"Where we always stood. In an absolutely untenable position."
"He's right. Seriously, we are exactly where we always were. Nobody else is. We are. They have caught up with us, for a moment, for this moment, and so we can act. The untenable position is the center of power. Now. We can act now."
"To prevent color-TVzation? How? The dam's broken! The goodies come flooding in. And we drown in them."
"Not if we establish the direction, the true direction, right now—"
"But will Rege listen to us? Why are. we turning back when we should be going forward? If we—"
"We have to establish—"
"No! We have to act! Freedom can be established only in the moment of freedom—" They were all shouting at once in their hoarse, worn-out voices. They had all been talking and listening and drinking bad coffee and living for days, for weeks, on love. Yes, on love; these are lovers' quarrels. It is for love that he pleads, it is for love that she rages. It was always for love. That's why the camera snout came poking and sucking into this dirty basement room where the lovers meet. It craves love, the sight of love; for if you can't have the real thing, you can watch it on TV, and soon you don't know the real thing from the images on the little screen where everything, as he said, can be done in two seconds. But the lovers know the difference.
This is a fairy tale, and you know that in the fairy tale, after it says that they lived happily ever after, there is no after. The evil enchantment was broken; the good servant received half the kingdom as his reward; the king ruled long and well. Remember the moment when the betrayal is made, and ask no questions. Do not ask if the poisoned fields grew white again with grain. Do not ask if the leaves of the forests grew green that spring. Do not ask what the maiden received as her reward. Remember the tale of Koshchey the Deathless, whose life was in a needle, and the needle was in an egg, and the egg was in a swan, and the swan was in an eagle, and the eagle was in a wolf, and the wolf was in the palace whose walls were built of the stones of power. Enchantment within enchantment! We are a long way from the egg that holds the needle that must be broken so Koshchey the Deathless can die. And so the tale ends. Thousands and thousands of people stood on the slanting pavement before the palace. Snow sparkled in the air, and the people sang. You know the song, that old song with words like land, love, free, in the language you have known the longest. Its words make stone part from stone, its words prevent tanks, its words transform the world, when it is sung at the right time by the right people, after enough people have died for singing it. A thousand doors opened in the walls of the palace. The soldiers laid down then- arms and sang. The evil enchantment was broken. The good king returned to his kingdom, and the people danced for joy on the stones of the city streets.
And we do not ask what happened after. But we can tell the story over, we can tell the story till we get it right.
"My daughter's on the Committee of the Student Action Council," said Stefan Fabbre to his neighbor Florens Aske as they stood in a line outside the bakery on Pradinestrade. His tone of voice was complicated. I know. Erreskar saw her on the television," Aske said.
"She says they've decided that bringing Rege here is the only way to provide an immediate, credible transition. They think the army will accept him."
They shuffled forward a step.
Aske, an old man with a hard brown face and narrow eyes, stuck his lips out, thinking it over.
"You were in the Rege government," Fabbre said. Aske nodded. "Minister of education for a week," he said, and gave a bark like a sea lion—owp!—a cough or a laugh.
"Do you think he can pull it off ?" Aske pulled his grubby muffler closer round his neck and said, "Well, Rege is not stupid. But he's old. What about that scientist, that physicist fellow?"
"Rochoy. She says their idea is that Rege's brought in first, for the transition, for the symbolism, the link to Fifty-six. And if he survives, Rochoy would be the one they'd run in an election."
"The dream of the election... ." They shuffled forward again. They were now in front of the bakery window, only eight or ten people from the door.
"Why do they put up the old man?" asked the old man. "These boys and girls , these young people. What the devil do they want us for again?" I don't know," Fabbre said. "I keep thinking they know what they're doing. She had me down there, ),on know, made me come to one of their meetings. She came to the lab—Come on, leave that I follow me! I did. No questions. She's in charge. All of them, twenty-two, twenty-three, they're in charge. In power. Seeking structure, order. but very definite: Violence is defeat, to them, violence is the loss of options. They're absolutely certain and Completely ignorant. Like spring-like the lambs in spring. They have never done anything and they know exactly what to do "
"Stefan," said his wife, Bruna, who had been standing at his elbow for several sentences, "you're lecturing. Hello, dear. Hello, Florens, I just saw Margarita at the market, we were queuing for cabbages. I'm on my way downtown. Stefan. I'll be back, I don't know, sometime after seven, maybe."
"Again?" he said.
And Aske said, "Downtown?
"It's Thursday," Bruna said. and bringing up the keys from her handbag, the two apartment keys and the desk key, she shook them in the air before the men's faces, making a silvery jingle and she smiled.
"I'll come," said Stefan Fabbre.
"Owp! Owp!" went Aske. "Oh, hell, I'll come too. Does man live by bread alone?"
"Will Margarita worry where you are?" Bruna asked as they left the bakery line and set off toward the bus stop.
"That's the problem with the women, you see, said the old man. "They worry that she'll worry. Yes. She will. Ad you worry about your daughter, eh?"
"Yes," Stefan said, "I do."
"No," Bruna said, "I don't. I fear her, I fear for her, I honor her. She gave me the keys." She clutched her imitation-leather handbag tight between her arm and side as they walked.
This is the truth. They stood on the stones in the lightly falling snow and listened to the silvery, trembling sound of thousands of keys being shaken, unlocking the air, once upon a time.