Araminta Station

by Jack Vance

  Fader addressed the group, speaking without inflection: “This is where men come to rest, to think their thoughts and think the thoughts of others. Women, of course, have similar facilities.”

  Dauncy asked Fader: “How many folk are out there?”

  “It is hard to guess. Persons come; persons go. Notice yonder around the balcony: a party of tourists is amused to throw coins out on the floor! As you see, it causes something of a scramble. Sometimes the tourists throw large sums, and persons become seriously hurt in the tumult.”

  Jardine asked suspiciously: “Is coin throwing permitted without payment of fees?”

  “Yes; we stretch a point in this case. You may indulge yourself as you wish. If you have no small coins you may change sols at the wicket yonder.”

  Kiper said excitedly: “I’m out of coins! Who’ll lend me a few dinkets?”

  Kirdy said sternly: “Learn some dignity, Kiper! It’s a stupid and pointless waste, throwing money away!” He looked at Fader: “We are not all of us lummoxes, despite your conviction.”

  Fader smiled, and shook his head. “I deal with many kinds of people, but I make no judgments.”

  Cloyd Diffin spoke: “You said that the women had separate facilities. Can these be visited?”

  “You may select from Tours 128, 129 or 130, as listed in the brochure. They are similar save for optional features.”

  “Where do men and women meet? How do they marry and form families?”

  Fader said: “Our social system is complex. I cannot even provide a generality within the limits of Tour 112. Payment of tutorial fees will provide instruction to any desired level of expertise. If you care to undertake this course of study, please make arrangements with the tour secretary tonight.”

  The irrepressible Kiper called out: “Tonight Cloyd performs his own research! He intends to gain wisdom at the very source of such lore!”

  Cloyd was not amused. “That will be about enough from you, Kiper.”

  Arles pointed across the Caglioro, to where the other group of tourists stood staring up toward the ceiling. “What is going on over there?”

  Fader turned to look. “They are paying for a spectacle. You must not look; that is the rule. If you participate in the viewing, you must pay what we call a subsidiary fee.”

  “Pure and total bosh!” declared Arles. “I have paid to look out over the Caglioro. If your spectacle interferes with my enjoyment of the view, I will feel free to claim a partial refund.”

  Fader emphatically shook his head. “If you are inconvenienced, simply turn your back and do not look.”

  Kirdy said: “Fader, be sensible. we have paid to inspect the Caglioro, together with - and here I quote the brochure to the best of my memory – ‘all the picturesque episodes and quaint incidents for which this surprising chamber is notorious.’ Any spectacles occurring during our visit are implicitly included.”

  “Just so,” said Fader. “Consider very carefully the thrust of that sentence. The Caglioro is not notorious for this particular spectacle, nor any other single and specific spectacle. Hence, if you watch one of these events, a subsidiary fee must be applied.”

  “In that case, we will look across the Caglioro as is our right, but we will ignore any and all spectacles. Fellow Bold Lions, do you hear this? Look out over the Caglioro to your heart’s content, but if a spectacle interferes with your view, pay no heed. Neither enjoy it nor acknowledge its existence; otherwise we must listen to Fader’s ratchety legalisms. Is that clear? Look, then, at will! But give no notice to any spectacle, should one chance to occur!”

  Fader had nothing to say. Meanwhile, on a walkway high up under the roof, a pair of old men shuffled out upon a circular platform ten feet in diameter. They wore only loose trunks: one white, the other black. The old man in white showed disinclination, and peered with raised eyebrows and a slack jaw down at the floor far below. He turned and would have scuttled back to the walkway had not a gate barred his exit. The old man in black hobbled forward and seized him; the two wrestled, lurching this way and that, until the man in white tripped and tumbled headlong, whereupon his opponent fell upon him, dragged him clawing and scratching to the edge of the platform, and pushed him over the side. Sprawling, toppling, the old man in white fell, to land upon a target studded with sharp staves, which pierced and broke his body. The Yips ranged around the floor of the Caglioro gave no more than a glance to the proceedings. Up on the high platform the old man in black trunks shuffled wearily away and was lost to view in the high shadows.

