“Nevertheless,” Toms said, “I want to learn the language.”
Varris stared at him thoughtfully. “But it is not a simple thing, Toms. The Language of Love, and its resultant technique, is every bit as complex as brain surgery or the practice of corporation law. It takes work, much work, and a talent as well.”
“I will do the work. And I’m sure I have the talent.”
“Most people think that,” Varris said, “and most of them are mistaken. But never mind, never mind. It’s been a long time since I’ve had any company. We’ll see how you get on, Toms.”
Together they went into the General Services Building, which Varris called his home. They went to the Main Control Room, where the old man had put down a sleeping bag and set up a camp stove. There, in the shadow of the giant calculators, Toms’s lessons began.
Varris was a thorough teacher. In the beginning, with the aid of a portable Semantic Differentiator, he taught Toms to isolate the delicate apprehension one feels in the presence of a to-be-loved person, to detect the subtle tensions that come into being as the potentiality of love draws near.
These sensations, Toms learned, must never be spoken of directly, for frankness frightens love. They must be expressed in simile, metaphor, and hyperbole, half-truths and white lies. With these, one creates an atmosphere and lays a foundation for love. And the mind, deceived by its own predisposition, thinks of booming surf and raging sea, mournful black rocks and fields of green corn.
“Nice images,” Toms said admiringly.
“Those were samples,” Varris told him. “Now you must learn them all.”
So Toms went to work memorizing great long lists of natural wonders, to what sensations they were comparable, and at what stage they appeared in the anticipation of love. The language was thorough in this regard. Every state or object in nature for which there was a response in love-anticipation had been catalogued, classified, and listed with suitable modifying adjectives.
When he had memorized the list, Varris drilled him in perceptions of love. Toms learned the small, strange things that make up a state of love. Some were so ridiculous that he had to laugh.
The old man admonished him sternly. “Love is a serious business, Toms. You seem to find some humor in the fact that love is frequently predisposed by wind speed and direction.”
“It seems foolish,” Toms admitted.
“There are stranger things than that,” Varris said, and mentioned another factor.
Toms shuddered. “That I can’t believe. It’s preposterous. Everyone knows—”
“If everyone knows how love operates, why hasn’t someone reduced it to a formula? Murky thinking, Toms, murky thinking is the answer, and an unwillingness to accept cold facts. If you cannot face them—”
“I can face anything,” Toms said, “if I have to. Let’s continue.”
As the weeks passed, Toms learned the words which express the first quickening of interest, shade by shade, until an attachment is formed. He learned what that attachment really is and the three words that express it. This brought him to the rhetoric of sensation, where the body becomes supreme.
Here the language was specific instead of allusive, and dealt with feelings produced by certain words, and above all, by certain physical actions.
A startling little black machine taught Toms the thirty-eight separate and distinct sensations which the touch of a hand can engender, and he learned how to locate that sensitive area, no larger than a dime, which exists just below the right shoulder blade.
He learned an entirely new system of caressing, which caused impulses to explode—and even implode—along the nerve paths and to shower colored sparks before the eyes.
He was also taught the social advantages of conspicuous desensitization.
He learned many things about physical love which he had dimly suspected, and still more things which no one had suspected.
It was intimidating knowledge. Toms had imagined himself to be at least an adequate lover. Now he found that he knew nothing, nothing at all, and that his best efforts had been comparable to the play of amorous hippopotami.
“But what else could you expect?” Varris asked. “Good love-making, Toms, calls for more study, more sheer intensive labor than any other acquired skill. Do you still wish to learn?”
“Definitely!” Toms said. “Why, when I’m an expert on love-making, I’ll—I can—”
“That is no concern of mine,” the old man stated. “Let’s return to our lessons.”
Next, Toms learned the Cycles of Love. Love, he discovered, is dynamic, constantly rising and falling, and doing so in definite patterns. There were fifty-two major patterns, three hundred and six minor patterns, four general exceptions, and nine specific exceptions.
Toms learned them better than his own name.
He acquired the uses of the Tertiary Touch. And he never forgot the day he was taught what a bosom really was like.
“But I can’t say that!” Toms objected, appalled.
“It’s true, isn’t it?” Varris insisted.
“No! I mean—yes, I suppose it is. But it’s unflattering.”
“So it seems. But examine, Toms. Is it actually unflattering?”
Toms examined and found the compliment that lies beneath the insult, and so he learned another facet of the Language of Love.
Soon he was ready for the study of the Apparent Negations. He discovered that for every degree of love, there is a corresponding degree of hate, which is in itself a form of love. He came to understand how valuable hate is, how it gives substance and body to love, and how even indifference and loathing have their place in the nature of love.
Varris gave him a ten-hour written examination, which Toms passed with superlative marks. He was eager to finish, but Varris noticed that a slight tic had developed in his student’s left eye and that his hands had a tendency to shake.
“You need a vacation,” the old man informed him.
Toms had been thinking this himself. “You may be right,” he said, with barely concealed eagerness. “Suppose I go to Cythera V for a few weeks.”
Varris, who knew Cythera’s reputation, smiled cynically. “Eager to try out your new knowledge?”
“Well, why not? Knowledge is to be used.”
“Only after it’s mastered.”
“But I have mastered it! Couldn’t we call this field work? A thesis, perhaps?”
“No thesis is necessary,” Varris said.
“But damn it all,” Toms exploded, “I should do a little experimentation! I should find out for myself how all this works. Especially Approach 33-CV. It sounds fine in theory, but I’ve been wondering how it works out in actual practice. There’s nothing like direct experience, you know, to reinforce—”
“Did you journey all this way to become a super-seducer?” Varris asked, with evident disgust.
“Of course not,” Toms said. “But a little experimentation wouldn’t—”
“Your knowledge of the mechanics of sensation would be barren, unless you understand love, as well. You have progressed too far to be satisfied with mere thrills.”
Toms, searching his heart, knew this to be true. But he set his jaw stubbornly. “I’d like to find out that for myself, too.”
“You may go,” Varris said, “but don’t come back. No one will accuse me of loosing a callous scientific seducer upon the galaxy.”
“Oh, all right. To hell with it. Let’s get back to work.”
“No. Look at yourself! A little more unrelieved studying, young man, and you will lose the capacity to make love. And wouldn’t that be a sorry state of affairs?”
Toms agreed that it would certainly be.
“I know the perfect spot,” Varris told him, “for relaxation from the study of love.”