“Then nothing I can do will avoid assassination.”
“No, Sire,” said Seldon, “but, on the other hand, you may prove fortunate.”
Cleon’s fingers were drumming on the arm of his chair. He said harshly, “You are useless, man, and so is your psychohistory. Leave me.” And with those words, the Emperor looked away, suddenly seeming much older than his thirty-two years.
“I have said my mathematics would be useless to you, Sire. My profound apologies.”
Seldon tried to bow but at some signal he did not see, two guards entered and took him away. Cleon’s voice came after him from the royal chamber. “Return that man to the place from which he was brought earlier.”
4
Eto Demerzel emerged and glanced at the Emperor with a hint of proper deference. He said, “Sire, you have almost lost your temper.”
Cleon looked up and, with an obvious effort, managed to smile. “Well, so I did. The man was very disappointing.”
“And yet he promised no more than he offered.”
“He offered nothing.”
“And promised nothing, Sire.”
“It was disappointing.”
Demerzel said, “More than disappointing, perhaps. The man is a loose cannon, Sire.”
“A loose what, Demerzel? You are always so full of strange expressions. What is a cannon?”
Demerzel said gravely, “It is simply an expression I heard in my youth, Sire. The Empire is full of strange expressions and some are unknown on Trantor, as those of Trantor are sometimes unknown elsewhere.”
“Do you come to teach me the Empire is large? What do you mean by saying that the man is a loose cannon?”
“Only that he can do much harm without necessarily intending it. He does not know his own strength. Or importance.”
“You deduce that, do you, Demerzel?”
“Yes, Sire. He is a provincial. He does not know Trantor or its ways. He has never been on our planet before and he cannot behave like a man of breeding, like a courtier. Yet he stood up to you.”
“And why not? I gave him permission to speak. I left off ceremony. I treated him as an equal.”
“Not entirely, Sire. You don’t have it within you to treat others as equals. You have the habit of command. And even if you tried to put a person at his ease, there would be few who could manage it. Most would be speechless or, worse, subservient and sycophantic. This man stood up to you.”
“Well, you may admire that, Demerzel, but I didn’t like him.” Cleon looked thoughtfully discontented. “Did you notice that he made no effort to explain his mathematics to me? It was as though he knew I would not understand a word of it.”
“Nor would you have, Sire. You are not a mathematician, nor a scientist of any kind, nor an artist. There are many fields of knowledge in which others know more than you. It is their task to use their knowledge to serve you. You are the Emperor, which is worth all their specializations put together.”
“Is it? I would not mind being made to feel ignorant by an old man who had accumulated knowledge over many years. But this man, Seldon, is just my age. How does he know so much?”
“He has not had to learn the habit of command, the art of reaching a decision that will affect the lives of others.”
“Sometimes, Demerzel, I wonder if you are laughing at me.”
“Sire?” said Demerzel reproachfully.
“But never mind. Back to that loose cannon of yours. Why should you consider him dangerous? He seems a naïve provincial to me.”
“He is. But he has this mathematical development of his.”
“He says it is useless.”
“You thought it might be useful. I thought so, after you had explained it to me. Others might. The mathematician many come to think so himself, now that his mind has been focused on it. And who knows, he may yet work out some way of making use of it. If he does, then to foretell the future, however mistily, is to be in a position of great power. Even if he does not wish power for himself, a kind of self-denial that always seems to me to be unlikely, he might be used by others.”
“I tried to use him. He would not.”
“He had not given it thought. Perhaps now he will. And if he was not interested in being used by you, might he not be persuaded by—let us say—the Mayor of Wye?”
“Why should he be willing to help Wye and not us?”
“As he explained, it is hard to predict the emotions and behavior of individuals.”
Cleon scowled and sat in thought. “Do you really think he might develop this psychohistory of his to the point where it is truly useful? He is so certain he cannot.”
“He may, with time, decide he was wrong in denying the possibility.”
Cleon said, “Then I suppose I ought to have kept him.”
Demerzel said, “No, Sire. Your instinct was correct when you let him go. Imprisonment, however disguised, would cause resentment and despair, which would not help him either to develop his ideas further or make him eager to help us. Better to let him go as you have done, but to keep him forever on an invisible leash. In this way, we can see that he is not used by an enemy of yourself, Sire, and we can see that when the time comes and he has fully developed his science, we can pull on our leash and bring him in. Then we could be . . . more persuasive.”
“But what if he is picked up by an enemy of mine or, better, of the Empire, for I am the Empire after all, or if, of his own accord, he wishes to serve an enemy—I don’t consider that out of the question, you see.”
“Nor should you. I will see to it that this doesn’t happen, but if, against all striving, it does happen, it would be better if no one has him than if the wrong person does.”
Cleon looked uneasy. “I’ll leave that all in your hands, Demerzel, but I hope we’re not too hasty. He could be, after all, nothing but the purveyor of a theoretical science that does not and cannot work.”
“Quite possibly, Sire, but it would be safer to assume the man is—or might be—important. We lose only a little time and nothing more if we find that we have concerned ourselves with a nonentity. We may lose a Galaxy if we find we have ignored someone of great importance.”
“Very well, then,” said Cleon, “but I trust I won’t have to know the details—if they prove unpleasant.”
Demerzel said, “Let us hope that will not be the case.”
5
Seldon had had an evening, a night, and part of a morning to get over his meeting with the Emperor. At least, the changing quality of light within the walkways, moving corridors, squares, and parks of the Imperial Sector of Trantor made it seem that an evening, a night, and part of a morning had passed.
He sat now in a small park on a small plastic seat that molded itself neatly to his body and he was comfortable. Judging from the light, it seemed to be midmorning and the air was just cool enough to seem fresh without possessing even the smallest bite.
Was it like this all the time? He thought of the gray day outside when he went to see the Emperor. And he thought of all the gray days and cold days and hot days and rainy days and snowy days on Helicon, his home, and he wondered if one could miss them. Was it possible to sit in a park on Trantor, having ideal weather day after day, so that it felt as though you were surrounded by nothing at all—and coming to miss a howling wind or a biting cold or a breathless humidity?