  Kirdy turned and addressed the Bold Lions: “I saw nothing unusual, in the nature of a spectacle. Did anyone?”

  “Not I.” “Not I.” “Not I.” “Nothing but ten thousand Yips engrossed in their machinations.”

  Uther Offaw turned to Fader: “I have just noticed a high platform up yonder. What is the reason for that, and I do not wish to pay an educational fee.”

  Fader allowed the shadow of an ironic smile to form on his face. “That is used for certain spectacles which we present to tourists willing to pay. Indigent old persons approaching death, if they so choose, are allowed a luxury supplement to their rations. In return they must wrestle upon the platform, until one of them falls to his death. It is a procedure beneficial in every respect. Old persons enjoy a good diet in their nonproductive years and generate income by their passing, which otherwise would be wasted.”

  “Interesting! Men and women both enjoy the advantages of the scheme?”

  “Naturally!”

  “It seems a rather cynical exploitation of these old people,” said Uther Offaw.

  “By no means!” declared Fader. “I am not encouraged to argue with you, but I will point out that because of strictures imposed upon us from without, we must use any and every means to survive.”

  “Hm. Might a spectacle be arranged with children as participants, rather than old men?”

  “Quite possibly so. The tour clerk will be able to quote you the exact charges.”

  “It seems that almost anything can be arranged for a fee.”

  Fader held out his hands. “Is this not true anywhere? I must announce that time is on the move. Have you seen enough of the Caglioro?”

  Shugart looked around the group. “We are ready to move on. Where next?”

  “We pass through the Gallery of Ancient Gladiators. Had you been attentive a few moments ago, you might have glimpsed a pair of these doughty warriors wrestling on the high platform. Since you failed to notice, I cannot charge a fee.”

  “Do we incur charges by traversing the gallery?”

  Fader made a reassuring sign. “It is on the way to the bazaar. Come.”

  Fader led the group into a long passage giving on a series of cubicles. In each an old man sat cross-legged on a dingy cushion.

  Some occupied themselves at a trifle of handicraft. One embroidered; another tatted; another wove strands of fiber into small toy animals. Others sat staring listlessly into space.

  As the Bold Lions moved along the gallery they caught up with the party of tourists which had arranged the spectacle in the Caglioro. These numbered about twenty: Glawen adjudged them to be Laddakees from the world Gaude Phodelius IV, by reason of their squat physiques, fresh complexions, round faces and distinctive wide-brimmed hats with trailing black ribbons. The group leader seemed to be arranging another spectacle, the so-called Double Bubble, with the tour guide; but was deterred by what he considered excessive charges. Others of the party clustered around a cubicle, conversing with the old man inside. The Bold Lions stopped to listen.

  A question had been put to the old man; he responded: “What choices are open to me? I can no longer work; should I sit in the dark and starve?”

  “But you seem reconciled to this sort of death!”

  “I care little, one way or another. It is a proper end to my life. I have achieved nothing, discovered nothing; I have brought not a twitch of change to the cosmos. I will soon be gone and no one will know the difference.�
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  “It seems a negative philosophy,” stated the Laddakee. “Is there nothing you have done of which you are proud?”

  “I have been a grass-scraper all my life. One stalk is much like the others. Still, long ago, an odd mood came on me and I carved a bit of wood into the similitude of a fish, with every scale in correct detail. Folk who saw it thought it very fine.”

  “And where is this fish now?”

  “It fell into the canal and drifted away on the tide. Not long ago I started another such fish - you see it here - but I lost heart and never finished it.”

  “So now you are ready to die.”

  “No one is ever quite ready.”

  One of the Laddakees pushed forward from the rear of the group. “If the truth be told, I am ashamed of this sort of thing. Instead of buying this gentleman’s death, let us take up a collection and ensure his survival. Is not that more worthy of humanity and our religion?”

  A mutter went around the group. Some seemed to agree; others were doubtful. A very stout man said plaintively: “That’s all well and good, but we have already paid for the spectacle; the money would be wasted!”

  Another said: “More to the point, there are thousands in the same case! If we rescue this old gaffer and his fish, then another will come to take his place; must we then rescue another, who perhaps has carved a bird? The process is endless!”

