fourth day. The road was now turning away from the coast to avoid a great headland jutting out to sea. Beyond this was the sheltered bay along whose shores the city had been built; when it had bypassed the high ground, the road would sweep northward in a great curve and come down upon Shastar from the hills.

Toward dusk it was clear that Bra-nt could not hope to see his goal that day. The weather was breaking, and thick, angry clouds had been gathering swiftly from the west. He was climbing now — for the road was rising slowly as it crossed the last ridge — in the teeth of a gale. He would have pitched camp for the night if he could have found a sheltered spot, but the hill was bare for miles behind him and there was nothing to do but to struggle onward.

Far ahead, at the very crest of the ridge, something low and dark was silhouetted against the threatening sky. The hope that it might provide shelter drove Brant onward: Sunbeam, head well down against the wind, plodded steadily beside him with equal determination.

They were still a mile from the summit when the rain began to fall, first in single, angry drops and then in blinding sheets. It was impossible to see more than a few paces ahead, even when one could open one’s eyes against

- the stinging rain. Bra-nt was already so wet that any additional moisture could add nothing to his discomfort; indeed, he had reached that sodden state when the continuing downpour almost gave him a masochistic

- pleasure. But the sheer physical effort of fighting against the gale was rapidly exhausting him.

It seemed ages before the road levelled out and he knew he had reached the summit. He strained his eyes into the gloom a-nd could see, not far

- ahead, a great dark shape, which for a moment he thought might be a

- building. Even if it was in ruins, it would give him shelter from the storm.

The rain began to slacken as he approached the object; overhead, the clouds were thinning to let through the last fading light of the western sky. It was just sufficient to show Bra-nt that what lay ahead of him was no building at all, but a great stone beast, crouching upon the hilltop and staring out to sea. He had no time to examine it more closely, but hurriedly pitched his tent in its shelter, out of reach of the wind that still raved angrily overhead.

It was completely dark when he had dried himself and prepared a meal. For a while he rested in his warm little oasis, in that state of blissful exhaustion that comes after hard and successful effort. Then he roused himself, took a hand-torch, and went out into the night.

The storm had blown away the clouds and the night was brilliant with stars. In the west a thin crescent moon was sinking, following hard upon the footsteps of the sun. To the north Bra-nt was aware — though how, he could not have said — of the sleepless presence of the sea. Down there in the darkness Shastar was lying, the waves marching forever against it; but strain his eyes as he might, he could see nothing at all.

He walked along the flanks of the great statue, examining the stonework by the light of his torch. It was smooth and unbroken by any joints or seams, and although time had stained and discoloured it, there was no sign of wear. It was impossible to guess its age; it might be older than Shastar or it might have been made only a- few centuries ago. There was no way of telling.

The hard, blue-white beam of the torch flickered along the monster’s wetly gleaming sides and came to rest upon the great, calm face and the empty eyes. One might have called it a human face, but thereafter words faltered and failed. Neither male nor female, it seemed at first sight utterly indifferent to all the passions of mankind; then Bra-nt saw that the storms of ages had left their mark behind them. Countless raindrops had coursed down those a-da-mantine cheeks, until they bore the stains of Olympian tears

— tears, perhaps, for the city whose birth and death now seemed almost equally remote.


Bra-nt was so tired that when he awoke the sun was already high. He lay for a moment in the filtered half-light of the tent, recovering his senses and remembering where he was. Then he rose to his feet and went blinking into the daylight, shielding his eyes from the dazzling glare.

The Sphinx seemed smaller than by night, though it was impressive enough. It was coloured, Bra-nt saw for the first time, a rich, autumnal gold, the colour of no natural rock. He knew from this that it did not belong, as he had half suspected, to any prehistoric culture. It had been built by science from some inconceivably stubborn, synthetic substance, and Bra-nt guessed that its creation must lie almost midway in time between him and the fabulous original which had inspired it.

Slowly, half afraid of what he might discover, he turned his back upon the Sphinx and looked to the north. The hill fell away at his feet and the road went sweeping down the long slope as if impatient to greet the sea; and there at its end lay Shastar.

It caught the sunlight and tossed it back to him, tinted with all the colours of its makers’ dreams. The spacious buildings lining the wide streets seemed unra-vished by time; the great band of marble that held the sea- at bay was still unbreached; the parks and gardens, though long overgrown with weeds, were not yet jungles. The city followed the curve of the bay for perhaps two miles, and stretched half that distance inland; by the standards of the past, it was very small indeed. But to Bra-nt it seemed enormous, a maze of streets and squares intricate beyond unravelling. Then he began to discern the underlying symmetry of its design, to pick out the main thoroughfares, and to see the skill with which its makers had avoided both monotony and discord.

