"Who's that down there?" the Duke barked.
"Two Johnnies who came along for the ride, Scor," said the tall Dune man.
"Why wasn't something said about them?"
"It was the chance they took, Soor," the Dune man said.
"My Lord," said Kynes, "these men know it's of little use to do anything about men trapped on the desert in worm country."
"We'll send a ship from base for them!" the Duke snapped.
"As you wish, my Lord," Kynes said. "But likely when the ship gets here there'll be no one to rescue."
"We'll send a ship, anyway," the Duke said.
"They were right beside where the worm came up," Paul said. "How'd they escape?"
"The sides of the hole cave in and make the distances deceptive," Kynes said.
"You waste fuel here, Sire," Halleck ventured.
"Aye, Gurney."
The Duke brought his craft around toward the Shield Wall. His escort came down from circling stations, took up positions above and on both sides.
Paul thought about what the Dune man and Kynes had said. He sensed half-truths, outright lies. The men on the sand had glided across the surface so surely, moving in a way obviously calculated to keep from luring the worm back out of its depths.
Fremen! Paul thought. Who else would be so sure on the sand? Who else might be left out of your worries as a matter of course--because they are in no danger? They know how to live here! They know how to outwit the worm!
"What were Fremen doing on that crawler?" Paul asked.
Kynes whirled.
The tall Dune man turned wide eyes on Paul--blue within blue within blue. "Who be this lad?" he asked.
Halleck moved to place himself between the man and Paul, said: "This is Paul Atreides, the ducal heir."
"Why says he there were Fremen on our rumbler?" the man asked.
"They fit the description," Paul said.
Kynes snorted. "You can't tell Fremen just by looking at them!" He looked at the Dune man. "You. Who were those men?"
"Friends of one of the others," the Dune man said. "Just friends from a village who wanted to see the spice sands."
Kynes turned away. "Fremen!"
But he was remembering the words of the legend: "TheLisan al-Gaib shall see through all subterfuge. "
"They be dead now, most likely, young Soor," the Dune man said. "We should not speak unkindly on them."
But Paul heard the falsehood in their voices, felt the menace that had brought Halleck instinctively into guarding position.
Paul spoke dryly: "A terrible place for them to die."
Without turning, Kynes said: "When God hath ordained a creature to die in a particular place, He causeth that creature's wants to direct him to that place."
Leto turned a hard stare at Kynes.
And Kynes, returning the stare, found himself troubled by a fact he had observed here: This Duke was concerned more over the men than he was over the spice. He risked his own life and that of his son to save the men. He passed off the loss of a spice crawler with a gesture. The threat to men's lives had him in a rage. A leader such as that would command fanatic loyalty. He would be difficult to defeat.
Against his own will and all previous judgments, Kynes admitted to himself: I like this Duke.
Greatness is a transitory experience. It is never consistent. It depends in part upon the myth-making imagination of humankind. The person who experiences greatness must have a feeling for the myth he is in. He must reflect what is projected upon him. And he must have a strong sense of the sardonic. This is what uncouples him from belief in his own pretensions. The sardonic is all that permits him to move within himself. Without this quality, even occasional greatness will destroy a man.
--from "Collected Sayings of Muad'Dib" by the Princess Irulan
IN THE dining hall of the Arrakeen great house, suspensor lamps had been lighted against the early dark. They cast their yellow glows upward onto the black bull's head with its bloody horns, and onto the darkly glistening oil painting of the Old Duke.
Beneath these talismans, white linen shone around the burnished reflections of the Atreides silver, which had been placed in precise arrangements along the great table--little archipelagos of service waiting beside crystal glasses, each setting squared off before a heavy wooden chair. The classic central chandelier remained unlighted, and its chain twisted upward into shadows where the mechanism of the poison-snooper had been concealed.
Pausing in the doorway to inspect the arrangements, the Duke thought about the poison-snooper and what it signified in his society.
All of a pattern, he thought. You can plumb us by our language-the precise and delicate delineations for ways to administer treacherous death. Will someone try chaumurky tonight--poison in the drink? Or will it be chaumas--poison in the food?
He shook his head.
Beside each plate on the long table stood a flagon of water. There was enough water along the table, the Duke estimated, to keep a poor Arrakeen family for more than a year.
Flanking the doorway in which he stood were broad laving basins of ornate yellow and green tile. Each basin had its rack of towels. It was the custom, the housekeeper had explained, for guests as they entered to dip their hands ceremoniously into a basin, slop several cups of water onto the floor, dry their hands on a towel and fling the towel into the growing puddle at the door. After the dinner, beggars gathered outside to get the water squeezings from the towels.
How typical of a Harkonnen fief, the Duke thought. Every degradation of the spirit that can be conceived. He took a deep breath, feeling rage tighten his stomach.
