Hot Sleep (22 page)

(Did I see the stranger glare at Jason? Noyock wondered. Why should he be angry?)

"His name is Stipock. Will you build him a house?"

Of course the people shouted, "Yes," and the meeting broke up immediately — it had lasted longer than any other Greeting in the History, and because of the stranger it seemed that the tumult afterward lasted longer, too. Everyone had to touch Jason, talk to him, see if he remembered them, show him the new children, ask him a question, tell him how well things were going. And then the more curious — and the majority were very curious — had to come meet the new Ice Person.

"Stipock," they all said, trying out the name. "Welcome to Heaven
City
."

Noyock watched as Wix (the problem! The thorn in everyone's side!) came to Stipock and fixed him with that cold, painful stare, and asked, "Why are you able to talk, when all the others who came from the Star
Tower
were like babies?"

Stipock glanced at Jason (Why do I keep thinking they're adversaries? Noyock asked himself), saw that he wasn't looking, and said, "Because my memory tape was the only one that survived the wreck of the ship in space."

Dead silence fell over the group. Someone muttered, "He makes words, too, just like Jason." But Wix only sneered and said to everyone and to no one, "Anyone can make up words." And then to prove his point, the fifteen–year–old man said, "Because my memory glibbit was the only one that survived the wreck of the mumblebunk in tiddiewart." Though Wix was irritating to practically everyone, they couldn't keep from laughing.

And Noyock wondered why the stranger was turning red. Embarrassment? Anger? Ah well. He'd need a place to stay until the new house could be built — so Noyock went to him and said, "I'm Noyock, the Warden. Would you be willing to live with me until we can build you a house?"

"I don't want to put you out," said Stipock.

"We won't leave," Noyock said hurriedly. "We'd stay there, too. It's a big house."

Stipock seemed as if he wanted to explain something, then thought better of it, and followed as Noyock led him out of the crowd.

Several people followed them up Noyock's Road toward Noyock's Town, the cluster of houses mostly belonging to Noyock's children and grandchildren that fringed the road near the crest of the hill. They wanted to hear Stipock speak — he had a different way of saying things that was very amusing, and no one was sure what to make of Jason's latest miracle.

The farther they walked up the hill toward Noyock's house, the stronger the smell of the cattle pens became. To Noyock it was the smell of home; the smell of prosperity. But Stipock wrinkled up his nose and said, "Can't you do something with the smell?"

Noyock was startled, then laughed. "And what can you do with a smell, when no one knows what it looks like, or how to take hold of it?"

Stipock didn't answer, and Noyock wondered if the man had a sense of humor. A person who can't laugh is only half a human, Noyock firmly believed. Why had Jason created this halfman, and brought him here?

Stipock stepped in a pile of fresh cow manure that was sitting in the middle of the road. He lifted his foot and asked, "What's that?" He sounded irritated.

"Cow manure," Noyock said, puzzled that the man wouldn't know.

Stipock walked from the road to the thick grass and hurriedly rubbed it off his shoes.

"If you didn't want it on your feet," Noyock asked, genuinely confused at the man's actions, "why did you step in it?" Stipock only shook his head, and wiped his feet some more.

Late that night, Noyock retreated to the room where he worked on the History. But tonight he couldn't bring himself to write anything. He just stared at the paper, and at last passed the time by drawing maps of his farm as it was, and as it should be within a year, five years, ten. Meaningless. He was tired — he had only managed a two hour nap in the afternoon. But he couldn't sleep.

All day Jason had been going through Heaven
City
, visiting with people, talking to them, asking what they thought about this, what they felt about that. As always the Warden was forbidden to come along. So instead, Noyock had had the increasingly odious task of dealing with this creature Stipock. He wasn't sure how he was going to broach the subject with Jason, but he certainly wished Jason would take the man back into the Star
Tower
with him.

Questions. "Why do you do this? Why do you do that?" When Stipock asked Aven, "Why do you let your wife do all this cooking while you just come in and sit at the table, expecting to be fed?" Noyock didn't even try to stem the outburst. Aven was at his furious best. "Because, by damn, I spend the day from an hour before dawn until an hour after dark tending cattle, hoeing fields, reaping, plowing, sowing and every other damn thing that keeps this family alive, including producing every damn thing you've put in your damn mouth today, Stipock! And if I expect my wife to cook the damn food and clean up the dishes after it seems only fair considering that there'd be no food and be no dishes and be no house and be no table if I didn't work to get them!"

Stipock had turned very, very red, and Noyock couldn't help it — he laughed outright. Now, drawing maps on the paper, he wondered what Jason intended to do with Stipock. Please, Noyock wished fervently, please explain at least what the fellow is for.

A knock on the door, and Noyock got up, startled. Everyone knew that after dark Noyock was not to be disturbed in this room. He opened the door — and it was the hundred–eleventh Ice Person. "What do you want?" Noyock asked.

