He sat down. Amanda went to seat herself, several chairs from him on his right. The room had filled behind them and empty chairs were rapidly being occupied. In a minute, they had all been filled; and he found himself looking along the polished tabletop, above which thirty-odd faces looked back and waited for him to speak.
Chapter Forty-seven
As they all sat watching him and waiting, an awareness he had never felt before woke suddenly in him.
Later, he was to become familiar with it, but this was his first experience; and it came on him with a shock that there could be a moment in which the universe seemed to stand still, like a ballet dancer poised on one toe; and for a fraction of a second all possibilities were equal. In that moment, he found, a form of double vision occurred. He saw the surrounding scene simultaneously from two viewpoints - both directly, and at one remove. So that he was at the same time both observer and observed; and he became aware of himself, for the first time, as part of something separate and remote. In that transient moment, for a split-second, his detachment was perfect; and his remote, viewing mind was able to weigh all things dispassionately, itself included.
Caught so, he understood for the first time now how those who knew they would be staying in Foralie Town under the vapors of the nickel carbonyl could have made the decision to use it. For at the core of such a moment was a perception tuned too sharply in self-honesty for fear or selfishness to affect decision.
Caught up in wonder at this new perception, Hal did not react for a long moment to the waiting faces as he ordinarily would have; and Rourke di Facino, far down the table on Hal's left, spoke instead to Amanda.
"Well, Amanda? You hinted at some strong reasons for our coming to this meeting. We're here."
Hal had not realized the quality of the acoustics in the dining room. Di Facino had spoken in no more than a soft conversational tone, but his words had sounded clearly across the length of the space between himself and Hal.
"I said there might be strong reasons for listening to Hal Mayne, Rourke," answered Amanda, "and I think there are. One, at least, is the one I told you about - that he's been sent here from Mara by the Exotics, to give us a message. And we could have other reasons for listening to him, as well."
"All right," said di Facino. "I only mention it because - no offense intended, of course - the ap Morgans have been reported before this as seeing things that aren't there, on occasion."
"Or perhaps," said Amanda, "they merely saw things other people were too blind to see. No offense intended, of course."
They smiled at each other like friendly old enemies across half the length of the dining room. Still caught in his moment, watching them all, Hal found Amanda standing out among the others as one very bright beacon might stand out in a bank of duller ones. The average age of the Grey Captains was at least in the fifties; and she, in her apparent youthfulness, looked almost like a young girl who has slyly slipped into a solemn gathering of family elders and waits to see how long she can hold her place before being discovered.
"In any case," the booming voice of Miriam Songhai reached them all, we've no prejudice on the Dorsai against people being sensitive, simply because what they're sensitive to isn't easily measured, weighed or tagged - I hope."
She turned to Hal.
"What's this message from the Exotics?',' she demanded.
Hal looked at the waiting faces. There was a quality of difference in those here, compared to the five he had faced on Mara. It was a difference in quietness. The Exotics had not fidgeted physically; but he had been conscious of conflict and uncertainty within each of them. Those sitting at this table with him now radiated no such impression of inner concerns. They were at home here, he was a stranger, and it was their job to decide whatever needed decision. In the hard daylight, here and now, there was no room for the ghosts and the memories he had found in the dining room earlier. He felt isolated, helpless to reach them and convince them.
"I was on my way to the Dorsai, in any case," he said. "But as it happened, I got to Mara first; and so it was the Exotics I talked to - "
"Just a minute." It was a heavy-bodied man in his fifties with a brush of stiff, gray hair; the one person there with oriental features. Hal rummaged in his memory for the name he had heard when Amanda had introduced them. Ke Gok, or K'Gok, was what he remembered hearing her say. "Why did they pick you to carry their message instead of sending one of their own people?"
"I can tell you what they told me," Hal said. "Amanda may have explained to you how I was raised by three tutors, one of them a Dorsai - "
"By the way, does anyone here know of a family named Nasuno?" Amanda's clear voice cut in on him. "They should have a homestead on Skalland."
There was a moment's silence, then the cadaverous man - whose name, in spite of the mnemonics of Hal's early training, had freakishly been lost - spoke, thoughtfully.
"Skalland's one of the islands in my area, of course. I know you asked me about that when you called, Amanda. But in the time I had I couldn't seem to turn up any such family. Which doesn't mean they aren't there - or weren't there - a generation ago."
"It's hardly likely someone could pose as a Dorsai for a dozen years, even on Earth, and get away with it," said Ke Gok. "But what I'm still waiting to hear is why the Exotics thought someone tutored by a Dorsai should be particularly qualified to talk to us for them."
"I was also tutored by a Maran - and by a Harmonyite," said Hal. "They seemed to feel the fact I'd been brought up by people from both their culture and yours might make me better able to communicate with you, than one of them could."
"Still strange," said Ke Gok. "Two worlds full of trained people and they pick someone from Earth?"
"They'd also run calculations on me," said Hal, "which seemed to show I might be historically useful at this time."
He had been dreading having to mention this; and he had chosen the mildest words in which to put the information, fearing the prejudice of practical people against anything as theoretical and long-range as Exotic calculations in ontogenetics. But none of those before him reacted antagonistically, and Ke Gok said no more.
"In what way," said a slim, good-looking woman named Lee, with large, intent brown eyes and gray-black hair, "did they think you could be historically useful?"
"Useful in dealing with the present historical situation - particularly with the situation created by the Others," he answered. "It's that same situation I'm concerned with, myself; and that I'd like to talk to you about, after I've given you the Exotic message - "
"I think we'll want to hear anything you've got to tell us - Exotic message and whatever else you want to talk to us about," said Lee, "but some of us have questions of our own, first."
"Of course," said Hal.
"Do I understand you right, then?" said Lee. "The Exotics are concerned about the Others; and they sent you to us because they thought you could do a better job of convincing us to think their way than any one of their own people could?"
Hal breathed deeply.
"Effectively," he said, "yes."
Lee sat back in her chair, her face thoughtful.
"How about you, Amanda?" di Facino said. "Are you part of this effort to bring us around to an Exotic way of thinking?"
"Rourke," said Amanda, "you know that's nonsense."