Orbitsville Trilogy

by Bob Shaw

  A murmur passed through the audience, a shifting sound equally expressive of surprise, concern and derision. The glowing expanse of sun-hats, variously coloured ellipses which appeared narrower the farther they were away from Nicklin, became briefly agitated.

  Montane raised his hands and waited for the disturbance to subside. "I am not omniscient. I have no direct line to God, on which He tells me what the future holds in store for His children. I do not know what the Devil's exact plans are – all I know is that, through God's divine mercy, we have been granted a breathing space. He could have ignored our predicament, and we would have deserved that, because it was through our own wilfulness that we left the world which He specially created for us. We turned our backs on the Eden He provided, and in our arrogance and blind stupidity we flocked to this metallic bubble. We allowed ourselves to be enticed into the trap.

  "But, as I have already said, there is still a little time left. God willing, there may be enough time for some of us to escape from the Devil's snare, and to do that we have to build starships. We have to quit Orbitsville. Earth may be denied to us for ever – a fitting punishment for our transgressions – but we can still fly to another God-given world, a new Eden, and make a new beginning for the human race."

  There was a fresh disturbance in the audience, a subdued commotion which took longer to die away, and in the midst of it could be heard voices of protest reinforced by sceptical laughter. It costs a lot of money to build starships, Nicklin thought, and you don't need to be the Gaseous Vertebrate to work out where the money is supposed to come from. He glanced about him warily, wondering how long it would be before the collectors got to work.

  "I am not asking you to accept anything on blind faith," Montane went on, raising his voice to quell the sounds of protest. "I know only too well that faith is a very scarce commodity these days – so all I am asking you to do is to weigh up the evidence. The cold, hard, indisputable evidence. Consider, for example, the curious fact that Orbitsville's environment is so exactly suited to…"

  The realisation that Corey Montane had to be certifiable, regardless of his rational manner, immediately caused Nicklin to lose all interest in what was being said. He shook his head, feeling oddly saddened, and was about to tap Zindee on the shoulder when she turned to him. She crooked a finger, signalling for him to bring his head down to her level.

  "Jim," she whispered, "this is another load of male ox. I think we should head over to Mr Chickley's."

  "Good idea!" Nicklin pressed his forefinger to his lips and began to do a cartoon-style sneaking-away-in-silence walk, circling each foot in the air twice before placing it on the ground. Zindee chortled into her cupped hand and fell in at his side, doing her own version of the walk. They had taken only a few grotesque paces when Nicklin noticed they were being observed at close range by a young woman. She was holding a wicker dish, which identified her as a member of Montane's collecting team, and her expression was one of mingled amusement and gentle reproof.

  "Leaving us so soon?" she said in a low and pleasantly accented voice. "Have you not been touched by anything that Corey has said?"

  Nicklin heard his mouth go into action at once. "It was all fascinating, truly fascinating, but we have some family business to attend to at the other side of town. My uncle is building himself a rock garden, you see, and he needs me to help him lift the…"

  Embellishments to the basic lie – including a partial biography of the imaginary uncle – crowded into his mind, and he was selecting the most promising when, belatedly, his gaze focused on the woman.

  He was totally unprepared for what happened next.

  The astonishing reality of the woman flowed into him by way of his eyes, and in that instant – quite simply – he became a different person.

  A major component of the starshell of emotion that burst inside him was straightforward physical lust. He wanted to go to bed with her, there and then. He craved to perform with her every act of passion that men and women had ever known and treasured as the means of giving and receiving pleasure. But there was much more to it than that. He also wanted to sleep with the woman, to experience the asexual delight of wakening beside her in the night, slipping his arm around her and nesting with her like spoons as he waited for sleep to return. He wanted to go shopping with her, to fend off doorstep salesmen together, to dab dust motes from each other's eyes, to find out what she thought of contemporary music and of the farming of trout, to discover how far she could run, what childhood ailments she had suffered, how good she was at crosswords…

  This is serious, Nicklin thought strickenly. I'm supposed to be immune to this kind of irrationality.

