Cat Country (8 page)

But it was not possible for me to long preserve even this pleasure. Again it was Scorpion who spoiled things. On about the seventh day after I had begun taking my baths, as soon as I arrived on the beach I saw some black shadows moving back and forth in the distance. I didn’t pay any particular attention to them, but merely waited, as usual, for the pleasure of watching the beauty of the sunrise.

A slate-red colour gradually rose in the east. After a while, a number of thick clouds broke apart and transformed themselves into large, deep-purple flowers. Suddenly the sky lightened so that the stars were no longer visible. Then the deep purple cloud-flowers joined together to form a horizontal layer, and the purple colour changed to a deep orange touched with a very light streak of dapple-grey and aqua. They were bordered with a bright silver-argent. The horizontal layer began to split apart again and some large, black spots began to appear in the orange.

Golden rays began shining down so intensely that they were even able to show through from behind the black spots. And then from out of the clouds emerged a sphere of blood-red. It was not quite round and seemed to shudder a bit before settling down in the morning sky. While this was going on, the broken clouds had shattered into tiny fragments, scattering golden fish scales across the sky. The river grew bright and began to give off a golden glow. The remnants of the morning clouds became thinner and more broken until gradually they disappeared, and there were only left in the sky a few threads of pale, peach-coloured silk. The sun climbed higher. The entire sky changed to a silver-grey, but in some places little touches of blue still showed through.

I had been so wrapped up in gazing at the sky that I had been oblivious to everything else, and when I turned around, I was quite surprised to discover a column of cat-men standing fifty yards or so back from the bank of the river. I didn’t have the foggiest notion as to what they were up to. At first I assumed it was some business that concerned only them, and I didn’t pay any attention to it. I decided to simply go on with the business of taking my bath; however, as I walked along the bank towards a deeper part of the river, I noticed that the column of cat-men shifted its position too. As I dove into the water, I heard a cry of alarm. I bobbed up and down a few times and then swam to a shallow place where I could stand up to look. Another cry went up and the column retreated several paces. I realised what was going on: they had come to take in the spectacle of my bath!

If they had never seen anyone bathe before, I suppose there was no harm in their watching. I knew that they hadn’t come for the joy to be had from seeing me in the nude, for the nude body is nothing new to the Cat People as they don’t wear clothes themselves. Undoubtedly, they had come to see how I swam. Well then, should I continue with my swimming exhibition in order to broaden their horizons, or should I break off my morning dip? I couldn’t make up my mind. At this juncture, I spotted Scorpion. He was closest to the bank, perhaps five or ten yards closer than any of the others. I realised he was showing off that he was not afraid of me. Jumping forward a few feet more, he waved to signal me to jump farther out into the river. On the basis of my three or four months’ experience on Mars, I could tell that if I obeyed his signal, the end result would be to greatly bolster Scorpion’s prestige. That was more than I could take. Ever since I can remember, I have always detested anyone who would rely on the prestige and power of a foreigner to hoodwink his own people. I walked in towards the beach, and Scorpion started walking forward again too. When I was fifteen or twenty yards from him, I picked up my revolver from the rock on which I had left it, and began closing in on him.

THE PROFIT MOTIVE

I
SEIZED
Scorpion. He smiled. In fact I had never seen him smile so wide before. The madder I got, the more he smiled. It seemed that the Cat People kept their paltry stock of smiles solely in order to avoid beatings. I asked him what he meant by gathering all these Cat People to watch me bathe. He didn’t say anything, but just kept on smiling as ingratiatingly as he could. I knew that he was up to something, but I was too sick of that wretched look of his to bother finding out what it was. I simply told him, ‘If you ever do anything like this again, watch out for your scalp!’

The next day I went to the river as usual. Before I had even arrived at the beach, I was conscious of a blackish mass in the distance. There were even more of them than yesterday! I decided to go along with my bath as if nothing had happened in order to see what they were up to; I could always give Scorpion a working over when I got back. The sun came out. I stood in a shallow place, pretending to be totally wrapped up in splashing in the water, but secretly watching the Cat People at the same time. Before long, Scorpion appeared, leading another cat-man who was carrying what appeared to be a pile of reverie leaves in both arms stacked up hard against his chin. I saw them walking along the line of cat-men. First Scorpion would put out his hand, and then the cat-man following him would extend his. I noticed that the stack of reverie leaves he held in his arms was gradually diminishing. So that was it – Scorpion was taking advantage of the gathering to sell a few reverie leaves! He had, no doubt, jacked up the price in honour of the occasion.

