“Not like that.”
“Dake, what are we doing here?”
“I had to have someone accept what I could do. Take it without fear and without horror. It seemed necessary to find someone, to find you.”
“But I’m shut out, aren’t I? I’m... like that puppy.”
“How honest do you want me to be?”
She was solemn. “All the way, Dake.”
“I have a feeling of guilt, about the things I can do and you can’t. Guilt makes me resent the fact that you can’t. I’m dissatisfied with your lack of ability.”
“I’ll be honest too. I envy you. And it’s a very small step from envy to resentment, from resentment to hate. I keep saying to myself, ‘Why did they take him? Why did they train him? Why wasn’t it me?’ Do you see?”
“Yes, I see, Mary. I’ve told you... every part of the story. Every part of my life, I guess. You know how it happened.”
“I know how it happened. And I’ve watched you, Dake. I’ve watched you sitting, staring at nothing, that puzzled look on your face. You haven’t told me the whole thing, have you?”
He sat back on his heels, picked up a handful of sun-hot sand, let it slide through his fingers. He said, “These weeks here... it’s the first breathing space I’ve had. The first time to think. My mind goes around and around in a crazy circle and then always ends up flat against a paradox that I can’t solve, can’t see around. A featureless thing like a wall.”
“I think I know what it is, Dake. You tell me.”
He picked up more sand, tossed it aside irritably. “Just this. The mind and the spirit are perhaps... indivisible. On Training T, I was trained by humans, in an alien series of mental techniques. Their method of conquering space, this Pack B, the buildings and methods I saw — all those came from some alien technology far superior to anything on earth. But their greatest advances are in the realm of the brain, and its great unused power. If the mind and the spirit are — instead, I guess I should say the mind and the soul — if they are indivisible, I should think that any increment in the power to use the mind would presuppose a greater understanding of the human soul. And if that is true, why is the influence of the trained ones inimical to mankind? Greater knowledge should mean greater understanding. So why haven’t they made of Earth a decent, safe, sane place to live. I know that with the powers I have, if I could be the only man on Earth with these powers, I could lead this planet into the greatest period of prosperity and peace it has ever seen. If I could do it, by crumbling away the rotten spots, reinforcing the good spots, why don’t they do it? I certainly have no corner on good will. I saw the people trained at the same time I was. I saw them change. I saw an ignorant Spanish Gypsy girl change utterly from a person who functioned on the instinctual animal level to a person who began to have sound, sincere, abstract thoughts and concepts. I’ve labeled the entire operation as something evil. And I doubt whether my label is... accurate. I have the feeling of some chance slipping away from me.”
“I’ve had that feeling for some time, Dake.”
“Then what is the answer?”
“There has to be some answer that you haven’t seen yet.”
“Then why didn’t they tell me the answer?”
“Maybe you had to decide it for yourself. Maybe they gave you enough clues.”
He smiled crookedly. “Then I should keep thinking?”
“Of course. And if you find the answer, you should go back.” She stood up, brushing the sand from herself. “Walk?”
“Sure.”
“Make me a mirage, Dake.”
“What kind?”
“On that hill. Something cool. Something inviting.”
He made heavy old trees and black shade and a limpid fountain. She took his hand and they walked across the desert floor.
“Not a puppy,” he said suddenly. “Something special. Something I need. Patrice had a portion of it, once. Karen had some of it. Even the Gypsy had some of it. I don’t know how to tell you what it is. Strength and warmth. The strong people never seem to be warm enough. The warm people too often have wills like suet. My wife was... right. So are you. I love you.”
“Scratch me behind the ear and throw a ball and I’ll fetch.”
“Stop that!”
“Don’t you see? Remember what they told you when you were learning arithmetic? You can’t add apples and oranges. You have to change the bottom halves of fractions before you can add them together. I can’t become like you. You can’t retrogress to me. I’ll be around as long as you want me, but my attitude will be... sacrificial.”
“That’s a hell of a thing to say.”
“I want you to realize your ‘apartness.’ You can’t love a human except condescendingly. You want desperately for me to be able to insert my thoughts into your mind, as you can into mine. But I can’t. So we’ll never have the sort of communication that you depend on, that you have learned to depend upon. Without that, I’m just a warm, articulated doll. Press the right switch and I’ll say, ‘I love you, Dake.’ Flat and metallic and mechanical. But I cannot ever say it... in your way.”
“But you do?”
“Of course. Puppies have a traditional attachment to their masters. A revolting adoration.”
In anger he walked rigidly ahead. He glanced back and she was standing quite still, watching him. He turned and climbed across brown rock.
Look out! Snake!
He caught the glint of sun on diamond coils and jumped wildly away, feeling the faint brush of blunt head and fangs against the leg of his trousers. It was a gigantic rattler, as big around as his upper arm. He moved warily away from it. It coiled, then turned slowly and slid, like oiled death, off into the raw brown rock.
It was only then, his heart still thudding, that he realized the implication of what had happened. He turned and looked at the girl, a hundred feet away. She stood with her chin up, her arms pressed tightly against her sides.
He walked slowly down toward her, faced her. Her expression told him nothing.
“That night on the bridge?”
“I was never far from you, Dake, from the moment you left Glendon Farms.”
There was a sick taste in his throat. “So I’m an assignment. Is that it?”
“Yes. I should have risked shouting. I didn’t think of it. Para-voice was quicker and... it saved you. I could only think of saving you.”
“Will you explain... everything to me?”
“Let’s go back.”
They walked in silence to the shack. They sat on the ground in the intense desert shade, in the dry coolness.
He laughed flatly. “I must have been pretty amusing, showing you all my little tricks.”
“Quite sweet, actually. A strain, though, not using my screens for so very long.”
“That’s a nice word. Sweet. And you were a sweet puppy, Mary.”
“Get all the bitterness out of your system, Dake.”
“And very amusing that the subject of your assignment fell in love with you.”
“Are you through?”
“What is it all about?”
“You were studied very carefully. There’s a paradox you don’t know about. Those who barely manage to get through without cracking are the ones who are eventually the most valuable. Take the Gypsy. She withstood it easily. And she very probably will never go beyond Stage One. It is the borderline ones who eventually become the Stage Threes. You will be a Stage Three someday, Dake. I know I’ll never go beyond Stage Two. So you see, you are rare and valuable.”
“Thank you,” he said, with irony.
“It was Karen’s duty to start you running. She did it very neatly indeed. You weren’t as much afraid of death as you were afraid of dying without ever knowing what Watkins called the ultimate answer.”