For a long time Bra-nt stood motionless on the hilltop, conscious only of the wonder spread beneath his eyes. He was alone in all that landscape, a tiny figure lost and humble before the achievements of greater men. The sense of history, the vision of the long slope up which Man had been toiling for a million years or more, was almost overwhelming. In that moment it seemed to Bra-nt that from his hilltop he was looking over Time rather than Space: and in his ears there whispered the soughing of the winds of eternity as they sweep into the past.


Sunbeam seemed very nervous as they approached the outskirts of the city. She had never seen anything like this before in her life, and Bra-nt could not help sharing her disquiet However unimaginative one may be, there is something ominous about buildings that have been deserted for centuries —and those of Shastar had been empty for the better part of five thousand years.

The road ran straight as an arrow between two tall pillars of white metal; like the Sphinx, they were tarnished but unworn. Bra-nt a-nd Sunbeam -~ passed beneath these silent guardians and found themselves before a- long, ~ low building which must have served a-s some kind of reception point for

visitors to the city.

From a distance it had seemed that Shastar might have been abandoned ~only yesterday, but now Bra-nt could see a thousand signs of desolation and - neglect. The coloured stone of the buildings wa-s stained with the patina of age; the windows were gaping, skull-blank eyes, with here a-nd there a

5 miraculously preserved fragment of glass.

Bra-nt tethered Sunbeam outside the first building and made his way to the entrance across the rubble a-nd thickly piled dirt. There wa-s no door, if indeed there had ever been one, and he passed through the high, vaulted archway into a hall which seemed to run the full length of the structure. At regular intervals there were openings into further chambers, and immediately a-head of him a- wide flight of stairs rose to the single floor above.

It took him almost a-n hour to explore the building, and when he left he - Was infinitely depressed. His careful search had revealed absolutely nothing. All the rooms, great and small, were completely empty; he had felt like a-n ant crawling through the bones of a- clean-picked skeleton.

Out in the sunlight, however, his spirits revived a little. This building wa-s probably only some sort of administrative office a-nd would never have

- COntained anything but records a-nd information ma-chines; elsewhere in the

• city, things might be different. Even so, the magnitude of the search appalled him.

Slowly he made his way toward the sea front, moving a-westruck through the wide avenues and admiring the towering façades on either side. Near the centre of the city he came upon one of its many parks. It was largely overgrown with weeds and shrubs, but there were still considerable areas of grass, a-nd he decided to leave Sunbeam here while he continued his explorations. She was not likely to move very far away while there was plenty to eat.

It was so peaceful in the park that for a- while Bra-nt wa-s loath to leave it to plunge a-ga-in into the desolation of the city. There were plants here Lmlike any that he had ever seen before, the wild descendants of those which the people of Shastar had cherished ages since. As he stood among the high grasses and unknown flowers, Bra-nt heard for the first time, ;tealing through the calm stillness of the morning, the sound he wa-s always to link with Shastar. It came from the sea, and though he had never heard it before in all his life, it brought a- sense of aching recognition into his Lieart. Where no other voices sounded now, the lonely sea gulls were still calling sadly across the waves.

It was quite clear that many days would be needed to make even the most superficial examination of the city, a-nd the first thing to do would be to find somewhere to live. Bra-nt spent several hours searching for the residential district before it began to dawn on him that there was something very peculiar about Sha-star. All the buildings he entered were, without exception, designed for work, entertainment, or similar purposes; but none of them had been designed to live in. The solution came to him slowly. As Lie grew to know the pattern of the city, he noticed that at almost every rtreet intersection there were low, single-storeyed structures of nearly Edentical form. They were circular or oval, a-nd had many openings lea-ding Ento them from all directions. When Bra-nt entered one of them, he found Liimself facing a line of great metal gates, each with a vertical row of Lndicator lamps by its side. And so he knew where the people of Shastar Lia-d lived.

At first the idea of underground homes was completely repellent to him. [hen he overcame his prejudice, a-nd realised how sensible, as well as how inevitable, this was. There was no need to clutter up the surface, and to )lock the sunlight, with buildings designed for the merely mechanical processes of sleeping and eating. By putting a-il these things underground, Ehe people of Sha-star had been able to build a- noble a-nd spacious city — a-nd yet keep it so small that one could walk its whole length within a-n hour.

The elevators were, of course, useless, but there were emergency stairways winding down into the darkness. Once all this underworld must have een a blaze of light, but Bra-nt hesitated now before he descended the rteps. He had his torch, but he had never been underground before a-nd had i horror of losing his way in some subterranean catacombs. Then he ~hrugged his shoulders and started down the steps; after all, there wa-s no ia-nger if he took the most elementary precautions — and there were iundreds of other exits even if he did lose his way.

He descended to the first level a-nd found himself in a- long, wide corridor stretching as far as his beam could penetrate. On either side were rows of numbered doors, a-nd Bra-nt tried nearly a- dozen before he found one that opened. Slowly, even reverently, he entered the little home that had been deserted for almost half the span of recorded history.