Now, I am a man who has
some
sense of humour; but a moment’s anger will cause even a person like myself to go to extremes. I well knew how afraid the cat-men were of me, simply because I was a foreigner. I also knew that this whole ridiculous spectacle was undoubtedly the handiwork of Scorpion alone, and it was by no means my original intention to cause harm to this innocent group of spectators just to punish Scorpion. However, at the time, my fury caused me to forget all considerations of benevolence. I’d simply have to give Scorpion a taste of my strength, otherwise I should never again be able to enjoy my morning exercise in peace. Now, if the cat-men had also wanted to come for a swim in the morning, then of course there would be nothing that I could say. The river was not my exclusive possession. But to have one man swim while several hundred others stood around watching, and then to have someone come along and take advantage of the gathering to do business – well, that was more than I could take!

I decided not to grab Scorpion first, for I knew that he wouldn’t tell me the truth anyway. The only way I could get to the bottom of all this would be to capture one of the spectators. I started easing my way towards the river bank, keeping my back to them so as not to make them jumpy. Once I got to the shore, it would be a matter of a hundred-yard dash and then I could catch one of them off guard.

No sooner had I reached the bank and turned around than I heard a most baleful cry – a cry even more pitiful than that made by a pig being slaughtered. My hundred-yard dash began. Ahead of me, it was as though an earthquake had suddenly occurred. Each of the spectators seemed torn between the desire to scatter in order to escape with his own life, and the desire to group together for security. Some ran; some fell; some forgot to run; and others fell down and tried to scramble back up again. In the twinkling of an eye they were dispersed like autumn leaves scattered by the wind – a little pile here, a little pile there, one to the east, two to the west. They were running and screaming as though they were completely out of their minds, and by the time that my hundred-yard dash was over, there were only a few of them left at the finish line, lying scattered about on the ground.

I grabbed one of them, but saw that his eyes were closed and he had stopped breathing. My regret at having killed him was much more intense than the panic of the calamity itself. I shouldn’t use my superiority in order to kill; however, what was done was done. Without thinking, I grabbed another fallen spectator. His leg was broken, but he was still alive. I’m really not proud of what I did next, for although I clearly saw his leg was broken, I went ahead and seized him for interrogation. Knowing one had already died of fright, I cruelly went ahead and grabbed another whom might very well also scare to death. If I can be excused for all of this on the grounds that I was acting ‘unconsciously’ in the heat of the excitement, then the argument for the innate goodness of man won’t hold water.

To get a half-dead cat-man to speak – and to speak to a foreigner at that – is the most difficult thing imaginable. I knew that forcing him to talk would be no different from murdering him, for he would certainly die of fright in a very short time. Poor unfortunate! I let him go, and looked around again. The few that had fallen were all injured, of course, and were reduced to crawling on the ground. They were crawling very fast, but I didn’t pursue them. Two of them were no longer moving at all.

I am not usually afraid of danger, but this time I felt that I had really stirred up a hornets’ nest. Who could tell what odd kind of concoction the Cat People’s law might turn out to be. Even though there might be a legal difference between murdering a man and scaring him to death, wasn’t it the same thing from the point of view of conscience? I couldn’t decide what to do. Perhaps I’d go and hunt down Scorpion. After all, he’d got me into this mess in the first place and he certainly ought to have some way of getting me out of it. But even if I did find him, he wouldn’t be likely to tell me the truth. Why not wait for
him
to come looking for me? Why not take advantage of this opportunity to find the spacecraft and take care of my dead friend’s body? Then if Scorpion ran into any danger in the reverie forest and came looking for me, I would be in a good position to interrogate him. For if he didn’t tell the truth, I’d refuse to return. Extortion? Perhaps. But how else can you handle a man to whom trust means nothing and who doesn’t consider lying as shameful?