  The leader said: “As you all know, I am a merciful man, and an Elder in the Church, but I must come down on the side of practicality. As I understand it, this spectacle conduces not to morbidity or perverse spasms, but to a healthy catharsis. Brother Jankoop’s scheme does him credit, but I would suggest that on our return home, he show an equal solicitude for his neighbors and put his goats out to pasture.”

  Grateful laughter greeted the sally. The leader turned to Fader. “Perhaps your party would care to join us at the Double Bubble spectacle. The fee, thus prorated among the two groups, would make the cost less daunting.”

  Arles inquired: “What, in fact, is the fee?”

  Fader calculated. “The charges would be five sols per individual. That is a flat rate.” He held up his hand to the instant chorus of protest. “There will be no prorating; prices are fixed.”

  Arles said with a shaky laugh: “After a financial shock like that, I truly need some catharsis. I will take part, despite the expense.”

  “Include me,” said Cloyd. “What about you, Dauncy?”

  “I don’t want to miss anything. I’ll come.”

  “Include me as well,” declared Kiper.

  “It’s disgusting,” said Uther Offaw. “I won’t have any part of it.”

  “Nor I,” said Glawen.

  Shugart also excluded himself from the event; Jardine at last decided to participate, “from sheer curiosity,” as he put it. Kirdy hesitated, his big rubicund face showing first one expression, then another. At last, feeling Glawen’s eyes upon him, he said, rather sulkily: “It’s not for me.”

  While Fader collected the five-sol charges, Glawen chanced to notice the half-finished fish. He pointed. “May I see it?”

  The old man handed him the object: a bit of wood eight inches long, with head and about half of the scales carved in exact and minute detail. On an impulse Glawen asked: “Would you sell this to me?”

  “It is nothing: not even complete. When I am dead it will be thrown away. You may have it without charge.”

  “Thank you,” said Glawen. From the corner of his eye he felt Fader’s observation fixed upon him. He told the old man: “At Yipton nothing is free. I will pay you this coin for the carving. Is that agreeable?”

  “Yes, just as you like.”

  Glawen paid over the coin and took the wooden half-fish. He noticed that Fader had turned away.

  The Laddakees’ tour guide called out: “Time for the spectacle! On your feet, old man! You must pump and blow hard if you wish to enjoy the evening supper.”

  Fader, with Kirdy, Uther, Shugart and Glawen, waited in the gallery. The others entered a room where a peculiar contrivance had been arranged: a pair of glass cylinders three feet in diameter and seven feet tall stood side by side, joined to each other by pipes. Into each of the cylinders an ancient gladiator was lowered, until he stood on the bottom; then lids were clamped over the top. Into the bottom of each cylinder water began to gush, rising ever higher. By working a lever arm, each old man could pump water from his own cylinder into that of his adversary. At first both men seemed apathetic, but as the water rose up around their waists, each essayed a few strokes of the pump and at last both began to pump in earnest. The old gladiator in one tube displayed more desperation and more stamina; at last he succeeded in pumping water over the head of the old man who had carved the fish, who thereupon ceased his exertions, clawed and kicked at the glass for a moment or two, then drowned, and the spectacle came to an end.

  The Bold Lions who had been on hand returned to the gallery. Kirdy said: “Well?”

  Jardine spoke in a hollow voice: “If that is catharsis, I have had enough.”

  Fader said briskly: “Come, now; time is short. To the bazaar. Prices, incidentally, are fixed; do not haggle. Please stay together; it is easy to become lost.”

  By way of trestles, galleries, passages and bridges, past many a glimpse of men at work: scraping sea grass, shelling and pounding molluscs, processing bamboo, weaving mats and panels of fronds, the Bold Lions arrived at the bazaar: a low ceilinged area of innumerable small booths, where Yips of both genders and all ages produced and sold articles of wood, metal, shell, glass, earthenware and knotted cord. Other booths displayed rugs, fabrics, dolls, grotesques of a hundred variants.

  The Bold Lions lacked interest in making purchases. Sensing their mood, Fader said: “We will now visit the Hall of Music, where you are at liberty to bestow gifts as you so wish, at no extra charge.”