"I just want to ask some questions," Stipock answered. And because Jason had, after all, said that he should be treated as carefully as an infant, Noyock invited him to come in and sit down. He did not, however, say to Stipock, "Be welcome." There were limits.

"Questions?" Noyock asked.

"I've been talking to Hoom," Stipock said. "Your grandson, right?"

Noyock nodded.

"He tells me that as Warden you tell everybody what to do."

Noyock shrugged. "When it needs telling, I tell it. Mostly people do what they want."

"But there are laws?"

Noyock nodded, wondering what Stipock was getting at. "Of course. Jason gave us those laws."

"And according to those laws a man has a right to beat his son?"

Ah. Another criticism. Noyock suddenly felt very tired and wanted to go to bed. "Within reason," Noyock said, "a man has power over his children."

Stipock laughed and shook his head. "I just can't believe how crude it all is."

Noyock stood up and stepped to the door. "Good night, Stipock. Let's talk in the morning, if you wish."

"No, I'm sorry," Stipock hurriedly said. "I didn't mean — I just meant that everything is so primitive." The word meant nothing to Noyock. Stipock went on: "I just wondered if you ever voted on anything. If you voted about the laws."

"We vote," Noyock said, "when there is no law. When Jason has given us a law, why should we vote?"

"Why shouldn't you?"

"Because if Jason says it, only a fool would disagree."

"It might as well be the Empire all over again," Stipock said, more to himself than to Noyock. "It hasn't occurred to anyone that the laws ought to come from the people, not from a man who comes out of the starship once every few years?"

"People are often very stupid," Noyock said.

"Including Jason, just like anyone else," Stipock said.

Noyock fixed a cold glare on him. "Good night, Stipock," Noyock said. "Sleep well."

Stipock shrugged, said, "Thanks for answering my questions," and left. Noyock closed the door after him, but his shaking fingers could hardly control the string to loop it on the bolt. He walked back to the table, sat down, and put his hands to his face.

It is very clear now what Jason wants, Noyock told himself. Stipock is here to test us, to try us. Jason has created an enemy, so that our love for him and our obedience to law will have its trial.

But we will overcome, Noyock vowed. We can and will be strong.

And then he remembered that Stipock had spoken with Hoom. With young, restless, easily influenced Hoom. And the spectre of the stranger stealing away the hearts of the children came up before Noyock's eyes for the first time, and he was afraid.

HOOM SAT
at the table, the tallow lamp casting a circle of light that included the paper and the pen. Except for the scratching of the point on the paper, the room was silent, until Hoom laid down the pen, sat up straight, and stretched, sighing softly.

He got up and walked to the window, which was barred. His fingers played along the bar, but he didn't lift it. He was confined to his room for a week, except for labor with his father on the farm. And Aven had gone so far, this time, as to insist that the window remain closed. Of course Aven would never know, this late at night, whether he was obeyed or not — but Hoom suspected that his father was so angry, this time, that he'd at least consider watching one night outside Hoom's room, just to see if he was obeyed.

Not worth a chance, Hoom decided. His back was still stiff from the last beating — the tenth in as many months. I will be fourteen next month, he reminded himself. Then I can move out of here and never see my father again.

Today his oldest brother, Grannit, at the age of thirty–two already a grandfather, had talked to him. "Why build a fire between father and yourself, so that neither of you can ever cross?" he had said, and Hoom had no answer. Except the silent one: "I'm not building the fire." He couldn't say that, though, because all the old people in Heaven
City
seemed to be on his father's side. They all distrusted Stipock, even though not a house in Heaven
City
lacked at least one of the tallow lamps Stipock had taught them to make. They all resented Wix, even though Jason himself had commended Wix for finding ways to travel on the water — even though Noyock (thank Jason for grandfather, Hoom thought) had ridden in the newest boat, which Stipock had helped Wix design. And they all had nothing but contempt for Hoom, who was "a disobedient child," as the phrase had so often been said. Hoom sat down and tried to write again. But the words were hard to come by. And would Jason even care to read what a thirteen–year–old boy had written? No, it was pointless. Noyock wouldn't change the law to set him free; Stipock hadn't the power; and Aven was determined that until the last moment that his authority lasted, Hoom would obey.

"I'll do all in my power to make him a decent man," Aven had said, loudly, when the cattlekeepers' council met tonight, "so that when he turns to rubbish next year, no man can say it was Aven's fault."

And while I rot this year, Hoom thought bitterly, no man says any fault to Aven, either.

A loud knock. Hoom got up, guiltily, as if his thoughts could be heard and he was going to be held to account. He turned the paper over, so the writing couldn't be read, and went to the door. No one was there. He wondered — who could be walking the halls tonight? And then the knock came again, louder, and Hoom realized that someone was knocking at the window. At a second–story window? No matter — someone was there, as a third knock testified. Hoom rushed to the window, opened it, and Wix tumbled into the room.

