"Can't say. Some trouble down below. The rangers were called on special duty hours ago, and we sent the tourists out. There's nobody here but me."
"Can you repair?"
"Could ... maybe. What's the trouble?" Monroe-Alpha showed him. "Can you fix it?"
"Not the talkie box. Might scare up some parts for the pilot. What happened? Looks like you smashed it yourself."
"I didn't." He opened a locker, located his car gun, and stuck it in his holster. The caretaker was brassarded; he shut up at once. "I think I'll take a walk while you fix it."
"Yes sir. It won't take long."
Monroe-Alpha took out his credit folder, tore out a twenty credit note, and handed it to the man. "Here. Leave it in the hangar." He wanted to be alone, to talk to no one at all, least of all this inquisitive stranger. He turned and walked away. He had seen very little of the Big Trees in landing; he had kept his eyes glued to the fog eyes and had been quite busy with the problem of landing. Nor had he ever been in the Park before. True, he had seen pictures-who has not?-but pictures are not the trees. He started out, more intent on his inner turmoil than on the giants around him. But the place got him.
There was no sun, no sky. The trees lost themselves in a ceiling of mist, a remote distance overhead. There was no sound. His own footsteps lost themselves in a carpet of evergreen needles. There was no limiting horizon; endless succession only of stately columns, slim green columns of sugar pine, a mere meter in thickness, massive red-brown columns of the great ones themselves. They receded from him on all sides, the eye could see nothing but trees-trees, the mist overhead, and the carpet of their debris, touched in spots by stubborn patches of old snow.
An occasional drop of purely local rain fell, dripping from the branches far above.
There was no time there. This had been, was and would be. Time was not. There was no need for time here; the trees negated it, ignored it. Seasons they might recognize, lightly, as one notes and dismisses a passing minute. He had a feeling that he moved too frantically for them to notice, that he was too small for them to see.
He stopped, and approached one of the elders, cautiously, as befits a junior in dealing with age. He touched its coat, timidly at first, then with palm-flat pressure, as he gained confidence. It was not cool, as bark is, but warm and live in spite of the moisture that clung to it. He drew from the tree, through its warm shaggy pelt, a mood of tranquil strength. He felt sure, on a level of being just below that of word-shaped thoughts, that the tree was serene and sure of itself, and, in some earth-slow somber fashion, happy.
He was no longer capable of worrying over the remote problems of his own ant hill. His scales had changed, and the frenetic struggles of that world had faded both in time and distance until he no longer discerned their details.
He came upon the Old One unexpectedly. He had been moving through the forest, feeling it rather than thinking about it. If there were signs warning him of what lay ahead he had not seen them. But he needed no signs to tell him what he saw. The other giants had been huge and old; this one dwarfed them as they dwarfed the sugar pines.
Four thousand years it had stood there, maintaining, surviving, building its giant thews of living wood. Egypt and Babylon were young with it-it was still young. David had sung and died. Great Caesar stained the Senate floor with his ambitious blood. Mohamet fled. Colon Christopher importuned a queen, and the white men found the tree, still standing, still green. They named him for a man known only through that fact-Generalsherman. The Generalsherman Tree.
It had no need of names. It was itself, the eldest citizen, quiet, untroubled, alive and unworried.
He did not stay near it long. It helped him, but its presence was overpowering to him, as it has been to every man who has ever seen it. He went back through the woods, finding the company of those lesser immortals almost jovial by contrast. When he got back near the underground hangar in front of which he had left his runabout, he skirted around it, not wishing to see anyone as yet. He continued on.
Presently he found his way blocked by a solid grey mass of granite which labored on up out of sight in the mist. A series of flights of steps, cleverly shaped to blend into the natural rock, wound up through its folds. There was a small sign at the foot of these stairs: MORO ROCK. He recognized it, both from pictures and a brief glimpse he had had of it through the fog in landing. It was a great grey solid mass of stone, peak-high and mountain-wide, a fit place for a Sabbat.
He started to climb. Presently the trees were gone. There was nothing but himself, the grey mist, and the grey rock. His feeling for up-and-down grew shaky, he had to watch his feet and the steps to hang on to it.
Once he shouted. The sound was lost and nothing came back.
The way led along a knife edge, on the left a sheer flat slide of rock, on the right bottomless empty grey nothingness. The wind cut cold across it. Then the path climbed the face of the rock again.
He began to hurry; he had reached a decision. He could not hope to emulate the serene, eternal certainty of the old tree-he was not built for it. Nor was he built, he felt sure, for the life he knew. No need to go back to it, no need to face it out with Hamilton nor McFee, whichever won their deadly game. Here was a good place, a place to die with clean dignity.
There was a clear drop of a thousand meters down the face of the rock.
He reached the top at last and paused, a little breathless from his final exertion. He was ready and the place was ready-when he saw that he was not alone. There was another figure, prone, resting on elbows, looking out at the emptiness.
He turned, and was about to leave. His resolution was shaken by another's presence. He felt nakedly embarrassed.
Then he turned and looked at him. Her gaze was friendly and unsurprised. He recognized her-without surprise, and was surprised that he had not been. He saw that she recognized him.
"Oh, hello," he said stupidly.
"Come sit down," she answered.
He accepted silently, and squatted beside her. She said nothing more at the time, but remained resting on one elbow, watching him-not narrowly, but with easy quietness. He liked it. She gave out warmth, as the redwoods did.
Presently she spoke. "I intended to speak to you after the dance. You were unhappy."
"Yes. Yes, that is true."
"You are not unhappy now."
"No," he found himself saying and realized with a small shock that it was true. "No, I am happy now."
They were silent again. She seemed to have no need for small speech, nor for restless movement. He felt calmed by her manner himself, but his own calm was not as deep. "What were you doing here?" he asked.
"Nothing. Waiting for you, perhaps." The answer was not logical, but it pleased him.
Presently the wind became more chill and the fog a deeper grey. They started down. The way seemed shorter this time. He made a show of helping her, and she accepted it, although she was more surefooted than he and they both knew it. Then they were on the floor of the forest and there was no further excuse to touch her hand or arm.
They encountered a group of mule deer-a five-point-buck who glanced at them and returned to the serious business of eating, his dignity undisturbed; two does who accepted them with the calm assurance of innocence long protected; and three fawns. The does were passively friendly, but enjoyed being scratched, especially behind their ears.
The fawns were skittishly curious. They crowded around, stepping on their feet and nuzzling their clothes, then would skitter away in sudden alarm at an unexpected movement, their great soft ears flopping foolishly.
The girl offered them leaves plucked from a shrub, and laughed when her fingers were nibbled. Monroe-Alpha tried it and smiled broadly-the nibbling tickled. He would have liked to have wiped his fingers, but noticed that she did not, and refrained.