A short, dark man smiled and nodded slightly, then froze his nod as he saw that the others weren’t giving out any information.
“You know who brought me here, then — Rayaye. I don’t know who he was acting for. What I can tell you, I will.” Relief had made him stupid, he was talking too much, playing hands-around-the-flowerbed while they played tough guy. “I have friends here,” he went on in a more neutral voice, looking at each of their faces in turn, direct but civil. “Bondswomen, house people. I hope they’re all right.”
“Depends,” said a grey-haired, slight man who looked very tired.
“A woman with a baby, Kamsa. An old woman, Gana.”
A couple of them shook their heads to signify ignorance or indifference. Most made no response at all. He looked around at them again, repressing anger and irritation at this pomposity, this tightlipped stuff.
“We need to know what you were doing here,” the brown-haired man said.
“A Liberation Army contact in the city was taking me from the embassy to Liberation Command, about fifteen days ago. We were intercepted in the Divide by Rayaye’s men. They brought me here. I spent some time in a crouchcage,” Esdan said in the same neutral voice. “My foot was hurt and I can’t walk much. I talked twice with Rayaye. Before I say anything else I think you can understand that I need to know who I’m talking to.”
The tall thin man who had released him from the locked room went around the table and conferred briefly with the grey-haired man. The brown-haired one listened, consented. The tall thin one spoke to Esdan in his uncharacteristically harsh, flat voice: “We are a special mission of the Advance Army of the World Liberation. I am Marshal Metoy.” The others all said their names. The big brown-haired man was General Banarkamye, the tired older man was General Tueyo. They said their rank with their name, but didn’t use it addressing one another, nor did they call him Mister. Before Liberation, rentspeople had seldom used any titles to one another but those of parentage: father, sister, aunty. Titles were something that went in front of an owner’s name: Lord, Master, Mister, Boss. Evidently the Liberation had decided to do without them. It pleased him to find an army that didn’t click its heels and shout Sir! But he wasn’t certain what army he’d found.
“They kept you in that room?” Metoy asked him. He was a strange man, a flat, cold voice, a pale, cold face, but he wasn’t as jumpy as the others. He seemed sure of himself, used to being in charge.
“They locked me in there last night. As if they’d had some kind of warning of trouble coming. Usually I had a room upstairs.”
“You may go there now,” Metoy said. “Stay indoors.”
“I will. Thank you again,” he said to them all. “Please, when you have word of Kamsa and Gana — ?” He did not wait to be snubbed, but turned and went out.
One of the younger men went with him. He had named himself Zadyo Tema. The Army of the Liberation was using the old veot ranks, then. There were veots among them, Esdan knew, but Tema was not one. He was light-skinned and had the city-dusty accent, soft, dry, clipped. Esdan did not try to talk to him. Tema was extremely nervous, spooked by the night’s work of killing at close quarters or by something else; there was an almost constant tremor in his shoulders, arms, and hands, and his pale face was set in a painful scowl. He was not in a mood for chitchat with an elderly civilian alien prisoner.
In war everybody is a prisoner, the historian Henennemores had written.
Esdan had thanked his new captors for liberating him, but he knew where, at the moment, he stood. It was still Yaramera.
Yet there was some relief in seeing his room again, sitting down in the one-armed chair by the window to look out at the early sunlight, the long shadows of trees across the lawns and terraces.
None of the housepeople came out as usual to go about their work or take a break from it. Nobody came to his room. The morning wore on. He did what exercises of the tanhai he could do with his foot as it was. He sat aware, dozed off, woke up, tried to sit aware, sat restless, anxious, working over words: A special mission of the Advance Army of World Liberation.
The Legitimate Government called the enemy army “insurgent forces” or “rebel hordes” on the holonews. It had started out calling itself the Army of the Liberation, nothing about World Liberation; but he had been cut off from any coherent contact with the freedom fighters ever since the Uprising, and cut off from all information of any kind since the embassy was sealed — except for information from other worlds light years away, of course, there’d been no end of that, the ansible was full of it, but of what was going on two streets away, nothing, not a word. In the embassy he’d been ignorant, useless, helpless, passive. Exactly as he was here. Since the war began he’d been, as Henennemores had said, a prisoner. Along with everybody else on Werel. A prisoner in the cause of liberty.
