The Enemy of My Enemy (6 page)

“How is that? Explain it.”

Explain it? Was there anyone who didn’t understand it? It was so clear and simple. Pemath was a dug that was sucked almost dry. If you wanted a drop of milk you had to fight your way to the udder, and, once there, you had to butt and bite. Tarnis was so full of milk it flowed out freely. You had only to lie down and lap. A rich land, underpopulated, barely exploited, indolently dealt with, yet strictly guarded. Tarnis was a land of legend and song and ease and treasures and all good things. “I’ve always been fascinated by it … I think there’s a fascination in it which is beyond my ability to analyze or to explain.”

“Perhaps the fact is not at all like the dream.”

This was not so pleasant. He frowned, lying in the luminous darkness. But not for long; after all, he had had the same thought more than once himself, and had answered it to his satisfaction. “Things to eat seldom taste as good as they smell, but they taste good enough, if they’re good at all. The very servants return from Tarnis with their skins scarcely wrinkled and their hands scarcely soiled. Ten or twenty years there gives them enough in the Fiscal to live at their ease the rest of their lives. I could do better. I could do more, and I could do it in less time, because I would not be a servant, I would not be at the bottom, but at the top.

“I’ve been a rogue and a pirate because that was the way I found things here. All beyond the dreams of glory and wealth I have a dream of glory which lies in not being a rogue or a pirate, in not
having
to be one or the other. Doesn’t the harlot dream of being a decent matron? Wouldn’t the traitor prefer to be a patriot? In Pemath there isn’t enough to go around. In places like Lermencas or Baho there
is
enough to go around —

“ — But in Tarnis, there is more than enough to go around — ”

The globe turned, the patterns changed, the colors swirled and melded. The bothersome image had been dissected, examined, expelled. It was cozy and content here, dreaming dreams of Tarnis. And the fulfillment would be better than the dream, for, after all, it was real … the dream was only a dream.

“Go on
.”

Success until now had always the taint and taste of slime about it. You climbed out of the muck only by planting your foot on the head of someone whom your climbing foot pushed deeper into the muck. You had to do it because there was no other way … except the way of being pushed into the muck by someone else’s foot upon your head. It had to be so, here. It didn’t have to be so everywhere. And the place it had to be so least of all: was Tarnis.

“I want to be rich more than I want to be decent. But that doesn’t mean that I don’t want to be decent at all. I do, I do! It’s a luxury I’ll be able to afford for the first time, in Tarnis. The Tarnisi don’t want, particularly, to be rich at all. Of course they don’t want
not
to be rich, they are rich without having had to do much to achieve it. They lie beneath the tree and catch the falling fruit. I wouldn’t elbow them away. I wouldn’t chop the tree down. I would gain more but they would not gain less. There would be less fruit left to rot upon the ground, but no one would be the worse for that. No one would suffer because I, instead of lying down, stood on my feet and plucked fruit still on the tree.”

“You speak in metaphors.”

He sighed, but it was a faint sigh. To explain was not unpleasant. “My metaphor means this: Given access to Tarnis and freedom in Tarnis, having been able to make money dishonestly in Pemath, I have no doubt of my being able to make money honestly and easily in Tarnis. They know nothing of commerce there. A little knowledge and a little effort should go a long, long way. Any vigorous outlander could do the same. I will do that and I will do it without doubts and contempts and recriminations and I will be happy while I do it. Allow me ten years or perhaps even five, and I’ll have enough to retire for life.”

“And where will you retire?”

Jerred hesitated.

“To one of the islands. There’d be enough for me to buy my own. Once I used to think of going off-Orinel, but not any more. I wouldn’t want to range that far.”

“But if Tarnis is or will prove to be so fine, why leave?”

There was silence, and the colored patterns shifted, shifted, like the swarming dances of butterflies. “I don’t know,” Jerred muttered after a while. “Somehow it always seemed to me that I’d have to leave. Maybe they wouldn’t keep on liking me there, if they found out — I don’t know.”

The gentle voice said,
“These questions are not asked to annoy you, nor to make you engage in introspection which might conceivably be painful. In order for the Craftsmen to prepare you for your chosen goal they must know what, in general terms, you think about it.”

“And who are the Craftsmen?”

“Those who are to prepare you for your chosen goal. The demand is there, and it is we who meet it. It is our profession.”

