Way of the Pilgrim

by Matt

  "... we know from our own experience," he told them, "that even fellow humans can misunderstand each other if they come from different cultures. We know that people of one language may be ear-blind—they literally do not hear certain sound differences from those they are used to in their own language. The French have two ways of sounding the letter 'r' in their own tongue. The born English speaker, who has never learned any other language, has trouble hearing the difference between those two sounds. The difference in English between T and 'r' occasionally is not immediately apparent to some speakers of your own tongue when they first attempt to pronounce words in that language.

  "In many of these cases," he said, "the untrained ear literally does not hear something obvious to native speakers. In the same way, culturally unique actions—gestures—can be misinterpreted or literally not noticed by strangers. It's impossible to have a culture without some such unique elements— and the Aalaag's culture has them, just as ours have. By taking advantage of those elements, which I've been lucky enough to have a chance to study, I believe the Aalaag can be forced to withdraw from our world. If your people will move when the word is given..."

  They were obviously receptive, but did they really understand? It was impossible to tell. He finished and sat down. There was a polite spatter of applause and someone else rose to acknowledge his speech. Finally, the dinner and the meeting were over.

  Usually there was an individual or two who lingered behind the rest to talk to him. In this case, no one did. They moved out in a body. They had not understood. They had only been polite and taken him on faith.

  Fatigue was once more beginning to drag heavily at his feet and dull his mind. He wanted to be back at the hotel and in bed. He returned to the hotel in a daze, hardly noticing the streets and the people that were now beginning to move about on them, as he went. But when he got back to his suite, thoughts of solutions were wiped out of his mind the moment he stepped through the door. Peter had caught up with them again.

  The Englishman did not bound to his feet this time on seeing Shane enter. He looked thinner than before and his eyes had dark shadows beneath them; but there was tightness to his lips and a jut to his jaw that was new to his appearance.

  "No," said Shane, closing the door behind him and coming to take a chair before the sofa on which Peter and Maria were sitting, "I won't talk to that organization of yours."

  "I didn't come to ask you that," said Peter sharply. "I came to tell you about a meeting of high Aalaag officers with Laa Ehon. You remember asking me to have that looked into, when you were in Cairo?"

  "Yes," said Shane. He looked at a coffee pot and cups on the low table before the sofa. "Is that coffee still hot? And if it is, would you pour me some?"

  Maria moved forward, but Peter was already pouring. Shane took the cup and tasted the dark liquid. It had a friendly bitterness after the liquor and tea of the restaurant dinner; and some of his tiredness seemed to evaporate with his first swallow of it. "All right, what did these people of yours leam?"

  "There was a meeting, all right. Fifteen high-ranking aliens from all parts of the world," said Peter. "It was held in an empty, former Egyptian army base, outside Cairo. One the aliens were evidently thinking of using for their own purposes. But our people weren't able to record what was said and done there."

  Shane smiled, a bit sadly.

  "I was afraid they wouldn't," he said.

  "No one has any idea why," Peter said, in a tone of voice that was almost angry—as if the failure to record was because of some unfairness on the part of the Aalaag. "The aliens came singly, most of them by air in those small personal ships of theirs. It looked like they all flew or drove themselves in. At any rate, only one got out of each vehicle. The meeting apparently was held in what had been a conference room of the base Headquarters building. We were all set to film and record everything that went on in that room—"

  "How did we find out that room was the one they were going to meet in?"

  "I wasn't told." For a moment Peter looked uncomfortable,. "But I was told the recording team was all set to get anything said or done in that room. Only, they got nothing. As soon as each Aalaag came into the room, he or she vanished—from the view of the people watching, not just on tape."

  Shane laughed.

  "If you think it's all that humorous—," Peter was beginning heatedly, "when they'd gone to all sorts of trouble to do this for you, after you'd refused to do anything for them—"

  "All right, all right..." Shane made himself sober up. "It's just that it's what I was almost sure would happen—only I'd hoped against hope, somehow, that a recording could be made. Well, it was worth trying. The Aalaag technology was just too much for us."

  "How?" demanded Peter. "And if that's so, why didn't you warn us ahead of time?"

  "Because there was no way of knowing until we tried it. Because, as I say, I hoped in spite of everything—nevermind. I'll show you someday, maybe, how it might have been done —if I'm right about that. But who knows if I'm right, come to think of it? They could have a dozen ways of making themselves seem to vanish to human eyes. The question is, did they do it because they knew your people were there?"

  "You tell me," said Peter bitterly. "You seem to know more about it than any of the rest of us."

  "I don't know," said Shane, putting his empty coffee cup down. His weariness was back in full force. "Well, there're two possibilities. No, I take that back. There're infinite possibilities; but making themselves invisible to human machines and eyesight because they knew humans were about to record what they said and did isn't one of them. They would have simply destroyed the humans concerned, instead. No, I don't know what the reason was ... but it was a reason having to do with the Aalaag, not with us. So we don't have to worry about that."

  "At least," said Peter, "we know they didn't know we had people in a position to record."