  He tried to decide what it was about her that had had such a devastating effect on him. She was about thirty, somewhere close to his own age, and he decided at once that she was not at all beautiful. Her face was squarish and unremarkable, with eyelids that seemed heavy and druggy; her mouth was wide, with an upper lip that was much fuller than the lower, almost as if it had been swollen by a blow. She was tall and black-haired, and her body – beneath the black sylkon blouse and taut black trousers – was slim and athletic, looking as though it had been pared down by exercise rather than dieting. She wore a flat black stetson instead of the standard coolie-style sun-hat, a flourish which indicated that the ensemble had been consciously chosen to create a certain effect. Nicklin was not sure what the effect was meant to be in terms of fashion, but he knew that for him it worked – the thought of unbuttoning the blouse actually made him feel weak at the knees.

  "You must go and help your uncle, of course," the woman said, "but perhaps you'll come back and listen to Corey when you're not so pressed for time. He really has something of great importance to say."

  "I'll certainly give it serious thought."

  "That's wonderful. By the way, my name is Danea."

  "Mine's Jim," Nicklin said, deeply thrilled by the realisation that there had been no need for the woman to give him her name. "Jim Nicklin, and I've just been thinking…"

  He glanced at the people sitting and standing nearby, who were beginning to look around at him with curiosity or resentment because the conversation was an unwelcome distraction. He pointed at his ear and then at an area of trampled grass which was at a remove from the audience but still inside the ring of pole-mounted speakers which were relaying Montane's words to the outside world. Danea nodded and moved in the indicated direction on black, spike-heeled sandals. Nicklin grabbed at Zindee's hand and followed.

  "That's better – there were too many decibels to compete against back there," he said when they stopped walking. "Look, I've been thinking things over. It'll soon be getting dark and there probably isn't enough time to get any useful work in on the rock garden. I think I'll just stay on here for a while and – " He paused, becoming aware that Zindee had gripped his wrist with both hands and was trying to drag him away.

  "Jim," she whispered fiercely. "Jim!"

  Danea looked down at her in a friendly manner. "Is this your daughter?"

  "No!" Nicklin realised he had put too much emphasis into the denial. "No, I'm not married. This is my friend Zindee. We were going to have us a sundae – on the way to my uncle's place, that is."

  "Hello, Zindee," Danea said. "Don't worry about getting that sundae. We all know how important sundaes are, and I'm sure Jim didn't mean that terrible thing he said about staying on here." She raised her gaze and her eyes locked with Nicklin's. "After all, he can come back here at any time."

  "Yes." Nicklin nodded vigorously as, annoyingly, Zindee redoubled her efforts to pull him off his feet. "I'll do that. I'll certainly do that."

  "Well, we'll see you then." Danea smiled at him, and he saw that her teeth were perfect, and that when she smiled the heaviness left her eyes, making them lively, star-centred and bold. The tremulous feeling returned to his knee joints. He raised his free hand in a farewell gesture and allowed Zindee to haul him away in the direction of Mr Chickley's ice-cream parlour.
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  "Why didn't you answer Danea when she said hello to you?" he demanded as soon as they had walked far enough to gain some privacy.

  "You were doing enough talking for both of us," Zindee replied, the set of her tiny chin showing that she was furious with him. "And what was all that bullshit about an uncle and a rock garden?" The fact that she had not used her customary euphemism – male ox droppings – confirmed to Nicklin that he was really in trouble with her.

  "You wouldn't understand," he said lamely.

  "What I don't understand is why you tell lies all the time. What makes you do it, Jim?"

  That's what I'd like to know, Nicklin thought, his cheeks beginning to grow hot with embarrassment. "You still haven't said why you were rude to Danea."

  "She talked to me like I was a kid. Sundaes are important. Huh!"