It was clean a-nd tidy, for there had been no dust or dirt to settle here. The beautifully propô~tioned rooms were bare of furniture; nothing of value had been left behind ~n the leisLwel< a-ge-long exodus. Some of the semipermanent fittings wèi’estill in position; the food distributor, with its familiar selector dial, was so strikingly like the one in Bra-nt’s own home that the sight of it almost annihilated the centuries. The dial still turned, though stiffly, and he would scarcely have been surprised to see a meal appear in the ma-terialisation chamber.

Bra-nt explored several more homes before he returned to the surface. Though he found nothing of value, he felt a growing sense of kinship toward the people who had lived here. Yet he still thought of them as his inferiors, for to have lived in a city — however beautiful, however brilliantly designed — was to Bra-nt one of the symbols of barbarism.

In the last home he entered he ca-me across a brightly coloured room with a- fresco of dancing animals around the walls. The pictures were full of a whimsical humour that must have delighted the hearts of the children for whom they had been drawn. Bra-nt examined the paintings with interest, for they were the first works of representative art he had found in Shasta-r. He was a-bout to leave when he noticed a tiny pile of dust in one corner of the room, a-nd bending down to investigate found himself looking at the

- still-recognisa-ble fragments of a- doll. Nothing solid remained save a- few

- coloured buttons, which crumbled to powder in his hand when he picked them up. He wondered why this sad little relic had been left behind by its owner; then he tiptoed away and returned to the surface and the lonely but sunlit streets. He never went to the underground city again.

Toward evening he revisited the park to see that Sunbeam had been up to no mischief, and prepared to spend the night in one of the numerous small buildings scattered through the gardens. Here he wa-s surrounded by flowers and trees, and could almost imagine he was home again. He slept better than he had done since he had left Cha-ldis, and for the first time for many days, his la-st waking thoughts were not of Yradne. The magic of Shasta-r was already working upon his mind; the infinite complexity of the civilisa-tion he had affected to despise was changing him more swiftly than he could imagine. The longer he stayed in the city, the more remote he would become from the naïve yet self-confident boy who had entered it only a- few hours before.

The second day confirmed the impressions of the first. Sha-star had not died in a- year, or even in a- generation. Slowly its people had drifted a-way as the new — yet how old! — pattern of society had been evolved a-nd humanity had returned to the hills a-nd the forests. They had left nothing behind them, save these marble monuments to a- way of life that was gone

forever. Even if anything of value had remained, the thousands of curious explorers who had come here in the fifty centuries since would have taken it long a-go. Bra-nt found many traces of his predecessors; their names were carved on walls throughout the city, for this is one kind of immortality that men have never been able to resist.

Tired at la-st by his fruitless search, he went down to the shore and sat on the wide stonework of the breakwater. The sea lying a- few feet beneath him was utterly calm a-nd of a cerulean blue; it was so still and clear that he could watch the fish swimming in its depths, and at one spot could see a wreck lying on its side with the seaweed streaming straight up from it like long, green hair. Yet there must be times, he knew, when the waves came thundering over these massive walls; for behind him the wide parapet wa-s strewn with a thick carpet of stones and shells, tossed there by the gales of centuries.

The enervating peacefulness of the scene, and the unforgettable object lesson in the futility of ambition that surrounded him on every side, took a-way all sense of disappointment or defeat. Though Shastar had given him nothing of material value, Bra-nt did not regret his journey. Sitting here on the sea wall, with his back to the la-nd and his eyes dazzled by that blinding blue, he already felt remote from his old problems, a-nd could look back with no pa-in at all, but only a dispassionate curiosity, on all the heartache a-nd the anxiety that had plagued him these last few months.

He went slowly back into the city, after walking a- little way a-long the sea front so that he could return by a new route. Presently he found himself before a large, circular building whose roof wa-s a shallow dome of some translucent material. He looked at it with little interest, for he was emotionally exhausted, and decided that it was probably yet another theatre or concert hall. He had almost passed the entrance when some obscure impulse diverted him and he went through the open doorway.

Inside, the light filtered through the ceiling with such little hindrance that Bra-nt almost had the impression of being in the open air. The entire building was divided into numerous large halls whose purpose he realised with a sudden stir of excitement. The telltale rectangles of discoloration showed that the walls had once been almost covered with pictures; it wa-s just possible that some had been left behind, and it would be interesting to see what Shasta-r could offer in the way of serious art. Bra-nt, still secure in his consciousness of superiority, did not expect to be unduly impressed; a-nd so the shock was a-lithe greater when it came.

The blaze of colour along the whole length of the great wall smote him like a fanfare of trumpets. For a moment he stood paralysed in the doorway, unable to grasp the pattern or meaning of what he saw. Then, slowly, he began to unravel the details of the tremendous a-nd intricate mural that had burst suddenly upon his vision.