He feared that he would come to accept his helplessness, that it would persuade his soul. He must remember what this war was about. But let the Liberation come soon, he thought, come set me free!
In the middle of the afternoon the young zadyo brought him a plate of cold food, obviously scraps and leftovers they’d found in the kitchens, and a bottle of beer. He ate and drank gratefully. But it was clear that they had not released the housepeople. Or had killed them. He would not let his mind stay on that.
After sunset the zadyo came back and brought him downstairs to the packdog room. The generator was off, of course; nothing had kept it going but old Saka’s eternal tinkering. Men carried electric torches, and in the packdog room a couple of big oil lamps burned on the table, putting a romantic, golden light on the faces round it, throwing deep shadows behind them.
“Sit down,” said the brown-haired general, Banarkamye — Read-bible, his name could be translated. “We have some questions to ask you.”
Silent but civil assent.
They asked how he had got out of the embassy, who his contacts with the Liberation had been, where he had been going, why he had tried to go, what happened during the kidnapping, who had brought him here, what they had asked him, what they had wanted from him. Having decided during the afternoon that candor would serve him best, he answered all the questions directly and briefly until the last one.
“I personally am on your side of this war,” he said, “but the Ekumen is necessarily neutral. Since at the moment I’m the only alien on Werel free to speak, whatever I say may be taken, or mistaken, as coming from the embassy and the Stabiles. That was my value to Rayaye. It may be my value to you. But it’s a false value. I can’t speak for the Ekumen. I have no authority.”
“They wanted you to say the Ekumen supports the Jits,” the tired man, Tueyo, said.
Esdan nodded.
“Did they talk about using any special tactics, weapons?” That was Banarkamye, grim, trying not to weight the question.
“I’d rather answer that question when I’m behind your lines, General, talking to people I know in Liberation Command.”
“You’re talking to the World Liberation Army Command. Refusal to answer can be taken as evidence of complicity with the enemy.” That was Metoy, glib, hard, harsh-voiced.
“I know that, Marshal.”
They exchanged a glance. Despite his open threat, Metoy was the one Esdan felt inclined to trust. He was solid. The others were nervy, unsteady. He was sure now that they were factionalists. How big their faction was, how much at odds with Liberation Command it was, he could learn only by what they might let slip.
“Listen, Mr. Old Music,” Tueyo said. Old habits die hard. “We know you worked for the Hame. You helped send people to Yeowe. You backed us then.” Esdan nodded. “You must back us now. We are speaking to you frankly. We have information that the Jits are planning a counterattack. What that means, now, it means that they’re going to use the bibo. It can’t mean anything else. That can’t happen. They can’t be let do that. They have to be stopped.”
“You say the Ekumen is neutral,” Banarkamye said. “That is a lie. A hun
dred years the Ekumen wouldn’t let this world join them, because we had the bibo. Had it, didn’t use it, just had it was enough. Now they say they’re neutral. Now when it matters! Now when this world is part of them! They have got to act. To act against that weapon. They have got to stop the Jits from using it.”
“If the Legitimates did have it, if they did plan to use it, and if I could get word to the Ekumen — what could they do?”
“You speak. You tell the Jit President: the Ekumen says stop there. The Ekumen will send ships, send troops. You back us! If you aren’t with us, you are with them!”
“General, the nearest ship is light years away. The Legitimates know that.”
“But you can call them, you have the transmitter.”
“The ansible in the embassy?”
“The Jits have one of them too.”
“The ansible in the foreign ministry was destroyed in the Uprising. In the first attack on the government buildings. They blew the whole block up.”
“How do we know that?”
