Well, those were private memories anyway.
He realized they had been walking for quite some time in silence. Only their footfalls on the cobbles, now that they were back in town, or an occasional trill from the houses that bulked on either side, could be heard. Courtesy insisted he should make conversation with the vaguely visible shape on his right. “What will you do?” he asked. “After we return, I mean.”
“I don’t know,” Kahn said. “Teach, perhaps.”
“Something technical, no doubt.”
“I could, if need be. Science and technology no longer change from generation to generation. But I would prefer history. I have had considerable time to read history, in space.”
“Really? I mean, the temporal contraction effect—”
“You forget that at one gravity acceleration, a ship needs a year to reach near-light speed, and another year to brake at the end. Your passengers will be in suspended animation, but we of the crew must stand watch.”
Kahn lit a cigaret. Earlier, Thrailkill had experimented with one, but tobacco made him ill, he found. He wondered for a moment if Earth’s food had the savor of Mithran. Funny. I never appreciated kernelkraut or sour nuts or filet of crackler till now, when I’m about to lose them.
The cigaret end brightened and faded, brightened and faded, like a tiny red watchlight in the gloaming. “After all,” Kahn said, “I have seen many human events. I was born before the Directorate came to power. My father was a radiation technician in the Solar War. And, too, mine are an old people, who spent most,of their existence on the receiving end of history. It is natural that I should be interested. You have been more fortunate.”
“And the Mithrans are luckier yet, eh?”
“I don’t know. Thus far, they are essentially a historyless race. Or are they? How can you tell? We look through our own eyes. To us, accomplishment equals exploitation of the world. Our purest science and art remain a sort of conquest. What might the Mithrans do yet, in Mithran terms?”
“Let us keep up the base,” Thrailkill said, “and we’ll keep on reporting what they do.”
“That would be splendid,” Kahn told him, “except that there will be no ships to take your descendants home. You have maintained yourselves an enclave of a few hundred people for a century. You cannot do so forever. If nothing else, genetic drift in that low a population would destroy you.”
They walked on unspeaking, till they reached the Center. It was a village within the village, clustered around the tower. Thence had sprung the maser beams, up through the sky to the relay satellite, and so to those on Earth who wondered what the universe was like. No more, Thrailkill thought. Dust will gather, nightcats will nest in corroding instruments, legends will be muttered about the tall strangers who built and departed, and one century an earthquake will bring down the tower which talked across space, and the very myths will die.
On the far side of the Mall, close to the clear plash of Louis’ Fountain, they stopped. There lay Thrailkill’s house, long and solid, made to endure. His grandfather had begun it, his father had completed it, he himself had wanted to add rooms but had no reason to when he would only be allowed two children. The windows were aglow, and he heard a symphony of Mithran voices.
“What the devil!” he said. “We’ve got company.” He opened the door.
The fireplace danced with flames, against the evening cold. Their light shimmered off the beautiful grain of wainscots, glowed on patterned rugs and the copper statue which owned one corner, and sheened along the fur of his friends. The room was full of them: Strongtail, Gleam-of-Wings, Nightstar, Gift-of-God, Dreamer, Elf-in-the-Forest, and more and more, all he had loved who could get here quickly enough. They sat grave on their tails, balancing cups of herb tea in their hands, while Leonie attended to the duties of a hostess.
She stopped when Thrailkill and Kahn entered. “How late you are!” she said. “I was growing worried.”
“No need,” Thrailkill replied, largely for Kahn’s benefit. “The last prowltiger hereabouts was shot five years ago.” I did that Another adventure— hai, what a stalk through the folded hills! (The Mithrans didn’t like it They attached some kind of significance to the ugly brutes. But prowltigers never took a Mithran. When the Harris boy was killed, we stopped listening to objections. Our friends forgave us eventually.) He looked around. “You honor this roof,” he said with due formalism. “Be welcome in good cheer.”
Strongtail’s music was a dirge. “Is the story true that you can never return?”
“Yes, I’m afraid so,” Thrailkill said. Aside to Kahn: “They want us to stay. I’m not sure why. We haven’t done anything in particular for them.”
“But you tried,” said Nightstar. “That was a large plenty, that you should care.”
“And you were something to wonder at,” Elf-in-the-Forest added.
“We have enjoyed you,” Strongtail said. “Why must you go?”
“We took council,” sang Gift-of-God, “and came hither to ask from house to house that you remain.”
“But we can’t!” Leonie’s words cracked over.
“Why can you not?” responded Dreamer.
It burst upon Thrailkill. He stood in the home of his fathers and shouted: “Why not? We can!”
The long night drew toward a close. Having slept, Kahn borrowed one of the flitters that had been manufactured here and went after Bill Redfeather, who’d gone on a jaunt with one of the autochthons.
He hummed across the Bay under constellations not so different from those on Earth. Thirty-three light-years were hardly significant in the galaxy. But the humans no longer used human names; those were the Boat, the Garden of Healing, the Fourfold, that wheeled and glittered around another pole star. I suppose there are more native influences, he thought. Not too many, but some. I wonder what kind of civilization they would build. They could hardly help but do better than Earth, on a rich and uncrowded planet In time they would be able to launch starships of their own.
The unrolling map guided him toward Stark-beam, and when the hamlet came into sight he detected the emissions from Redfeather’s portable transceiver and homed on them. They led him to a peak that loomed over the peninsular hills and the soaring scarletwood forest. He must come down vertically on a meadow.
Dew soaked his breeches as he stepped out. The eastern sky had paled, but most light still came from the stars, and from the campfire that fluttered before a tent. Redfeather and Strongtail squatted there, half seen in shadows. A pot on a framework of sticks bubbled above, merrily competing with the first sleepy bird-chirps. The air was raw, and Kahn shivered and felt glad to settle down with hands held near the coals.
Strongtail murmured some notes. “I think that means ‘welcome,’ ” Redfeather said. Strongtail nodded. “Breakfast will be ready soon. Or lunch or something. Hard to get used to his diurnal period. What do the base people do?”
“About twenty hours awake, ten asleep, around the clock,” Kahn said. “Have you had a good outing?”
“Lord, yes. Strongtail’s a mighty fine guide, even if he can’t talk to me. Very kind of you to take me.” Strongtail trilled in pleasure. “I do wish I could hunt, but my pal here doesn’t quite approve. Oh, well, I’m glad to get out in the woods anyway.” Redfeather stirred the pot. “I suppose you’re joining us?”