It wa-s nearly a hundred feet long, and was incomparably the most wonderful thing that Bra-nt had ever seen in his life. Sha-star had awed a-nd overwhelmed him, yet its tragedy had left him curiously unmoved. But this

struck straight at his heart a-nd spoke in a- language he could understand; and as it did so, the la-st vestiges of his condescension toward the pa-st were scattered like leaves before a gale.


The eye moved naturally from left to right a-cross the painting, to follow the curve of tension to its moment of climax. Qn the left was the sea-, a-s deep a-blue a-s the water that beat a-ga-inst Sh~stdr; and moving a-cross its face wa-s a fleet of strange shi iWn—by-Th red banks of oars a-nd by billowing sails that strained toward the distant land. The painting covered not only miles of space but perhaps years of time; for now the ships had reached the shore, and there on the wide plain an army lay encamped, its banners a-nd tents and chariots dwarfed by the walls of the fortress city it was beleaguering. The eye scaled those still inviolate walls a-nd ca-me to rest, a-s it wa-s meant to do, upon the woman who stood upon them, looking down at the army that had followed her a-cross the ocean.

She was leaning forward to peer over the battlements, a-nd the wind wa-s catching her hair so that it formed a golden mist a-bout her head. Upon her face was written a sadness too deep for words, yet one that did nothing to mar the unbelievable beauty of her face — a beauty that held Bra-nt spellbound, for long unable to tear a-way his eyes. When at la-st he could do so, he followed her gaze down those seemingly impregnable walls to the group of soldiers toiling in their shadow. They were gathered around something so foreshortened by perspective that it was some time before Bra-nt realised what it was. Then he saw that it was a-n enormous image of a horse, mounted on rollers so that it could be easily moved. It roused no echoes in his mind, and he quickly returned to the lonely figure on the wall, around whom, as he now saw, the whole great design wa-s balanced and pivoted. For a-s the eye moved on a-cross the painting, ta-king the mind with it into the future, it came upon ruined battlements, the smoke of the burning city staining the sky, and the fleet returning homeward, its mission done.

Bra-nt left only when the light was so poor that he could no longer see. When the first shock had worn off, he had examined the great painting ~more closely; a-nd for a- while he had searched, but in vain, for the signature of the artist. He also looked for some caption or title, but it wa-s clear that

-there had never been one — perhaps because the story wa-s too well known to need it. In the intervening centuries, however, some other visitor to Shasta-r had scratched two lines of poetry on the wall:


Is this the face that launched a thousand ships

And burned the topless towers of Ilium?


ilium! it was a strange a-nd magical name; but it meant nothing to Bra-nt. Re wondered whether it belonged to history or to fable, not knowing how many before him had wrestled with that same problem.

As he emerged into the luminous twilight, he still carried the vision of

that sad, ethereal loveliness before his eyes. Perhaps if Bra-nt had not himself been an artist, and had been in a less susceptible state of mind, the impression would not have been so overwhelming. Yet it was the impression that the unknown master had set out to create, Phoenix-like, from the dying embers of a- great legend. He had captured, and held for all future ages to see, that beauty whose service is the purpose of life, and its sole justification.

For a long time Bra-nt sat under the stars, watching the crescent moon sink behind the towers of the city, and haunted by questions to which he could never know the answers. All the other pictures in these galleries had gone, scattered beyond tracing, not merely throughout the world, but throughout the universe. How had they compared with the single work of genius that now must represent forever the art of Shasta-r?

In the morning Bra-nt returned, after a night of strange dreams. A plan had been forming in his mind; it was so wild and ambitious that at first he tried to laugh it away, but it would give him no peace. Almost reluctantly, he set up his little folding easel and prepared his paints. He had found one thing in Shastar that was both unique and beautiful; perhaps he had the skill to carry some faint echo of it back to Cha-ldis.

It was impossible, of course, to copy more than a- fragment of the va-st design, but the problem of selection was easy. Though he had never attempted a portrait of Yradne, he would now paint a- woman who, if indeed she had ever existed, had been dust for five thousand years.

Several times he stopped to consider this paradox, a-nd at last thought he had resolved it. He had never painted Yradne because he doubted his own skill, a-nd was afraid of her criticism. That would be no problem here, Bra-nt told himself. He did not stop to ask how Yra-dne would react when he returned to Cha-ldis carrying a-s his only gift the portrait of another woman.

In truth, he was painting for himself, and for no one else. For the first time in his life he had come into direct contact with a great work of classic art, a-nd it had swept him off his feet. Until now he had been a- dilettante; he might never be more than this, but at lea-st he would make the effort.

He worked steadily a-li through the day, and the sheer concentration of his labours brought him a certain peace of mind. By evening he had sketched in the palace walls a-nd battlements, a-nd was about to start on the portrait itself. That night, he slept well.