“Your own forces did it. General, do you think the Legitimates have an ansible link with the Ekumen that you don’t have? They don’t. They could have taken over the embassy and its ansible, but in so doing they’d have lost what credibility they have with the Ekumen. And what good would it have done them? The Ekumen has no troops to send,” and he added, because he was suddenly not sure Banarkamye knew it, “as you know. If it did, it would take them years to get here. For that reason and many others, the Ekumen has no army and fights no wars.”
He was deeply alarmed by their ignorance, their amateurishness, their fear. He kept alarm and impatience out of his voice, speaking quietly and looking at them unworriedly, as if expecting understanding and agreement. The mere appearance of such confidence sometimes fulfills itself. Unfortunately, from the looks of their faces, he was telling the two generals they’d been wrong and telling Metoy he’d been right. He was taking sides in a disagreement.
Banarkamye said, “Keep all that a while yet,” and went back over the first interrogation, repeating questions, asking for more details, listening to them expressionlessly. Saving face. Showing he distrusted the hostage. He kept pressing for anything Rayaye had said concerning an invasion or a counterattack in the south. Esdan repeated several times that Rayaye had said President Oyo was expecting a Liberation invasion of this province, downriver from here. Each time he added, “I have no idea whether anything Rayaye told me was the truth.” The fourth or fifth time round he said, “Excuse me, General. I must ask again for some word about the people here — ”
“Did you know anybody at this place before you came here?” a younger man asked sharply.
“No. I’m asking about housepeople. They were kind to me. Kamsa’s baby is sick, it needs care. I’d like to know they’re being looked after.”
The generals were conferring with each other, paying no attention to this diversion.
“Anybody stayed here, a place like this, after the Uprising, is a collaborator,” said the zadyo, Tema.
“Where were they supposed to go?” Esdan asked, trying to keep his tone easy. “This isn’t liberated country. The bosses still work these fields with slaves. They still use the crouchcage here.” His voice shook a little on the last words, and he cursed himself for it.
Banarkamye and Tueyo were still conferring, ignoring his question. Metoy stood up and said, “Enough for tonight. Come with me.”
Esdan limped after him across the hall, up the stairs. The young zadyo followed, hurrying, evidently sent by Banarkamye. No private conversations allowed. Metoy, however, stopped at the door of Esdan’s room and said, looking down at him, “The housepeople will be looked after.”
“Thank you,” Esdan said with warmth. He added, “Gana was caring for this injury. I need to see her.” If they wanted him alive and undamaged, no harm using his ailments as leverage. If they didn’t, no use in anything much.
He slept little and badly. He had always thrived on information and action. It was exhausting to be kept both ignorant and helpless, crippled mentally and physically. And he was hungry.
Soon after sunrise he tried his door and found it locked. He knocked and shouted a while before anybody came, a young fellow looking scared, probably a sentry, and then Tema, sleepy and scowling, with the door key.
“I want to see Gana,” Esdan said, fairly peremptory. “She looks after this,” gesturing to his swaddled foot. Tema shut the door without saying anything. After an hour or so, the key rattled in the lock again and Gana came in. Metoy followed her. Tema followed him.
Gana stood in the reverence to Esdan. He came forward quickly and put his hands on her arms and laid his cheek against hers. “Lord Kamye be praised I see you well!” he said, words that had often been said to him by people like her. “Kamsa, the baby, how are they?”
She was scared, shaky, her hair unkempt, her eyelids red, but she recovered herself pretty well from his utterly unexpected brotherly greeting. “They are in the kitchen now, sir,” she said. “The army men, they said that foot do pain you.”
“That’s what I said to them. Maybe you’d re-bandage it for me.”
He sat down on the bed and she got to work unwrapping the cloths.
“Are the other people all right? Heo? Choyo?”
She shook her head once.
“I’m sorry,” he said. He could not ask her more.
She did not do as good a job bandaging his foot as before. She had little strength in her hands to pull the wrappings tight, and she hurried her work, unnerved by the strangers watching.
“I hope Choyo’s back in the kitchen,” he said, half to her half to them. “Somebody’s got to do some cooking here.”