I tucked my gun under my belt and with a heavy heart, followed the river. The sun was very hot and I felt that I lacked something – of course, those goddamned reverie leaves! Without them I wouldn’t be able to resist either the rays of the sun or the noxious mist that was rising from the river. Cat Country will never produce a sage, I said to myself. (I had to content myself with disparaging the Cat People in order to lighten my own sense of shame.) I thought of going over and taking the reverie leaves from the hands of those two dead cat-men. Was I really going to go so far as to rob the dead? After all, I could always go back to the reverie forest and break off a big branch; there would certainly be no one to stop me. But I didn’t feel like walking that far. In the end, I did indeed wrest the leaves from the dead hands of the fallen cat-men! Half of one leaf had already been eaten; I ate the other half and continued my way along the river bank.

After walking for some time, I recognised a dark grey hill, a hill that I knew was not far from where our spacecraft had crashed. However, I didn’t know how far the crash site was from the river or which side of the river it was on. It was really hot. I ate two more of the reverie leaves, but still didn’t feel any cooler. Since there were no trees, there were no shady spots in which a man might rest. I decided to press on and find the spacecraft no matter what the cost.

Just then, someone called from behind. I recognised Scorpion’s voice in the distance, but didn’t stop. However, he was faster than me, and before long he had caught up. I thought of grabbing him by the scalp to shake the truth out of him, but when I saw the pathetic state he was in, I didn’t have the heart to lay a hand on him. His pig-mouth was swollen, there was a nasty gash on his head, and a number of scratches on his body. He looked as though he had been doused in something, for his fine hair was stuck to his skin. He looked rather like a drowned rat. Although I was the one who had scared a few of the cat-men to death, apparently he had been the one who had taken the beating. It occurred to me that although the cat-men didn’t dare take on foreigners, they were most courageous in laying into each other. Their disputes were, of course, none of my business. Yet, despite myself, I began to identify with, and even feel some sympathy for, my terrified, injured and defeated friend. Scorpion opened his mouth several times before he managed to get a word out.

‘Hurry back! The reverie forest is being plundered!’

I laughed. Whatever sympathy I may have felt for him was obliterated by his words. If he’d taken a beating and then come to ask me to avenge him, then although it wouldn’t be the most admirable thing in the world to do, looking at it from a Chinese point of view, I would still have followed him back immediately. But the reverie forest being plundered? Who wanted to be the running dog of this capitalist anyway? If it was being plundered, let it be plundered. That had nothing to do with me. ‘Hurry back! The reverie forest is being plundered!’ Scorpion’s eyes almost popped right out of their sockets. It seemed that the reverie forest was everything, and his life nothing by comparison.

I said, ‘First tell me about what was going on this morning, then I’ll go back with you.’

He almost fainted from frustration and quickly stretched his neck several times in succession as he forced himself to swallow his anger. ‘But the reverie forest is being plundered!’ If he had had the nerve, he would certainly have knocked my brains out on the spot.

But I was as fully determined as him. If he wouldn’t tell me the truth, I wouldn’t budge. In the end, each of us settled for half a victory: I would return with him immediately; and on the way, he would explain everything to me.

Scorpion finally confessed the truth: the morning bath spectators had been invited out from the city and were all upper-class Cat People. Ordinarily the upper class would never have got up so early, but the opportunity to watch an Earthman bathe was too rare to pass up. Moreover, Scorpion had agreed to provide succulent reverie leaves for the occasion. Each person gave him ten National Souls (the standard monetary unit in Cat Country) for the privilege of watching me. And at no extra cost, each spectator got two succulent and juicy leaves of the very best quality.

Why you bastard, I thought to myself. Putting me on display as though I were your personal property! Before I had a chance to explode, Scorpion had a deceptive explanation all ready. ‘Look at it this way: A National Soul is a National Soul. Getting other people’s National Souls into one’s own hands is certainly an honourable undertaking,’ he said while walking at a fast pace, which didn’t seem to interfere in the least with his devious reasoning. ‘Now although I didn’t talk it over with you beforehand, I knew that you certainly wouldn’t oppose such an honourable undertaking. You’d still get to take your bath as usual, and I’d take the opportunity to obtain a few National Souls. The spectators would broaden their understanding, and it would be a profitable undertaking all round. Very profitable!’