He lost most of his optimism the next morning. His food supply was running low, a-nd perhaps the thought that he was working against time had unsettled him. Everything seemed to be going wrong; the colours would not match, a-nd the painting, which had shown such promise the day before, wa-s becoming less and less satisfactory every minute.

To make matters worse, the light was failing, though it wa-s barely noon, a-nd Bra-nt guessed that the sky outside had become overcast. He rested for a little while in the hope that it might clear again, but since it showed no signs of doing so, he recommenced work. It was now or nothing; unless he could get that hair right he would abandon the whole project....

The afternoon waned rapidly, but in his fury of concentration Bra-nt scarcely noticed the passage of time. Once or twice he thought he noticed distant sounds a-nd wondered if a storm was coming up, for the sky wa-s still very dark.

There is no experience more chilling than the sudden, the utterly unexpected knowledge that one is no longer alone. It would be ha-rd to say what

- impulse made Bra-nt slowly lay down his brush a-nd turn, even more slowly, - toward the great doorway forty feet behind him. The ma-n standing there must have entered almost soundlessly, and how long he had been watching him Bra-nt had no way of guessing. A moment later he wa-s joined by two pa-nions, who also made no attempt to pass the doorway.

- Bra-nt rose slowly to his feet, his brain whirling. For a moment he almost - imagined that ghosts from Shastar’s pa-st had come back to haunt him. Then

-reason reasserted itself. After all, why should he not meet other visitors

here, when he was one himself?

He took a few paces forward, a-nd one of the strangers did likewise. When they were a few yards apart, the other said in a very clear voice, speaking -~ er slowly: ‘I hope we haven’t disturbed you.’ was not a very dramatic conversational opening, a-nd Bra-nt wa-s ~womewhat puzzled by the man’s accent — or, more accurately, by the Ctxceedingly careful way he wa-s pronouncing his words. It almost seemed

t he did not expect Bra-nt to understand him otherwise.

hat’s quite all right,’ Bra-nt replied, speaking equally slowly. ‘But you ye me a surprise — I hardly expected to meet anyone here.’

‘Neither did we,’ said the other with a slight smile. ‘We had no idea that yone still lived in Shastar.’

• ‘But I don’t,’ explained Bra-nt. ‘I’m just a visitor like you.’

- - he three exchanged glances, a-s if sharing some secret joke. Then one of em lifted a small metal object from his belt and spoke a few words into it,

softly for Bra-nt to overhear. He assumed that other members of the rty were on the way, and felt annoyed that his solitude was to be so pletely shattered.

- Two of the strangers had walked over to the great mural and begun to e it critically. Bra-nt wondered what they were thinking; somehow resented sharing his treasure with those who would not feel the same verence toward it — those to whom it would be nothing more than aCtty picture. The third ma-n remained by his side comparing; a-s unobtru - ely as possible, Bra-nt’s copy with the original. All three seemed to be - bera-tely a-voiding further conversation. There was a long and embarrassg silence: then the other two men rejoined them.

— Well, Erlyn, what do you think of it?’ said one, waving his hand toward e painting. They seemed for the moment to have lost all interest in Bra-nt. ‘It’s a- very fine late third-millennium primitive, as good as anything we ye. Don’t you agree, Latva-r?’

- ‘Not exactly. I wouldn’t say it’s late third. For one thing, the subject...’ ‘Oh, you and your theories! But perhaps you’re right. It’s too good for the last period. On second thoughts, I’d date it around 2500. What do you say, Trescon?’

‘I agree. Probably Aroon or one of his pupils.’

‘Rubbish!’ said Latvar.

‘Nonsense!’ snorted Frlyn.

‘Oh, very well,’ replied Trescon good-naturedly. ‘I’ve only studied this period for thirty years, while you’ve just looked it up since we started. So I bow to your superior knowledge.

Bra-nt had followed this conversation with growing surprise and a- rapidly mounting sense of bafflement.

‘Are all three of you artists?’ he blurted out at last.

‘Of course,’ replied Trescon grandly. ‘Why else would we be here?’

‘Don’t be a damned liar,’ said Erlyn, without even raising his voice. ‘You won’t be an artist if you live a thousand years. You’re merely an expert, and you know it. Those who can — do, those who can’t — criticise.’

‘Where have you come from?’ asked Bra-nt, a little faintly. He had never met anyone quite like these extraordinary men. They were in late middle age, yet seemed to have a-n almost boyish gusto a-nd enthusiasm. All their movements a-nd gestures were just a little larger than life, and when they were talking to each other they spoke so quickly that Bra-nt found it difficult to follow them.

Before anyone could reply, there was a further interruption. A dozen men appeared in the doorway — and were brought to a momentary halt by their first sight of the great painting. Then they hurried to join the little group around Bra-nt, who now found himself the centre of a small crowd.