Surprise turned to dismay. Hoom quickly closed the window again, then rushed and closed the door. Returning to Wix, who was now lying on his back on the floor, flexing his arms, Hoom whispered, "What are you doing, coming here when I'm confined? Are you trying to get me killed?"

"You killed!" Wix whispered back, laughing silently. "And there I was hanging by my elbows, trying to butt my head against the window loud enough that you'd hear me! Were you asleep?"

Hoom shook his head. "I was writing. As Stipock said to do."

"Writing'll never do any damn good," Wix said.

"I think Stipock's right," Hoom said. "Why should the Wardens be the only ones to write the History? Then it's all written down the way they think it happened.

"Well, it's your grandfather," Wix said.

"Why did you come here? I've been beaten too much already!"

"I came because you'd've killed me if I hadn't. We finished the new boat today, and Stipock says we're to try it out tonight."

"Tonight? In the dark?"

"There's a moon. And Stipock says that the night wind is from the southwest and will help us fight the current. We're going to cross the river."

Hoom immediately began pulling trousers over his naked legs. "Cross the river, and doing it tonight!"

"Coming then?" Wix asked, laughing silently again.

"Think I'd miss it?"

"What about your father?" Wix's eyes taunted him.

"This one's worth another beating," Hoom said. "And maybe he won't know." Hoom opened the window and Wix climbed out, falling lightly on his feet in the soft earth below. Hoom paused a moment in the window, dreading another huge quarrel with his father, wondering if taking this jump was worth it. But the thought of taking the big boat out into the river — across the river — ended his inward debate, and he jumped, landing on all fours and rolling.

Wix scrambled back up the wall enough to close the window, so that discovery wouldn't be easy, while Hoom smoothed the dirt where they had landed. A few meters out from the house the dirt was covered by a thick mat of grass — no tracks there. And the dew was cold on their feet as they ran. A cow lowed as they sped through the pasture, almost three kilometers before they reached the forest's edge. There they rested, panting, out of breath, until their eyes got used to the denser darkness under the thick leaves. They followed a path known only to children's feet, a narrow winding that seemed deliberately to take the most dangerous descents, the steepest slopes, and it took almost a half hour for them to reach the edge of the river, in a little bay protected by a finger of rock that protruded into the river, blocking the current. There the boat lay rocking on the water; there a half–dozen shadowy people were busy at a half–dozen nameless, invisible tasks in the darkness.

"Who's that?" hissed a voice, and Wix answered, aloud, "Me, of course."

"Hurry, then, we're nearly done. Did you get Hoom?"

"I'm here," Hoom said, clambering down the slope after Wix. Closer, he could distinguish the features of the people there, and he immediately sought out Dilna, who smiled at him and let him help her with her task, which was folding and loading on the extra sail.

A few minutes later, Wix and Stipock pushed the boat out of the tiny cove and then were helped aboard as Hoom held the tiller. He had been tillerman on the last two boats, too, and as the boat hit the first currents (still not as strong as the main current a kilometer farther out — they had never tried to cross that before) he laughed with pleasure at how lightly and easily the boat responded to his touch.

Wix, in the meantime, with Dilna and Cirith, was putting up the sail, and the wind from the southwest caught it, pulling the boat forward, making it dance across the water.

There were four oars on the boat, just in case the sail didn't work, but Hoom laughed and said, "Won't be needing to row, now, will we?" and Wix laughed and said, "We could sleep our way across in this boat," and Stipock said, "Shut up and mind the tiller and the sail. The real current's still ahead."

When they reached the main stream, the bow of the boat yawed widely to the left, and for a moment there was a flurry of activity until the sail was turned to take the boat virtually into the current. Hoom plied the tiller vigorously, and kept the boat on course, and when they finally passed out of the main current and into the gentle eddies of the opposite side of the river, they gave a quiet cheer. Quiet, because Stipock had warned them that sound flew across water better than through forest.

Ahead loomed the highest hill of the opposite shore, and just to the west of it there was a beach. They unshipped the oars now, and pulled down the sail, rowing gently into the shore. This time everyone but Hoom jumped out of the boat into the water, pulling it ashore. Hoom got out then, patting the firm structure of the boat as he swung from the bow.

"Well," said Dilna, "it doesn't feel much different from the sand on the other side."

"What did you expect?" Stipock asked. "Gold?"

"What's gold?" Hoom asked, and Stipock shook his head and laughed. "Never mind. Let's climb that hill, and see how the world looks from this side of the water."

So they climbed up the hill, Wix pointedly taking the shorter, steeper way, and Hoom following him. At the top, they waited for the others to come. Stipock was smiling when he reached them, and as they stood together in the wind, he laughed and said, "It's not too many years off, my friends, when you'll be as glad as I am to find the path that's not so steep!"

