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.Afterward the bulk of mankind will reject scientism, will reject science itself and only keep what ossifiedtechnology is needful to maintain the world, They will become ever more inward-turning, contempla-tive,mystical; the common man will look to the sage for en-lightenment, who himself will look into himself.AmI right? I don t know, Havig said. I have that impression, but nothing more than the impression.Mostly, yourealize, I don t understand so much as the languages.One or two I can barely puzzle out, but I ve neverhad the time to spare for gaining any-thing like fluency.It s taken me years of lifespan to learn what little Ihave learned about you Maurai.Uptime, they re further removed from me. And the paradox is deepened, Keajimu said,  by the con-trasting sights you have seen.In the middleof a pastoral land-scape, spires which hum and shimmer with enigmatic energies.Noiseless throughotherwise empty skies glide enormous ships which seem to be made less of metal than of force.And &the symbols on a statue, in a book, chiseled across a lintel, re-vealed by the motion of a hand.they arenothing you can comprehend.You cannot imagine where they came from.Am I right? Yes, Havig said miserably. Carelo, what should I do? I think you are at a stage where the question is, What should I learn? Carelo, I, I m a single man trying to see a thousand years.I can t! I just, well, feel this increasing doubt.that the Eyrie could possibly bring forth those machine aspects.Then what will?Keajimu touched him, a moth-wing gesture. Be calm.A man can do but little.Enough if that little beright. What s right?Is the future a tyranny of a few technic mas-ters over a humankind that s turnedlofty-minded and passive because this world holds nothing except wretchedness? If that s true, what canbe done? As a practical politician, albeit retired, Keajimu said with that sudden dryness which could alwaysstartle Havig out of a mood,  I suspect you are overlooking the more grisly possibili-ties.Plain despotismcan be outlived.But we Maurai, in our concentration on biology, may have left a heritage worse than thepain it forestalls. What? Havig tensed on his straw mat. Edged metal may chop firewood or living flesh, Keajimu declared. Explosives may clear away rubbleor inconvenient human beings.Drugs--well, I will tell you this is a problem that currently troubles ourgovernment in its most secret councils.We have chemicals which do more than soothe or stimulate.Under their influence, the subject comes to believe whatever he is told.In detail.As you do in a dream,supplying every nec-essary bit of color or sound, happiness or fear, past or future. To what extent dare we administer these potions to our key troublemakers? I am almost glad to learn that the hegemony of the Federa-tion will go under before this issue becomescritical.The guilt cannot, therefore, be ours. Keajimu bowed toward Havig. But you, poor timewanderer, you must think beyond the next century.Come, this evening know peace.Observe the starstread forth, inhale the incense, hear the songbird, feel the breeze, be one with Earth.I sat alone over a book in my cottage in Senlac, November 1969.The night outside was brilliantly clearand ringingly cold.Frostflowers grew on my windowpanes.A Mozart symphony lilted from a record player, and the words of Yeats were on my lap, and a finger ortwo of Scotch stood on the table by my easy chair, and sometimes a memory crossed my mind andsmiled at me.It was a good hour for an old man.Knuckles thumped the door.I said an uncharitable word, hauled my body up, constructed excuses whileI crossed the rug.My temper didn t improve when Fiddlesticks slipped between my ankles and nearlytripped me.I only kept the damn cat be-cause he had been Kate s.A kitten when she died, he was nownear his ending--As I opened the door, winter flowed in around me.The ground beyond was notsnow-covered, but it was frozen.Upon it stood a man who shivered in his inadequate topcoat.He wasof medium height, slim, blond, sharp-featured.His age was hard to guess, though furrows were deep inhis face.Half a decade without sight of him had not dimmed my memories. Jack! I cried.A wave of faintnesspassed through me.He entered, shut the door, said in a low and uneven voice,  Doc, you ve got to help me.My wife isdying.12 CHILLS AND FEVER, chest pain, cough, sticky reddish sputum yes, sounds like lobar pneumonia, Inodded. What s scarier is that development of headache, backache, and stiff neck.Could be meningitissetting in.Seated on the edge of a chair, mouth writhing, Havig im-plored,  What to do? An antibiotic-- Yes, yes.I m not enthusiastic about prescribing for a patient I ll never see, and letting a layman give thetreatment.I would definitely prefer to have her in an oxygen tent. I could ferry-- he began, and slumped. No.A big enough gas container weighs too much. Well, she s young, I consoled him. Probably streptomycin will do the trick. I was on my feet, andpatted his stooped back. Relax, son.You ve got time, seeing as how you can re-turn to the instant youleft her. I m not sure if I do, he whispered; and this was when he told me everything that had happened.In the course of it, fear struck me and I blurted my confes-sion.More than a decade back, inconversation with a writer out California way, I had not been able to resist passing on those hints Havighad gotten about the Maurai epoch on his own early trips thence.The culture intrigued me, what tiny bit Iknew; I thought this fellow, trained in speculation, might in-terpret some of the puzzles and paradoxes.Needless to say, the information was presented as sheer playing with ideas.But presented it was, andwhen he asked my permission to use it in some stories, I d seen no reason not to agree. They were published, I said miserably. In fact, in one of them he even predicted what you d discoverlater, that the Maurai would mount an undercover operation against an un-derground attempt to build afusion generator.What if an Eyrie agent gets put on the track? Do you have copies? Havig demanded.I did.He skimmed them.A measure of relief eased the lines in his countenance [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]