  Nicklin remained silent until they had reached the edge of the common, crossed Coach-and-Four Lane and taken up good window seats in Chickley's. The place was quite narrow, but it extended a long way back from the street and had a glittering chrome-and-glass counter right across the inner end. Fat Mr Chickley was proud of having designed the period decor himself, even though there was some uncertainty about which period he had been aiming at. Clumps of coloured neon strips broke out here and there among the pseudo-Victorian gaslights on the walls. There were only a few customers in the twin rows of booths, presumably because of the rival attraction of Montane's meeting.

  While Zindee was up at the counter placing her complex order he took stock of himself and was not surprised to find that his hands were slightly unsteady. What had happened to him out there on the common? By inviting the woman to move to a quieter place he had, by his standards of behaviour, been making a pass at her – and he had never before behaved that way with a stranger. The unsettling thing, however, was that she had known he was making the pass and had continued to give him positive signals. No local woman would have responded to an advance from him in that way.

  He was well aware that, as well as having the reputation of being ineffectual and eccentric, he was suspected of homosexuality by most people in Orangefield. He could have earned the esteem of many men, and probably of quite a few women, by being seen visiting certain homes in the town where the lady of the house had fallen back, so to speak, on an ancient means of earning a living. The main reason he had not given those houses any business was that he was an intensely private person, and did not like the idea of the town gossips knowing the exact dates on which he had found it necessary to relieve biological pressures. He therefore restricted himself to those occasions when he was over in Weston Bridge buying books or machine parts.

  It was quite some coincidence, he decided, that the only woman ever to blitz him in such a way was also just about the first ever to respond encouragingly to his show of interest. As a result, there was nothing else in the world that he wanted more than to be with Danea. That was why he had lied about the rock garden in front of Zindee – she had ceased to register on his senses, she had effectively ceased to exist. And, right now, the thought that but for her intrusive presence he could still have been talking to Danea was inspiring him with resentment towards the child.

  "Here we go," Zindee said, arriving at the table with two imposing confections in tall glasses balanced on a tray. "Just look at them! Feast your eyes, Jim! How's that for a vision of paradise?"

  "Not bad."

  "Not bad!" As she sat down it was apparent from Zindee's expression and manner that she had been restored to good humour. "Peasant! Philistine! Have you no appreciation for genuine works of art?"

  "Perhaps not," Nicklin said, taking his spoon and tentatively probing a pale green area of his sundae.

  "Who's being rude now?"

  "Sorry." He was dully surprised to find that he was not at all sorry. Why don't you take yourself for a long walk and leave me in peace for a while?

  "I know what's the matter with you." Zindee gave him a knowing smirk, the downy hair on her upper lip already blobbed with white. "I know what's eating our Jim."

  "Do you?"

  "He's in love! The poor guy's got the throbs for the Lady in Black."

  "Eat your ice cream, Zindee," Nicklin said, eyeing her with growing dislike. "You're talking rubbish."

  "Oh, no I'm not! I was watching you." Zindee popped a cherry into her mouth and chewed contemplatively. "She's got a good pair of headlights."

  Nicklin felt he ought to tell Zindee off for using language unbecoming to a well-brought-up child, but her comment had rekindled his furnace. Now that he thought about it, Danea's breasts had been quite full in comparison to the slimness of her body, creating horizontal wrinkles in her sylkon blouse. And there was her smile! He was inclined to smile as little as possible, because when he did so his mouth curved too far up at the corners, giving him what he regarded as a goofy hayseed appearance. Danea's smile, however, was straight, and perhaps her mouth even turned down a little at the corners – a feature which Nicklin had always envied and regarded as a hallmark of mature and worldly sophistication. What was her surname? And was the heaviness of her eyes and possible bruising of the upper lip a sign that she had spent most of the previous night in strenuous sexual activity? With Montane? Nicklin had read that it was quite commonplace for leaders of quirky religious groups to bed the most attractive of their acolytes. Perhaps this particular group went in for sex in a big way, in rituals and so forth. Perhaps Danea had been doing it with everybody! If that were the case, he wanted his share of her – even if it meant joining her nutty religion…

  A mental picture of Danea coupling promiscuously with all the men with whom she travelled filled Nicklin with a pang of desire, jealousy and outrage so powerful that it caused him to squirm in his seat. He should be with her at that very moment, instead of playing nursemaid to a precocious brat who insisted on clinging to him like a leech. Looking out above the half-length net curtain which gave Mr Chickley's window seats some privacy, Nicklin tried to see Danea, but the trees and shifting groups of townsfolk made it impossible.