"The hill's high enough," Hoom said, looking at how small their boat seemed down on the shore. The moon was full and high, and without trees around them, it seemed they could see forever.

"Well," said Stipock, after they had all had ample time to look around, "what do you see over there?" And he pointed toward the shore they had come from.

"I can see my house," Hoom said immediately, because his house crowned the bald hill of the Pasture. There were others near it, of course, but his grandfather's house, where he lived, was highest.

"There's a light in my father's house," Wix said, pointing to the many houses that skirted Linkeree's Bay, where Wix's father, Ross, still lived in the house that his father, Linkeree, had built.

"My family lives in the Main
Town
," Dilna said. "I can't see it from here."

Stipock chuckled softly behind them. "And is that all you see?"

Cirith said, "What I mostly see is trees. The houses look pretty damn small when you compare them to the forest." Stipock patted her arm.

Hoom wondered what in the world he was supposed to see as he looked across the river. Sure enough, everything did look smaller from farther away, but everyone knew that. What did Stipock want them to see?

Wix finally kicked a rock off the hill and turned back to Stipock. "Quit the guessing game. You want to show us something, show us."

"Right," Hoom said. "All that we can see from here is forest and Heaven
City
."

"And there's the answer," Stipock said, clapping Hoom on the back. "That's Heaven
City
. Over there, isn't it?"

"Where else would it be?" Cirith asked.

"Look down on this side. Is Heaven
City
here?"

No, of course not, they said.

"Well then. What if a man crossed the river with his wife, and they built a house here. Would that house be in Heaven
City
or not?"

And now they began to catch a glimmer of the idea. "It wouldn't have to be, would it?" Dilna said.

And Hoom added, "And if the people who lived here had the boats, they could pretty much decide who came and who didn't."

"They could even keep the damned Warden and his stupid laws on the other side," Wix said. "We could vote on everything, like you've been saying!"

But the excitement was dampened when Stipock said, "And could you keep Jason on the other side?"

They shrugged. They shuffled. They didn't know. After all, you never knew what Jason could do.

"Let me tell you, then," Stipock said. "You can't keep Jason away. Because Jason has machines that let him fly."

Fly! Hoom stared in wonderment at Stipock. The man was strange — for hours he would talk to them about how Jason was just a man, like any other; and then he would say things like this, or talk about Jason piloting a great ship between the stars. Who could know? Even Stipock himself couldn't seem to make up his mind as to whether Jason was God, as the old people said, or whether he was just a man.

"And not just Jason. Which of you owns a cow?"

None of them did.

"Or an ax? Or anything at all?"

"I have my tools," Wix said, but he was the oldest of those who followed Stipock, and few of the others had turned fourteen and reached adulthood.

"Are your tools enough to build a town?"

Wix shook his head.

"Then we're back where we started, aren't we? Because you can't be free from Heaven
City until you don't need Heaven
City
anymore. But it's still worth thinking about, isn't it? Still worth, perhaps, planning for. Perhaps?"

"Perhaps," Hoom said, so solemnly that he earned several punches and jests from the others all the way down the hill. But as he sat at the tiller on the way back, he couldn't keep from looking back often at the shore they had left. Land as good as any at Heaven
City
. But perhaps there the young, who, like Hoom and Wix, cared little for the old people's single–minded attention to every word that dropped from Jason's mouth, might be able to set up another city, one that depended on the will of those governed, as Stipock had so often said, rather than the will of those governing.

Now as they crossed the river, the current was trickier. They had to steer into it again, though it took them far from the direction they wanted to go, because the wind was directly against them returning. Once they had crossed the main stream, though, they let the eddies carry them lazily back across Linkeree
Bay
, around the point, and into the shallow cove where they had built the boat.

They splashed to shore (except Hoom at the tiller) and tied the boat to three trees, and then they all laughed with each other and made funny remarks about having to go back to the old people again, and then they parted.

Because Dilna lived in the Main
Town
, she and Hoom had to go back in the same direction, which was perfectly all right with Hoom. He wanted to talk to her anyway, had wanted to ever since he had met her in the group that met to listen to Stipock months ago, while he was still talking about the stars and planets and billions of people on other worlds (as if anyone much cared what really existed in heaven). As they wound their way through the forest toward the Pasture, Hoom held her hand, and she only held the tighter when he tried to do the courteous thing, and let go as they reached level, open ground.

That was encouragement enough for Hoom. "Dilna," he whispered as they walked through the Pasture. "Dilna, in a month I'll be fourteen."

"And I'll be fourteen in two weeks," she said.

"I'm moving out of my father's house that day," Hoom said.

"I'd move, too," she answered, "if only I had a place to go."