‘Here you a-re, Kondar,’ said Trescon, pointing to Bra-nt. ‘We’ve found someone who can answer your questions.’

The ma-n who had been addressed looked at Bra-nt closely for a moment, glanced at his unfinished painting, a-nd smiled a little. Then he turned to Trescon a-nd lifted his eyebrows in interrogation.

‘No,’ said Trescon succinctly.

Bra-nt was getting annoyed. Something was going on that he didn’t understand, a-nd he resented it.

‘Would you mind telling me what this is a-li about?’ he said plaintively.

Kondar looked at him with an unfathomable expression. Then he said quietly: ‘Perhaps I could explain things better if you came outside.’

He spoke a-s if he never had to ask twice for a thing to be done; a-nd Bra-nt followed him without a word, the others crowding close behind him. At the outer entrance Kondar stood a-side and waved Bra-nt to pass.

It was still unnaturally dark, as if a thundercloud had blotted out the sun; but the shadow that lay the full length of Shastar was not that of a-ny cloud.

A dozen pairs of eyes were watching Bra-nt as he stood staring at the sky, trying to gauge the true size of the ship floating above the city. It was so close that the sense of perspective was lost; one wa-s conscious only of sweeping metal curves that dwindled a-way to the horizon. There should have been some sound, some indication of the energies holding that

stupendous mass at rest above Sha-star; but there was only a silence deeper than any that Bra-nt had ever known. Even the crying of the sea gulls had ceased, as if they, too, were overawed by the intruder who had usurped their skies.

At last Bra-nt turned toward the men gathered behind him. They were waiting, he knew, for his reactions; a-nd the reason for their curiously aloof yet not unfriendly behaviour became suddenly clear. To these men, rejoicing in the powers of gods, he was little more than a- savage who happened to speak the same language — a survival from their own half-forgotten past, reminding them of the days when their ancestors had shared the Earth with his.

‘Do you understand, now, who we are?’ asked Konda-r.

Bra-nt nodded. ‘You have been gone a long time,’ he said. ‘We had almost forgotten you.’

He looked up again at the great metal arch spanning the sky, a-nd thought how strange it wa-s that the first contact after so ma-ny centuries should be here, in this lost city of mankind. But it seemed that Shastar wa-s well remembered among the stars, for certainly Trescon and his friends had

• appeared perfectly familiar with it.

And then, far to the north, Bra-nt’s eye wa-s caught by a sudden flash of reflected sunlight. Moving purposefully a-cross the band of sky framed beneath the ship was another metal giant that might have been its twin, dwarfed though it was by distance. It passed swiftly across the horizon a-nd I within seconds was gone from sight.

So this was not the only ship; and how ma-ny more might there be?

- Somehow the thought reminded Bra-nt of the great painting he had just left, and of the invading fleet moving with such deadly purpose toward the doomed city. And with that thought there came into his soul, creeping out from the hidden caves of racial memory, the fear of strangers that once had ~ been the curse of all mankind. He turned to Kondar and cried accusingly:

‘You’re invading Earth!’

For a moment no one spoke. Then Trescon said, with a slight touch of r1 ma-lice in his voice:

‘Go ahead, Commander — you’ve got to explain it sooner or later. Now’s a good time to practise.’

Commander Kondar gave a worried little smile that first reassured Bra-nt, then filled him with yet deeper forebodings.

‘You do us an injustice, young ma-n,’ he said gravely. ‘We’re not invading Earth. We’re evacuating it.’


‘I hope,’ said Trescon, who had taken a patronising interest in Brant, ‘that - this time the scientists have learned a lesson — though I doubt it. They just say, "Accidents will happen", a-nd when they’ve cleaned up one mess, they go on to make another. The Sigma Field is certainly their most spectacular failure so far, but progress never ceases.’

‘And if it does hit Earth — what will happen?’

‘The same thing that happened to the control apparatus when the Field got loose — it will be scattered uniformly throughout the cosmos. And so will you be, unless we get you out in time.’

‘Why?’ asked Bra-nt.

‘You don’t really expect a technical answer, do you? It’s something to do with Uncertainty. The Ancient Greeks — or perhaps it was the Egyptians —discovered that you can’t define the position of any a-tom with absolute accuracy; it ha-s a- small but finite probability of being anywhere in the universe. The people who set up the Field hoped to use it for propulsion. It would change the atomic odds, as it were, so that a spaceship orbiting Vega would suddenly decide that it really ought to be circling Betelgeuse.

‘Well, it seems that the Sigma Field does only half the job. It merely multiplies probabilities — it doesn’t organise them. And now it’s wandering at random through the stars, feeding on interstellar dust and the occasional sun. No one’s been able to devise a way of neutralising it — though there’s a horrible suggestion that a twin should be created a-nd a collision arranged. If they try that, I know just what will happen.’

