“I’m sure we’d learn a great deal from them,” Rawlins said.
“I know you would. I’d destroy them before I’d let any of you see them. Are you getting hungry, boy?”
“A little.”
“Don’t go away. I’ll bring you some lunch.”
Muller strode toward the nearby buildings and disappeared. Rawlins said quietly, “This is awful, Charles. He’s obviously out of his mind.”
“Don’t be sure of it,” Boardman replied. “No doubt nine years of isolation can have effects on a man’s stability, and Muller wasn’t all that stable the last time I saw him. But he may be playing a game with you—pretending to be crazy to test your good faith.”
“And if he isn’t?”
“In terms of what we want from him, it doesn’t matter in the slightest if he’s insane. It might even help.”
“I don’t understand that.”
“You don’t need to,” said Boardman evenly. “Just relax. You’re doing fine so far.”
Muller returned, carrying a platter of meat and a handsome crystal beaker of water. “Best I can offer,” he said, pushing a chunk of meat between the bars. “A local beast. You eat solid food, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“At your age, I guess you would. What did you say you were, twenty-five?”
“Twenty-three.”
“That’s even worse.” Muller gave him the water. It had an agreeable flavor, or lack of flavor. Muller sat quietly before the cage, eating. Rawlins noticed that the effect of his emanation no longer seemed so disturbing, even at a range of less than five meters. Obviously one builds a tolerance to it, he thought. If one wants to make the attempt.
Rawlins said, after a while, “Would you come out and meet my companions in a few days?”
“Absolutely not.”
“They’d be eager to talk to you.”
“I have no interest in talking to them. I’d sooner talk to wild beasts.”
“You talk to me,” Rawlins pointed out.
“For the novelty of it. And because your father was a good friend. And because, as human beings go, boy, you’re reasonably acceptable. But I don’t want to be thrust into any miscellaneous mass of bug-eyed archaeologists.”
“Possibly meet two or three of them,” Rawlins suggested. “Get used to the idea of being among people again.”
“No.”
“I don’t see—”
Muller cut him off. “Wait a minute. Why should I get used to the idea of being among people again?”
Rawlins said uneasily, “Well, because there are people here, because it’s not a good idea to get too isolated from—”
“Are you planning some sort of trick? Are you going to catch me and pull me out of this maze? Come on, come on, boy, what’s in back of that little mind of yours? What motive do you have for softening me up for human contact?”
Rawlins faltered. In the awkward silence Boardman spoke quickly, supplying the guile he lacked, prompting him. Rawlins listened and did his best.
He said, “You’re making me out to be a real schemer, Dick. But I swear to you I’ve got nothing sinister in mind. I admit I’ve been softening you up a little, jollying you, trying to make friends with you, and I guess I’d better tell you why.”
“I guess you’d better!”
“It’s for the archaeological survey’s sake. We can spend only a few weeks here. You’ve been here—what is it, nine years? You know so much about this place, Dick, and I think it’s unfair of you to keep it to yourself. So what I was hoping, I guess, was that I could get you to ease up, first become friendly with me, and then maybe come to Zone E, talk to the others, answer their questions, explain what you know about the maze—”
“Unfair to keep it to myself?”
“Well, yes. To hide knowledge is a sin.”
“Is it fair of mankind to call me unclean, and run away from me?”
“That’s a different matter,” Rawlins said. “It’s beyond all fairness. It’s a condition you have—an unfortunate condition that you didn’t deserve, and everyone is quite sorry that it came upon you, but on the other hand, you surely must realize that from the viewpoint of other human beings it’s rather difficult to take a detached attitude toward your—your—”
“Toward my stink,” Muller supplied. “All right. It’s rather difficult to stand my presence. Therefore I willingly refrain from inflicting it upon your friends. Get it out of your head that I’m going to speak to them or sip tea with them or have anything at all to do with them. I have separated myself from the human race and I stay separated. And it’s irrelevant that I’ve granted you the privilege of bothering me. Also, while I’m instructing you, I want to remind you that my unfortunate condition was not undeserved. I earned it by poking my nose into places where I didn’t belong, and by thinking I was superhuman for being able to go to such places. Hybris. I told you the word.”
Boardman continued to instruct him. Rawlins, with the sour taste of lies on his tongue, went on, “I can’t blame you for being bitter, Dick. But I still think it isn’t right for you to withhold information from us. I mean, look back on your own exploring days. If you landed on a planet, and someone had vital information you had come to find, wouldn’t you make every effort to get that information—even though the other person had certain private problems which—”
“I’m sorry,” said Muller frostily, “I’m beyond caring,” and he walked away, leaving Rawlins alone in the cage with two chunks of meat and the nearly empty beaker of water.
When Muller was out of sight Boardman said, “He’s a touchy one, all right. But I didn’t expect sweetness from him. You’re getting to him, Ned. You’re just the right mixture of guile and naiveté.”
“And I’m in a cage.”
“That’s no problem. We can send a drone to release you if the cage doesn’t open by itself soon.”
“Muller isn’t going to work out,” Rawlins murmured. “He’s full of hate. It trickles out of him everywhere. We’ll never get him to cooperate. I’ve never seen such hate in one man.”
“You don’t know what hate is,” said Boardman. “And neither does he. I tell you everything is moving well. There are bound to be some setbacks, but the fact that he’s talking to you at all is the important thing. He doesn’t want to be full of hate. Give him half a chance to get off his frozen position and he will.”
“When will you send the probe to release me?”
“Later,” said Boardman. “If we have to.”
Muller did not return. The afternoon grew darker and the air became chilly. Rawlins huddled uncomfortably in the cage. He tried to imagine this city when it had been alive, when this cage had been used to display prisoners captured in the maze. In the eye of his mind he saw a throng of the city-builders, short and thick, with dense coppery fur and greenish skin, swinging their long arms and pointing toward the cage. And in the cage huddled a thing like a giant scorpion, with waxy claws that scratched at the stone paving blocks, and fiery eyes, and a savage tail that awaited anyone who came too close. Harsh music sounded through the city. Alien laughter. The warm musky reek of the city-builders. Children spitting at the thing in the cage. Their spittle like flame. Bright moonlight, dancing shadows. A trapped creature, hideous and malevolent, lonely for its own kind, its hive on a world of Alphecca or Markab, where tailed waxy things moved in shining tunnels. For days the city-builders came, mocked, reproached. The creature in the cage grew sick of their massive bodies and their intertwining spidery fingers, of their flat faces and ugly tusks. And a day came when the floor of the maze gave way, for they were tired of the outworlder captive, and down he went, tail lashing furiously, down into a pit of knives.