  "Not necessarily," said Shane. "The Aalaag might just have ignored your recording crew—like the mice or insects in the walls. But on second thought I don't really believe that. Or maybe they just haven't gotten around to destroying them yet. Again, there're any number of possible nonhuman answers. It doesn't matter. What I wanted to know was whether the other officers there were joining with Laa Ehon in whatever Laa Ehon's got in mind, or were just invited to come and consider joining—and now I don't know that."

  "I see," said Peter. "That's the tragedy, of course, your not knowing. The fact that the men and women who tried to record that meeting for you may still be in line to be chopped by the aliens is hardly worth thinking about."

  Shane looked at him grimly.

  "My not knowing may end up costing millions of human lives," he said. "How many were there in the recording crew?"

  "Why?" Peter leaned forward. "Why might it end up costing millions of human lives?"

  "Because the Aalaag have politics, too," said Shane sharply. "And there's a move afoot to replace Lyt Ahn as First Captain with Laa Ehon. If that happens, we're in trouble. Laa Ehon is unwell—"

  "What do you mean, 'unwell'?" interrupted Peter. "Why don't you say what's wrong with him instead of trying to translate some alien term?"

  "Because there's nothing that translates 'unwell' the way the Aalaag mean it," said Shane. "It covers more territory than any human word. It means 'anything other than well'—literally; and their definition of 'well' is different from ours. But in this case what it means is that by Aalaag standards Laa Ehon isn't sane. That means he doesn't react the same way well Aalaag do; and everything I know, everything we can use in handling that race is based upon well Aalaag. With Lyt Ahn, I know what reaction a certain action or word'll bring. With Laa Ehon I can't be sure. So I want to do what I can to keep him out, and knowing what went on at that meeting—if it really was a political meeting under the guise of a business meeting—might have told me."

  He stopped, even more exhausted than before.

  "All right," said Peter. Suddenly the tightness was gone from his
mouth and the jut from his jaw. His face looked discouraged and old. "All right, all right. If you say so. But, oh hell! What can anyone do with you, Shane?"

  Shane felt a sudden rush of revulsion against himself. It was followed by the same sort of feeling he had felt toward Sylvie Onjin in the House of Weapons, after his first annoyance with her for waiting to surprise him in his quarters when he returned from Milan. He looked from Peter to Maria now and saw expressions on both their faces that were much alike, as they looked back at him.

  "By God!" he said softly. "You do believe in me—both of you!"

  There was a moment of strange silence in the room.

  "What else can anyone do, Shane?" Maria asked.

  "That's right," said Peter. "You don't give us much other choice, do you?"

  "I suppose not," said Shane. He could not stop himself from staring at them as if he had never seen them before. "But you see, until—until just lately—I've never really believed in myself."

  Peter stared back at him. But Maria smiled.

  "And now you do," she said, almost as softly as if she was speaking to herself.

  "What's the matter with you?" demanded Peter furiously. "Did you think what we've been saying was all talk? That everything about people putting on robes and taking up staves was—by Christ, you've even been ddUbting all this business of the professionals getting together in the Organization, and everything I told you about them!"

  "Yes," said Shane, "I guess I have. But mainly I didn't believe in the Pilgrim—so I couldn't bring myself to believe in people reacting to him the way you and everyone said they were—I didn't even believe when I saw them in robes myself. I kept on believing they must all have personal, selfish reasons for doing what they did."

  "In heaven's name, why?" Peter said.

  "Because, you see," said Shane, "I'm not the Pilgrim. I'm just a body the Pilgrim's using—the real Pilgrim. What the Pilgrim really is, is something entirely nonphysical who only exists in the minds of the people who believe in him—or her; and the more who believe, the more powerful the real Pilgrim is."

  His voice died off suddenly. He stared at them.

  "My God," he said, "that's it. All the time, my unconscious was doing the right thing and I didn't know it. Of course, that's their blindness, their vulnerability. They don't have a Pilgrim—I mean they don't have a real Pilgrim, the Pilgrim I've been talking about!"

  Peter and Maria stared back at him.

  "All right," Peter said finally. "Assuming that makes any sense at all—what does it all mean, according to you? What's got you so excited about coming to such a conclusion, anyway?"

  "You don't see what it means?" Shane said. "It means they're blind in that area—they're lacking in that area. They've got nothing to handle the Pilgrim; and my unconscious knew it all the time—all our unconscious minds knew it all the time, that's why we've been doing what we've been doing. The Aalaag really don't understand why, when we deface buildings, we always do it with the same mark. Don't you understand? The universe as they see it doesn't include anything like the Pilgrim—to them he doesn't exist."

  "You exist," said Peter.

  "But I've just been telling you—I'm not the Pilgrim. Oh, I'm part of him. But the Pilgrim's you, Maria; and he's you, Peter, and Johann and even Georges Marrotta, and all the people in the Resistance, and all the people in this Organization of yours; and millions, billions more. He or she's everyone who's human!"

  They were both watching him.

  "What good does that do us?" said Peter.