“Yes, sir,” she whispered.
Not sir, not master! he wanted to warn her, fearing for her. He looked up at Metoy, trying to judge his attitude, and could not.
Gana finished her job. Metoy sent her off with a word, and sent the zadyo after her. Gana went gladly, Tema resisted. “General Banarkamye —“ he began. Metoy looked at him. The young man hesitated, scowled, obeyed.
“I will look after these people,” Metoy said. “I always have. I was a compound boss.” He gazed at Esdan with his cold black eyes. “I’m a cutfree. Not many like me left, these days.”
Esdan said after a moment, “Thanks, Metoy. They need help. They don’t understand.”
Metoy nodded.
“I don’t understand either,” Esdan said. “Does the Liberation plan to invade? Or did Rayaye invent that as an excuse for talking about deploying the bibo? Does Oyo believe it? Do you believe it? Is the Liberation Army across the river there? Did you come from it? Who are you? I don’t expect you to answer.”
“I won’t,” the eunuch said.
If he was a double agent, Esdan thought after he left, he was working for Liberation Command. Or he hoped so. Metoy was a man he wanted on his side.
But I don’t know what my side is, he thought, as he went back to his chair by the window. The Liberation, of course, yes, but what is the Liberation? Not an ideal, the freedom of the enslaved. Not now. Never again. Since the Uprising, the Liberation is an army, a political body, a great number of people and leaders and would-be leaders, ambitions and greed clogging hopes and strength, a clumsy amateur semi-government lurching from violence to compromise, ever more complicated, never again to know the beautiful simplicity of the ideal, the pure idea of liberty. And that’s what I wanted, what I worked for, all these years. To muddle the nobly simple structure of the hierarchy of caste by infecting it with the idea of justice. And then to confuse the nobly simple structure of the ideal of human equality by trying to make it real. The monolithic lie frays out into a thousand incompatible truths, and that’s what I wanted. But I am caught in the insanity, the stupidity, the meaningless brutality of the event.
They all want to use me, but I’ve outlived my usefulness, he thought; and the thought went through him like a shaft of clear light. He had kept thinking t
here was something he could do. There wasn’t.
It was a kind of freedom.
No wonder he and Metoy had understood each other wordlessly and at once.
The zadyo Tema came to his door to conduct him downstairs. Back to the packdog room. All the leader-types were drawn to that room, its dour masculinity. Only five men were there this time, Metoy, the two generals, the two who used the rank of rega. Banarkamye dominated them all. He was through asking questions and was in the order-giving vein. “We leave here tomorrow,” he said to Esdan. “You with us. We will have access to the Liberation holonet. You will speak for us. You will tell the Jit goverment that the Ekumen knows they are planning to deploy banned weapons and warns them that if they do, there will be instant and terrible retaliation.”
Esdan was light-headed with hunger and sleeplessness. He stood still — he had not been invited to sit down — and looked down at the floor, his hands at his sides. He murmured barely audibly, “Yes, master.”
Banarkamye’s head snapped up, his eyes flashed. “What did you say?”
“Enna.”
“Who do you think you are?”
“A prisoner of war.”
“You can go.”
Esdan left. Tema followed him but did not stop or direct him. He made his way straight to the kitchen, where he heard the rattle of pans, and said, “Choyo, please, give me something to eat!” The old man, cowed and shaky, mumbled and apologised and fretted, but produced some fruit and stale bread. Esdan sat at the worktable and devoured it. He offered some to Tema, who refused stiffly. Esdan ate it all. When he was done he limped on out through the kitchen exitways to a side door leading to the great terrace. He hoped to see Kamsa there, but none of the housepeople were out. He sat on a bench in the balustrade that looked down on the long reflecting pool. Tema stood nearby, on duty.
“You said the bondspeople on a place like this, if they didn’t join the Uprising, were collaborators,” Esdan said.
Tema was motionless, but listening.
The Birthday of the World and Other Stories Page 21