“And Lady Mani’s — ?”

“No …
The voice was gentle as ever, not condemning her, not reproaching him. It might have belonged to one of those men the storytellers told about, men who were not men but man-like machines, “in the days of old, and in former years;” “ …
not Lady Mani’s. She is merely aware of it, and receives her fee.”

Well enough. This was Pemath. Nothing was ever done for nothing in Pemath. Although it was so pleasant lying here and doing nothing but watching the kaleidoscopic colors in the turning globe and dreaming wishful dreams. He rolled off the contoured couch and got to his feet. “I can’t stay here forever, you know,” he said.

“No. Of course not. We must begin.”

Nothing in the voice altered. It gave nothing away. But Jerred Northi felt a sudden certainty that if he had not done exactly what he had just done and done it just exactly then, that he very well might have stayed there forever. Or, at least, that he would never have gone anywhere else.

• • •

“That’s me for sure,” he said.

Some of the mirrors were actually mirrors and some were 3D cameras and screen. Wherever he looked he saw himself, naked and alone. Life-sized, front and back and sidewise. Twice life-size, half life-size, all to scale, looking down views and angled views at level. A man in his late twenties, presumably, and in good health. Too dark of hair and skin to be Pemathi; too tall, as well. Tending to stoop, perhaps from an unwitting attempt to diminish his height to the average, perhaps influenced by the tendency of so many Pemathi to stoop even when not bowed by present and physical burdens; but not tending to stoop very much. Hazel eyes, mouth sullen more often than not, hairy in the usual places but not shaggy. In no way an outstanding body, but one familiar to him, one which had served him well enough.

And, “That’s me for sure,” a voice said, voice recognized after a moment as his own voice. Voice was well enough, too. Northi didn’t know what others might make of it, but in it he recognized traces of all the nations and at least some of the other worlds who (for one) spoke InterGal and (for another) contributed to the population of the Two Ports; plus the subtle but unmistakable — at any rate, to him — influences of both Pemathi and the chopchop dialect which served as lingua franca. “That’s me for sure” — loudly. “ — me for sure” — softly.

Yes. Him for sure. And, unless he gave the word, him never again more. Forever after his eyes would see someone else, his ears hear someone else, “Jerred Northi,” in this physical identity, would have ceased to exist, and a stranger would take his place — a stranger to whom the man inside would have to become accustomed. Did he like the image of “Jerred Northi” enough to cling to it? He could, if he wanted to. He could then return to Lady Mani and be provided with papers and passage to Tannil or Mallasa or Ludens, Ran or Gor or Thonish, or any city or colony of Lermencas, Baho, or where he pleased. Anywhere at all. Only not Tarnis. Tarnis had never seen the body or heard the voice of “Jerred Northi” but was yet intent that it would never see or hear it. Tarnis he never knew. Did he want to know it enough to do this? To sentence “Jerred Northi” to death?

Vaguely, he wondered where the name had come from, who gave it to him and why? Someone with a sense of humor, evidently, for it was a Thonish name, and if one thing was certain from his physical appearance it was that he was not of Thonish stock. He had no sentimental attachment to the name, certainly, and as for the personality and appearance which went with it — He shrugged. He watched the shrug repeated in a variety of positions and sizes.

“I can do without Jerred Northi,” he said. “Let’s get on with it.” The reflections, the images faded away. He made no particular effort to commit them to memory. There were a few pleasant memories. He supposed that he would remember them.

“Presumably,” the Craftsman (He never learned any of their names, it being obvious that he was not intended to.) said, “the Tarnisi descend from a single small group of phenotypical progenitors. We know of no other people presenting so physically homogenous an appearance, or one — I’m speaking, naturally, of Orinel — whose appearance is so distinct from all other peoples. And inasmuch as everyone else seems always to have accepted them as a comely physical type, it’s small wonder that they themselves are inclined to be exceedingly narcissistic. They speak about
the Seven Signs
. It’s a dreadful, definitive reproach, no longer being confined to bodily appearance, for them to say of one of their number who has acted outrageously,
He lacks the Seven Signs
. In fact, even though the modern Tarnisi has studied anatomy and physiology and in theory knows better full well, his entire traditional training inclines him to regard the Seven Signs not merely as Tarnisi but as
human
characteristics. The inference is, of course, that the rest of us are really not quite human.”