"The custom stops here!" he muttered.
He saw a serving woman--one of the old and gnarled ones the housekeeper had recommended--hovering at the doorway from the kitchen across from him. The Duke signaled with upraised hand. She moved out of the shadows, scurried around the table toward him, and he noted the leathery face, the blue-within-blue eyes.
"My Lord wishes?" She kept her head bowed, eyes shielded.
He gestured. "Have these basins and towels removed."
"But... Noble Born...." She looked up, mouth gaping.
"I know the custom!" he barked. "Take these basins to the front door. While we're eating and until we've finished, each beggar who calls may have a full cup of water. Understood?"
Her leathery face displayed a twisting of emotions: dismay, anger....
With sudden insight, Leto realized that she must have planned to sell the water squeezings from the foot-trampled towels, wringing a few coppers from the wretches who came to the door. Perhaps that also was a custom.
His face clouded, and he growled: "I'm posting a guard to see that my orders are carried out to the letter."
He whirled, strode back down the passage to the Great Hall. Memories rolled in his mind like the toothless mutterings of old women. He remembered open water and waves--days of grass instead of sand--dazed summers that had whipped past him like windstorm leaves.
All gone.
I'm getting old, he thought. I've felt the cold hand of my mortality. And in what? An old woman's greed.
In the Great Hall, the Lady Jessica was the center of a mixed group standing in front of the fireplace. An open blaze crackled there, casting flickers of orange light onto jewels and laces and costly fabrics. He recognized in the group a stillsuit manufacturer down from Carthag, an electronics equipment importer, a watershipper whose summer mansion was near his polar-cap factory, a representative of the Guild Bank (lean and remote, that one), a dealer in replacement parts for spice mining equipment, a thin and hard-faced woman whose escort service for off-planet visitors reputedly operated as cover for various smuggling, spying, and blackmail operations.
Most of the women in the hall seemed cast from a specific type--decorative, precisely turned out, an odd mingling of untouchable sensuousness.
Even without her position as hostess, Jessica would have dominated the group, he thought. She wore no
jewelry and had chosen warm colors--a long dress almost the shade of the open blaze, and an earth-brown band around her bronzed hair.
He realized she had done this to taunt him subtly, a reproof against his recent pose of coldness. She was well aware that he liked her best in these shades--that he saw her as a rustling of warm colors.
Nearby, more an outflanker than a member of the group, stood Duncan Idaho in glittering dress uniform, flat face unreadable, the curling black hair neatly combed. He had been summoned back from the Fremen and had his orders from Hawat--"Under pretext of guarding her, you will keep the Lady Jessica under constant surveillance. "
The Duke glanced around the room.
There was Paul in the corner surrounded by a fawning group of the younger Arrakeen richece, and, aloof among them, three officers of the House Troop. The Duke took particular note of the young women. What a catch a ducal heir would make. But Paul was treating all equally with an air of reserved nobility.
He'll wear the title well, the Duke thought, and realized with a sudden chill that this was another death thought.
Paul saw his father in the doorway, avoided his eyes. He looked around at the clusterings of guests, the jeweled hands clutching drinks (and the unobtrusive inspections with tiny remote-cast snoopers). Seeing all the chattering faces, Paul was suddenly repelled by them. They were cheap masks locked on festering thoughts--voices gabbling to drown out the loud silence in every breast.
I'm in a sour mood, he thought, and wondered what Gurney would say to that.
He knew his mood's source. He hadn't wanted to attend this function, but his father had been firm. "You have a place--a position to uphold. You're old enough to do this. You're almost a man."
Paul saw his father emerge from the doorway, inspect the room, then cross to the group around the Lady Jessica.
As Leto approached Jessica's group, the watershipper was asking: "Is it true the Duke will put in weather control?"
From behind the man, the Duke said: "We haven't gone that far in our thinking, sir."
The man turned, exposing a bland round face, darkly tanned. "Ah-h, the Duke," he said. "We missed you."
Leto glanced at Jessica. "A thing needed doing." He returned his attention to the watershipper, explained what he had ordered for the laving basins, adding: "As far as I'm concerned, the old custom ends now."
"Is this a ducal order, m'Lord?" the man asked.
"I leave that to your own... ah ... conscience," the Duke said. He turned, noting Kynes come up to the group.
One of the women said: "I think it's a very generous gesture--giving water to the--" Someone shushed her.
The Duke looked at Kynes, noting that the planetologist wore an old-style dark brown uniform with epaulets of the Imperial Civil Servant and a tiny gold teardrop of rank at his collar.
The watershipper asked in an angry voice: "Does the Duke imply criticism of our custom?"
"This custom has been changed," Leto said. He nodded to Kynes, marked the frown on Jessica's face, thought: A frown does not become her, but it'll increase rumors of friction between us.