  In the Hall of Music elderly men and women sitting in booths played instruments and sang melancholy songs, each with a small bamboo pot in front of him, containing coins presumably contributed by persons who had been affected by their music. Shugart Veder changed a sol into small coins, which he distributed into each pot without regard for the excellence of the music. Kirdy asked one of the musicians: “How do you spend all the money you collect?”

  “There’s not much to spend. Tax takes more than half; the rest goes for gruel. I haven’t known the taste of fish in five years.”

  “Pity.”

  “Yes. They’ll have me in the Gladiators’ Gallery before long. That’s when the music stops.”

  “Come along,” said Fader. “Time is up, unless you care for overtime charges.”

  “Not at all likely.”

  Once back at the hotel, Fader said: “Now, in the matter of my gratuity, ten percent is considered paltry and mean.”

  Shugart said: “What is nothing at all considered, after you refused to take us to the rotunda and threw me in the canal?”

  “Nothing at all is considered careless, and it involves wondering what you are eating when you take your meals.”

  “You make a persuasive point. Very well. You shall have ten percent and think of us however you like. To be candid, I am as unconcerned with your good opinion as you are with mine.”

  Fader could not be bothered with a comment. The gratuity was paid over; Fader accepted it with a cool nod. “You are going to Pussycat Palace?”

  “Yes; later this evening.”

  “You will need a guide.”

  “Why? The way is clearly marked.”

  “Let me warn you; footpads are rife! They spring at you from side corridors; you are hurled to the ground, and an instant later your money is gone. You are given a kick or two in the face for good measure, and they are gone, all inside half a minute. But they dare not attack if you are protected by a guide. My charges are nominal, and you will go to Pussycat Palace in dignity and assurance.”

  “What, then, are the charges?”

  “Nine persons: nine sols.”<
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  “I will consult with my fellows at dinner.”

  As Syrene sank low, the Bold Lions, who had gathered on the terrace, settled at a table overlooking the harbor directly above the Faraz, where it lay alongside the dock.

  For a period the Bold Lions refreshed themselves with rum punches and ling-lang toddies, and congratulated themselves upon the romantic ambience of the situation.

  “Naturally, we exclude the Big chife when we discuss the local delectations,” said Dauncy Diffin whimsically.

  Kiper spoke bravely: “The Big Chife, bah! I’ve almost forgotten it. What’s a bit of stink, after all?”

  “Speak for yourself,” said Uther. “I am not so tolerant.”

  Kiper told him: “It’s all in your head! A person must have a brain well-stocked with all manner of vileness before he can identify a bad smell. My mind is noble and pure; hence I am unaffected.”

  “We can learn much from Kiper,” said Shugart. “When I fell in that filthy canal, he advised me take a dispassionate view of the situation, and enjoy it along with everyone else.”

  Jardine grinned. “As I recall, this was also Fader’s opinion.”

  “I’m lucky he did not charge me for a bath,” growled Shugart.

  “He thought of everything else, and now he wants another nine sols for taking us to Pussycat Palace. He claims it’s the only way to avoid attack by footpads, presumably led by himself.”

  Uther, ordinarily casual, now became incensed. “That is extortion, plain and simple! I’m of a mind to report him to the Oomps!”

  Kiper, grinning like a fox, pointed. “If you’re serious, there they stand: two of the elite.”

  Uther jumped to his feet and strode off to confront the Oomps.

  They listened politely as he explained his grievance, and made what appeared to be a sympathetic response. Uther turned on his heel and came back to the table.

  “Well?” asked Kiper.

  “They wanted to know how much Fader charged. I told them and they agreed that it wasn’t too much. I asked why they did not apprehend the footpads; they said that as soon as they started to patrol the corridors, the footpads went away and the Oomp arched back and forth to no purpose. I mentioned that the blue pamphlet said that experienced persons could visit Pussycat Palace alone in perfect safety. They told me the pamphlet was a bit outdated; that these ‘experienced visitors’ always tipped the tour clerk five or ten sols, which somehow seemed to mitigate the nuisance.”