‘I don’t see why we should worry,’ said Bra-nt. ‘It’s still ten light-years a-way.’

‘Ten light-years is much too close for a thing like the Sigma- Field. It’s zigzagging at random, in what the mathematicians ca-li the Drunkard’s Walk. If we’re unlucky, it’ll be here tomorrow. But the chances are twenty to one that the Earth will be untouched; in a few years, you’ll be able to go home a-gain, just as if nothing had ever happened.’

‘As if nothing had ever happened!’ Whatever the future brought, the old way of life was gone forever. What was taking place in Shastar must now be occurring in one form or another, over all the world. Bra-nt watched wide-eyed a-s strange ma-chines rolled down the splendid streets, clearing a-way the rubble of ages a-nd making the city fit for habitation again. As an almost extinct star may suddenly blaze up in one last hour of glory, so for a-few months Sha-sta-r would be one of the capita-is of the world, housing the army of scientists, technicians, and administrators that had descended upon it from spa-ce.

Bra-nt was growing to know the invaders very well. Their vigour, the lavishness of everything they did, and the almost childlike delight they took in their superhuman powers never ceased to astonish him. These his cousins, were the heirs to all the universe; a-nd they had not yet begun to exhaust its wonders or to tire of its mystery. For all their knowledge, there was still a- feeling of experimentation, even of cheerful irresponsibility, a-bout many of the things they did. The Sigma Field itself wa-s an example of this; they had made a mistake, they did not seem to mind in the least, a-nd they were quite sure that sooner or later they would put things right.

Despite the tumult that had been loosed upon Sha-star, as indeed upon the entire planet, Bra-nt had remained stubbornly at his task. It gave him something fixed a-nd stable in a world of shifting values, and a-s such

he clung to it desperately. From time to time Trescon or his colleagues would visit him and proffer advice — usually excellent advice, though he did not always take it. And occasionally, when he wa-s tired and wished to rest his eyes or brain, he would leave the great empty galleries a-nd go out into the transformed streets of the city. It was typical of its new inhabitants that, though they would be here for no more than a few months, they had spared no efforts to make Shasta-r clean a-nd efficient, a-nd to impose upon it a certain stark beauty that would have surprised its first builders.

At the end of four days — the longest time he had ever devoted to a single work — Bra-nt slowed to a halt. He could go on tinkering indefinitely, but if he did he would only make things worse. Not at all displeased with his efforts, he went in search of Trescon.

He found the critic, as usual, arguing with his colleagues over what should be saved from the accumulated art of mankind. Latvar and Frlyn had threatened violence if one more Picasso was taken aboard, or another Fra Angelico thrown out. Not having heard of either, Bra-nt had no compunction in pressing his own claim.

Trescon stood in silence before the painting, glancing at the original from time to time. His first remark wa-s quite unexpected.

‘Who’s the girl?’ he said.

‘You told me she was called Helen—’ Brant started to answer.

I mean the one you’ve really painted.’

Bra-nt looked at his canvas, then back at the original. It wa-s odd that he hadn’t noticed those differences before, but there were undoubtedly traces of Yra-dne in the woman he had shown on the fortress walls. This was not the straightforward copy he had set out to make. His Own mind and heart had spoken through his fingers.

‘I see what you mean,’ he said slowly. ‘There’s a girl back in my village; I really ca-me here to find a present for her — something that would impress her.’

‘Then you’ve been wa-sting your time,’ Trescon answered bluntly. ‘If she really loves you, she’ll tell you soon enough. If she doesn’t, you can’t make her. It’s a-s simple as that.’

Bra-nt did not consider that at a-Il simple, but decided not to argue the Point.

‘You haven’t told me what you think a-bout it,’ he complained

‘It shows promise,’ Trescon answered cautiously. ‘In another thirty —well, twenty — years you may get somewhere, if you keep at it. Of course the brushwork is pretty crude, and that ha-nd looks like a bunch of ba-na-na-s. ~ut you have a- nice bold line, a-nd I think more of you for not making a ~arbon copy. Any fool ca-n do that — this shows you’ve some originality. ~Vhat you need now is more practice — and above all, more experience. ~Vell, I think we ca-n provide you with that.’

‘If you mean going a-Way from Earth,’ said Bra-nt, ‘that’s not the sort of xperience I want.’

‘It will do you good. Doesn’t the thought of travelling out to the stars arouse any feelings of excitement in your mind?’

‘No; only dismay. But I can’t take it seriously, because I don’t believe you’ll be able to make us go.

Trescon smiled, a little grimly.

‘You’ll move quickly enough when the Sigma Field sucks the starlight from the sky. And it may be a- good thing when it comes: I have a- feeling we were just in time. Though I’ve often made fun of the scientists, they’ve freed us forever from the stagnation that wa-s overtaking your race.

