“All the time that it was happening,” said Lansing, “I had the feeling that I was being taken. And yet I had to go ahead with it. My curiosity drove me to it.”
“Perhaps it was a good thing that you were driven to it,” said the Brigadier. “Otherwise the rest of us would have been stranded here without a penny to our name.”
“It is strange,” said Sandra, “how differently we were translated to this place — I through listening to music, you through the agency of these things you call slot machines.”
“I was done in,” said Mary, “by, of all things, a blueprint. A fellow engineer brought it to me, claiming there was something in it that he did not understand. He insisted I have a look at it, and he pointed with his finger to where he wanted me to look. It was nothing I had ever seen before and as I struggled to make some sense of it, I was caught up in the configuration that was represented on it and the next I knew I was standing in a forest. I am struck by the coincidence that both Edward and myself were trapped by another human — in his case a student, in my case another engineer. This would argue that whoever, or whatever, did this to us has agents on our worlds.”
“For a time I thought,” Lansing said to Mary, “that you and I might be from the same world, the same culture. Our societies seemed very much the same. But I was looking at you when I said a certain word and I could tell that you were puzzled by it. It seemed you didn’t know what communistic meant.”
“I know the word,” she said. “I was surprised by the context in which you used it. You seemed to make it a proper noun, as if a communistic society might exist.” “On my world it does.”
“There was, I am sure,” said the Parson, “no human provocation for what happened to me. I saw the Glory. I had been seeking it for years. I had felt at times that I was close upon it, but each time it eluded me. And then, standing in a turnip field, I saw it, brighter and more glorious than I had thought it would be. I held up my hands to worship it, and as I did it became larger and brighter and I fell into it.”
“It seems to me the evidence is clear,” said the Brigadier, “that each of us is from a different world — different, but human worlds. It would seem, as well, that no further evidence is needed. The testimony of the four of you is quite sufficient. You will pardon me, I hope, if I do not join with you in telling by what strange circumstance I happen to be here.”
“I, for one, would take it rather badly,” said the Parson. “The rest of us have spoken fully—”
“It’s all right,” said Lansing, interrupting. “If the General does not want to bare his soul, it’s quite all right with me.”
“But in a band of brothers…”
“We’re not brothers, Parson. There are two women here. Even in the sense you mean it, I wonder if we’re brothers.” “If we are,” said the robot, Jurgens, “we must prove it on the road ahead.”
“If we take that road,” the Parson said. “I, for one, am taking it,” said the Brigadier. “I would die of boredom, cooped up in this inn. This miserable innkeeper of ours spoke of a city up ahead. Certainly a city of any sort would offer better accommodation and entertainment, and perhaps even more instruction, than this pig sty of a place.”
“He also mentioned a cube,” said Sandra. “I wonder what it could be. Never before have I heard anything described simply as a cube.”
8
They were late in getting started. Breakfast had been unaccountably delayed and there had been much haggling over the purchase of items they would need upon the road — food, clothing, hiking shoes, sleeping bags, belt knives, hatchets, matches, cooking gear, a long list of equipment. The Brigadier had insisted on a gun and had become quite worked up when informed by the innkeeper that no weapons were for sale.
“That’s ridiculous!” stormed the Brigadier. “Who ever heard of an expedition starting out without an adequate defense?”
Mine Host attempted to reassure him. “There’s no danger along the way. There is no need to fear.”
“How would you know that?” demanded the Brigadier. “When we questioned you on other matters you were singularly bereft of knowledge. Knowing nothing else, how can you be so certain that there is no danger?”
When it came time to pay for the supplies, Lansing got down to painful dickering. The innkeeper seemed determined to make an extra profit to compensate for his failure at extracting a higher price for their lodging. In his efforts Lansing was backed up vehemently by the Parson, who was of the general opinion that everyone was out to gouge him.
Finally the transaction was concluded to no one’s liking and they started out.
The Brigadier led the way, with the Parson close behind him. Mary and Sandra followed, while Jurgens and Lansing brought up the rearguard. Jurgens carried a heavy pack that was jammed with food. He alone of them had needed almost nothing — no food or sleeping bag, for he neither ate nor slept. He had no need, as well, of clothing, but he did choose a hatchet and a knife, both of which were bound by a belt about his waist.
“I am intrigued by your first words to me,” Lansing said to the robot as they walked along together. “You asked me if I was a crackpot. You said you collected crackpots. Yet later on you said that in your world there are few humans left. If that is the case—”
“I made a bad joke, only,” the robot told him. “I am sorry now I did. I don’t actually collect humans. What I do is collect crackpot humans I find in literature.” “You make a list of crackpot characters?” “Oh, I do more than that. I construct miniatures of them. Miniatures of the kind of humans I conceive they would have been in actual life.” “A doll collector, then?”
“More than a doll collection, Mr. Lansing. They move about and talk, they act out little scenes. It is most amusing. I use them by the hour for my entertainment Also, I think I may get some further insight into the human condition from the interplay among them.” “Mechanical dolls?”
“I suppose you could say so. Basically mechanical. Although in some of their aspects they are biological.”
“That is amazing,” said Lansing, somewhat shocked. “You create living beings.”
“Yes. They are alive in many different ways.” Lansing said nothing further, reluctant to expand upon the subject.
The road was little more than a trail. Occasionally the double ruts cut by wheeled vehicles could be seen, but in most places the wheel traces were obliterated by erosion, with grass and creeping vines growing over them. For a time the road climbed through forestland that after a couple of hours of travel began to dwindle, gradually giving way to a rolling, grassy countryside, spotted with small groves of trees. The day, at first comfortably warm, grew hotter as the hour of noon approached.
The Brigadier, still in the lead, halted at a grove, carefully let himself to the ground and leaned against a tree.
As the others came up, he explained the stop. “I thought we had best halt in consideration of the ladies. The sun has proved uncommonly warm.”
He hauled a large, white handkerchief from a tunic pocket and wiped his streaming face. Then he hoisted his canteen around in front of him, unscrewed the cap and gulped at the water.
“We can rest for a while,” said Lansing. “If we want to take the time, we could eat some lunch.”
The Brigadier responded eagerly. “A capital idea,” he said.
Jurgens already had his pack open, was slicing cold meat and cheese. He found a tin of hard biscuits and opened it.
“Should I make some tea?” he asked. “We haven’t the time,” said the Parson. “We should be pushing on.”
“I’ll rustle up some wood,” said Lansing, “so we can have a fire. I saw a dead tree back a ways. Some tea would be good for all of us.”