The Craftsman smiled. “As we see them seldom, and do not depend on them in any immediate way, we may find this amusing. It is understandable that isolation for so long a period, based upon the remoteness of their large island not only from other continents but even from other islands, should have increased (if indeed it did not produce) this tendency on their part. Isolation, plus the fact of their being so different in appearance from the aborigines of Tarnis … the Volanth. The Volanth were greatly inferior in culture and very different in appearance; furthermore, they were enemies. You see the logical equation. Different=Inferior = Dangerous.”

His voice took on the smooth, confident, very slightly bored tone of the long-accustomed lecturer. “Fortunately, the introduction of Tarnis into the comity of nations occurred without violence or intrigue. Having no historical relation of enmity to the rest of us, they do not hate us. They do not even, as a general rule, despise us. But they cannot take us altogether seriously. After all, we don’t know their language. We can’t practice their arts. We engage in coarse activities like commerce — ”

The man sitting in the hospital gown in front of him stirred, slightly.

“But, most important, most significant:
We lack the Seven Signs
.

“Do you see? Naturally, such creatures cannot be allowed unrestricted entrance into or access to one’s country. And even the right to restricted residence has to be rigidly controlled. The only exceptions have been visitors on official missions, brief and ceremonial … visitors on commercial missions, suffered a short while in silence … and Pemathi. The Pemathi are there on sojourners’ tickets — contracts, actually — for a term of years to perform certain specific tasks which the Tarnisi want done, but not enough to do them themselves. Most of the Pemathi, almost
all
the Pemathi there, are men. There are an allotted number of women, of course, because the Tarnisi realize that men need women and it would never do for the Pemathi to turn their attentions to Tarnisi women! But no sojourner ever stays to grow old there, none ever retire there, and if by chance or mischance one of their women should conceive, she goes elsewhere — any elsewhere — to have her child, and if she returns, she returns alone.

“Now — You have a question. Before stopping to answer it, I think I’d best enumerate the Seven — was that your question? I had an idea it was — the Seven Signs.

“Green eyes.

“Long fingers.

“Long ears, with tips.

“Smooth and hairless bodies.

“Full mouths.

“Slender feet.

“Melodious voices.”

The atmosphere was like that of a small but very up-to-date and well-maintained medical centrum. Except that, at the moment, there seemed to be only one patient. “That’s quite a bill to fill,” he observed, quietly. He had seldom felt so passive, entirely submitting, in his life before. Perhaps never. He was no longer, at this moment, physically naked … but the tests and examinations he had been undergoing all day, and all day the day before, left him still feeling — he reached about for the thought — internally naked. As though everything about every cell of his body was now known and revealed, exposed.

The Craftsman at the desk said, “You have no idea, I think, just how large the bill is. But it may not involve endowing you with each and every one of the Seven Signs. As a matter of fact, not all of the Tarnisi by any means have all seven. It’s the ideal of them which matters. As for you, we will see … . Which one of them, do you suppose, is the most difficult to achieve?”

The patient considered. “Oh … the green eyes, I suppose.”

A brief smile rested on the Craftsman’s thin, precise lips. “No. That will be the easiest. Fingers and feet pose the biggest problem, because there we are dealing with bone structure. Fortunately, you already have long fingers and slender feet. You were certainly aware that all of this has to be paid for,” the Craftsman, changing the subject in so smooth and easy a voice that the transition seemed natural; “and that brings us to the matter of the price, which is 100,000 units.”

“Yes, I … Oh. I haven’t got that much. I never had.”

“True. You have 35,000 in the National Fiscal, and three accounts under other names in other places which total 27,000 units. Your, ah, professional equipment we will not consider. Part of it belongs to your backers, and it will cause the least disturbance if we allow your crewmen to assume your equity for the present. There remains, then, personal property to the amount of 17,000 units; and all this comes to 69,000 units, or 31,000 less than is required. The Craftsmen will extend credit for the remainder. There is little doubt, we consider, that you will be paying it off before you leave Tarnis. We know what you have, what you have done, what you can do. It requires only a simple extension of logic to calculate, minimally, what you will do.” He let out a satisfied breath. “And, if, after you leave Tarnis, you wish to assume another and different identity and form … the Craftsmen will make that possible for you, too.” He looked very, very satisfied as he said this.