  "Jim, I've got an idea," Zindee said. "You don't really want your sundae, do you?"

  "I guess not. I guess I'm not in the mood for an ice."

  "That's the understatement of the century. Look, hows about you giving your sundae to me? I'll be able to eat the two of them – no problem – but it's bound to take me quite a while." Zindee spoke with the grave tones of a general laying out a major campaign. "That would give you time to nip back across the street and see if you can fix yourself a date with the Lady in Black. What do you say?"

  "I … " Nicklin gazed at her with an up-welling of affection so strong that it was little short of adoration. "Are you sure you would be all right? Sitting here by yourself?"

  Zindee shrugged. "What could happen to a girl in an ice-cream joint?"

  He stood up, drummed a message of thanks with his fingers on the crown of her sun-hat, and hurried out into the street. As he crossed to the common he realised that, without actual sight of Danea to goad him to recklessness, his cursed timidity had returned in force. He had no idea of what to say to her and, perversely, he now wished he had remained with Zindee. A glance at the sky showed that the eastern edge of the sun was being clipped by the next advancing force bar. Night would arrive quite soon, and he felt he might recapture his surprising boldness under cover of darkness, but he would have been obliged to rejoin Zindee by then.

  Breasting waves of sound from the loudspeakers, he walked towards the meeting. Montane was still delivering his dire warnings, but the message was no longer penetrating to Nicklin's brain. He circled around the listening crowd, the white marquee and all the associated vehicles three times, but was unable to see any sign of Danea.

  Steeped in black, bitter disappointment – but at the same time feeling oddly relieved – he headed back towards Mr Chickley's. From the edge of the green he saw the small and indomitable figure of Zindee outlined by the peach-coloured lights which had just been switched on in the sh
op. She was busily working on the sundaes.

  He smiled as he thought of how pleasant it was going to be, walking home with her and savouring her safe, undemanding companionship.

  CHAPTER 5

  "By our old standards," Corey Montane said, "we did quite well today."

  His audience – some forty strong and composed solely of his own workers – made sounds of gratification, but in a subdued and tentative manner. It was highly unusual for Montane to call a general meeting so late in the day, and each of them knew that something serious was afoot. They were sitting in a tight group in a corner of the marquee. All the door flaps had been drawn shut and tied, and the only illumination came from a single overhead globe which served to emphasise the darkness in the shadowy reaches of the huge tent. The conspiratorial atmosphere was enhanced by the fact that Montane had positioned himself in the midst of his team and was speaking in a low voice, obviously determined that any strangers who might be lurking outside would not hear what he was saying.

  "We took in almost six hundred orbs today," Montane went on. "And six hundred orbs is quite a creditable sum – by our old standards. The trouble is that our old standards no longer apply. They have lost all relevance. They are totally without meaning for us."

  Montane paused, surveying his audience with sombre eyes. They were a mixed bag of men and women, and he loved them all. Some – like the electricians Petra Davies and old Jock Craig – had joined him in the knowledge that they had useful skills to offer; others had come along with no special aptitudes, but prepared to do or learn to do anything that was asked of them. What they had in common was their belief in his message, their loyalty and their trust.

  And now it was required of him, in this grim hour, that he should put all those qualities to the test.

  "You already know, from today's news, that the world has been moved to some alien part of the continuum, to a new location so remote that the astronomers cannot even find the Local Group – the twenty or more galaxies that made up our cosmic neighbourhood. The event is a vindication of all that I have told people in the last six years, but sadly, incredibly, they still do not believe. The blindness continues.