  "All the good there is!" said Shane. "It means I can let the Pilgrim run things from here on out. Maria was right. She said I thought too much like an Aalaag; and I did—so much like an Aalaag I couldn't see the Pilgrim. But now I can. I can let myself be human, let the Pilgrim speak through me, from now on. Peter, how soon could you get some representatives of this Organization to meet with me, after all?"

  "You mean it?" demanded Peter.

  "I mean it!"

  "In about fifteen minutes, if you really mean it; if you really want to!" Peter exploded. "There's a couple here with me, now. They were in Cairo, too, when you were there, if I could just have gotten you to talk with them. What changed your mind so suddenly? Just this business of finding out the Aalaag aren't on to us?"

  "That, and some other things I've come to understand in the last twenty-four hours," answered Shane. "Fifteen minutes, you said? Good. Get them over here."

  "I'll be back before you can turn around," said Peter, and left them.

  "I'm not sure I follow you either," said Maria quietly to Shane, after the other man had gone. "Have you got the answer now—the one you went out looking for?"

  "I still don't know just how I'm going to do it," he said. "I've only got an inkling. But I know I'm going to confront the Aalaag with the Human race; and I'm going to confront Lyt Ahn with the Pilgrim. And the Pilgrim's something I don't think they can take. They'll go. How they'll go—I don't know...."

  Shane, still staring at the closed door through which Peter had disappeared, turned to her. She came to him and he held her.

  "It's so strange," he said to the top of her head. "I was doing the right thing all along and didn't know it."

  "Not strange at all," said Maria.

  He held her off at arm's length with his hands on her shoulders and searched her face, marveling at her.

  "Come and sit down," she said.

  She led him to the sofa she had been sitting on when he came in, and pulled him beside her onto it, nestling up against him. They sat together in silence until, suddenly, less than fifteen minutes later, there was a knock at the door. Maria jumped up.

  "You haven't got your robe on!" she said. "I'll answer the door. You go get dressed!"

  "Damn!" said Shane.

  He ducked into the bedroom, closed the door to it behind him and swiftly threw on his robe over his jacket and slacks, with the cowl's front edges fastened together up to a point just below his eyes. He went back out into the other room.

  Peter had returned with two men, both of them dressed in business suits and looking to be in their late forties or early fifties. They were unremarkable appearing individuals; one, Caucasian, fairly short and balding, with straight sandy hair. The other, Oriental, taller and slimmer, with an erectness and a nearness that could imply a military background.

  "Pilgrim," said Peter, "may I introduce Mr. Shepherd and Mr. Wong?"

  25

  They all took seats, Shane in the chair he had sat in before, this time facing the almost certainly pseudonymous Shepherd and Wong, who now sat side by side on the sofa Peter and Maria had occupied. Peter and Maria had found themselves chairs each to one side a little back from Shane, so that they were out of the narrow slit of view his closed cowl gave him, unless he turned his head, so that his field of vision contained only the two new visitors.

  These men were not what Shane had expected. He had been expecting a couple of hard-sell characters who would come on strong from the standpoint that they were here to gift him with the enormous favor of their help. But—just the opposite—these two seemed self-contained enough, but if anything a little unsure and hesitant at meeting him in person. He reminded himself once more of how he had been underestimating the commitment of his fellow human beings to action against the Aalaag.

  Until these two gave him some cause to doubt them, he told himself, he would take them on faith.

  "Tell me," he said abruptly, "why do you think people all over the world have taken to the idea of the Pilgrim in such numbers?"

  They did not look at each other in silent consultation before deciding who was to answer him; but there was a perceptible pause before Mr. Wong spoke. His accent was American, rather than British.

  "There've been studies made," he said. "A number of good minds have looked at the phenomenon; and what they mostly seem to conclude is that the Pilgrim is two things—one, a particularly appropriate symbol of the human feeling toward the aliens and, two,
that as a symbol he came on the scene at just the right time."

  "You say 'he,'" said Shane, "taking your cue from my voice, I suppose. But how do you know I'm the real Pilgrim?"

  "We don't, of course..." answered Mr. Shepherd. But his voice ended on such a note of uncertainty that it was almost an appeal; and this time he did turn frankly to his taller companion for help.

  "I think Mr. Shepherd is referring to something I feel myself," said Mr. Wong firmly. "Of course you're right. We've no way of knowing if you're the real Pilgrim, or someone standing in for him—or her. But I feel very strongly myself that you're the real Pilgrim; and clearly Mr. Shepherd does too. But you wanted to know about why people had taken so to the Pilgrim symbol?"

  "That's right," said Shane.

  "According to the opinion of these scholars and others who've studied the matter," said Mr. Wong, "the Pilgrim's as close to being a symbol common to most cultures as you're likely to get. The image has religious overtones; and—in spite of other differences in individual or cultural attitudes—the idea of someone on a pilgrimage is in the folklore or history of many peoples. Along with it goes the idea of the Pilgrim being under the protection of a higher power, gifted—or perhaps blessed would be a better word—with a special purpose; and of course the robe and the staff are common to the ancient dress of many peoples. In short, it's easily identified as a symbol of untouchable good which may conquer and overcome whatever evil there is. An attractive symbol."