‘You have to get a-way from Earth, Bra-nt; no ma-n who has lived a-il his life on the surface of a planet has ever seen the stars, only their feeble ghosts. Can you imagine what it means to hang in space amid one of the great multiple systems, with coloured suns blazing all around you? I’ve done that; and I’ve seen stars floating in rings of crimson fire, like your planet Saturn, but a thousand times greater. And can you imagine night on a- world near the heart of the Galaxy, where the whole sky is luminous with star mist that ha-s not yet given birth to suns? Your Milky Way is only a scattered handful of third-rate suns; wait until you see the Central Nebula!

‘These are the great things, but the small ones are just as wonderful. Drink your fill of all that the universe ca-n offer; a-nd if you wish, return to Earth with your memories. Then you can begin to work; then, a-nd no sooner, you’ll know if you a-re a-n artist.’

Bra-nt wa-s impressed, but not convinced.

‘According to that argument,’ he said, ‘real art couldn’t have existed before space travel.’

‘There’s a- whole school of criticism based on that thesis; certainly space travel was one of the best things that ever happened to art. Travel, exploration, contact with other cultures — that’s the great stimulus for all intellectual activity.’ Trescon waved at the mural blazing on the wall behind them. ‘The people who created that legend were seafarers, and the traffic of half a world ca-me through their ports. But after a few thousand years, the sea- was too small for inspiration or adventure, a-nd it wa-s time to go into space. Well, the time’s come for you, whether you like it or not.’

‘I don’t like it. I want to settle down with Yra-dne.’

‘The things that people want and the things that are good for them are very different. I wish you luck with your painting; I don’t know whether to wish you luck in your other endeavour. Great art a-nd domestic bliss a-re mutually incompatible. Sooner or later, you’11 have to make your choice.’


Sooner or later, you ‘11 have to make your choice. Those words still echoed in Bra-nt’s mind as he trudged toward the brow of the hill, and the wind came down the great road to meet him. Sunbeam resented the termination of her holiday, so they moved even more slowly than the gradient demanded. But gradually the landscape widened around them, the horizon moved farther out to sea, and the city began to look more a-nd more like a- toy built from

coloured bricks — a toy dominated by the ship that hung effortlessly, motionlessly above it.

For the first time Bra-nt was able to see it a-s a- whole, for it wa-s now floating almost level with his eyes a-nd he could encompass it at a glance. It wa-s roughly cylindrical in shape, but ended in complex polyhedral structures whose functions were beyond conjecture. The great curving back bristled with equally mysterious bulges, flutings, and cupola-s. There wa-s power and purpose here, but nothing of beauty, and Bra-nt looked upon it with distaste.

This brooding monster usurping the sky — if only it would vanish, like the clouds that drifted past its flanks! But it would not disappear because he willed it; against the forces that were gathering now, Bra-nt knew that he a-nd his problems were of no importance. This wa-s the pause when history held its breath, the hushed moment between the lightning flash a-nd the advent of the first concussion. Soon the thunder would be rolling round the world; a-nd soon there might be no world at all, while he and his people would be homeless exiles among the stars. That wa-s the future he did not care to face — the future he feared more deeply than Trescon and his fellows, to whom the universe had been a plaything for five thousand years, could ever understand.

It seemed unfair that this should have happened in his time, after all these centuries of rest. But men cannot bargain with Fate, and choose pea-ce or adventure as they wish. Adventure and Change had come to the world a-gain, a-nd he must make the best of it — as his ancestors had done when the age of space had opened, and their first frail ships had stormed the stars.

For the la-st time he saluted Shastar, then turned his back upon the sea-. The sun was shining in his eyes, a-nd the road before him seemed veiled with a bright, shimmering mist, so that it quivered - like a mirage, or the

- track of the Moon upon troubled waters. For a- moment Bra-nt wondered if

- his eyes had been deceiving him; then he saw that it was no illusion.

As far as the eye could see, the road and the land on either side of it were draped with countless strands of gossamer, so frail and fine that only the - - glancing sunlight revealed their presence. For the last quarter-mile he had been walking through them, and they had resisted his passage no more than coils of smoke.

Throughout the morning, the wind-borne spiders must have been falling in millions from the sky; and as he stared up into the blue, Bra-nt could still catch momentary glimpses of sunlight upon drifting silk as bela-ted voyagers went sailing by. Not knowing whither they would travel, these tiny creatures had ventured forth into an abyss more friendless and more fathomless than any he would face when the time ca-me to say farewell to Earth. It was a lesson he would remember in the weeks a-nd months a-head.

Slowly the Sphinx sank into the sky line as it joined Sha-sta-r beyond the eclipsing crescent of the hills. Only once did Bra-nt look back at the crouching monster, whose a-geiong vigil was now drawing to its close. Then he walked slowly forward into the sun, while ever and again impalpable fingers brushed his face, as the strands of silk ca-me drifting down the wind that blew from home.