"With the Duke's permission," the watershipper said, "I'd like to inquire further about customs."
Leto heard the sudden oily tone in the man's voice, noted the watchful silence in this group, the way heads were beginning to turn toward them around the room.
"Isn't it almost time for dinner?" Jessica asked.
"But our guest has some questions," Leto said. And he looked at the watershipper, seeing a round-faced man with large eyes and thick lips, recalling Hawat's memorandum: "... and this watershipper is a man to watch--Lingar Bewt, remember the name. The Harkonnens used him but never fully controlled him. "
"Water customs are so interesting," Bewt said, and there was a smile on his face. "I'm curious what you intend about the conservatory attached to this house. Do you intend to continue flaunting it in the people's faces... m'Lord?"
Leto held anger in check, staring at the man. Thoughts raced through his mind. It had taken bravery to challenge him in his own ducal castle, especially since they now had Bewt's signature over a contract of allegiance. The action had taken, also, a knowledge of personal power. Water was, indeed, power here. If water facilities were mined, for instance, ready to be destroyed at a signal.... The man looked capable of such a thing. Destruction of water facilities might well destroy Arrakis. That could well have been the club this Bewt held over the Harkonnens.
"My Lord, the Duke, and I have other plans for our conservatory," Jessica said. She smiled at Leto. "We intend to keep it, certainly, but only to hold it in trust for the people of Arrakis. It is our dream that someday the climate of Arrakis may be changed sufficiently to grow such plants anywhere in the open."
Bless her! Leto thought. Let our watershipper chew on that.
"Your interest in water and weather control is obvious," the Duke said. "I'd advise you to diversify your holdings. One day, water will not be a precious commodity on Arrakis."
And he thought: Hawat must redouble his efforts at infiltrating this Bewt's organization. And we must start on stand-by water facilities at once. No man is going to hold a club over my head!
Bewt nodded, the smile still on his face. "A commendable dream, my Lord." He withdrew a pace.
Leto's attention was caught by the expression on Kynes' face. The man was staring at Jessica. He appeared transfigured--like a man in love ... or caught in a religious trance.
Kynes' thoughts were overwhelmed at last by the words of prophecy: "And they shall share your most precious dream. " He spoke directly to Jessica: "Do you bring the shortening of the way?"
"Ah, Dr. Kynes," the watershipper said. "You've come in from tramping around with your mobs of Fremen. How gracious of you."
Kynes passed an unreadable glance across Bewt, said: "It is said in the desert that possession of water in great amount can inflict a man with fatal carelessness."
"They have many strange sayings in the desert," Bewt said, but his voice betrayed uneasiness.
Jessica crossed to Leto, slipped her hand under his arm to gain a moment in which to calm herself. Kynes had said: "...the shortening of the way." In the old tongue, the phrase translated as "Kwisatz Haderach." The planetologist's odd question seemed to have gone unnoticed by the others, and now Kynes was bending over one of the consort women, listening to a low-voiced coquetry.
Kwisatz Haderach, Jessica thought. Did our Missionaria Protectiva plant that legend here, too? The thought fanned her secret hope for Paul. He could be the Kwisatz Haderach. He could be.
The Guild Bank representative had fallen into conversation with the watershipper, and Bewt's voice lifted above the renewed hum of conversations: "Many people have sought to change Arrakis."
The Duke saw how the words seemed to pierce Kynes, jerking the planetologist upright and away from the flirting woman.
Into the sudden silence, a house trooper in uniform of a footman cleared his throat behind Leto, said: "Dinner is served, my Lord."
The Duke directed a questioning glance down at Jessica.
"The custom here is for host and hostess to follow their guests to table," she said, and smiled: "Shall we change that one, too, my Lord?"
He spoke coldly: "That seems a goodly custom. We shall let it stand for now."
The illusion that I suspect her of treachery must be maintained, he thought. He glanced at the guests filing past them. Who among you believes this lie?
Jessica, sensing his remoteness, wondered at it as she had done frequently the past week. He acts like a man struggling with himself, she thought. Is it because I moved so swiftly setting up this dinner party? Yet, he knows how important it is that we begin to mix our officers and men with the locals on a social plane. We are father and mother surrogate to them all. Nothing impresses that fact more firmly than this sort of social sharing.
Leto, watching the guests file past, recalled what Thufir Hawat had said when informed of the affair: "Sire! I forbid it!"
>
A grim smile touched the Duke's mouth. What a scene that had been. And when the Duke had remained adamant about attending the dinner, Hawat had shaken his head. "I have bad feelings about this, my Lord," he'd said. "Things move too swiftly on Arrakis. That's not like the Harkonnens. Not like them at all."
Paul passed his father escorting a young woman half a head taller than himself. He shot a sour glance at his father, nodded at something the young woman said.
"Her father manufactures stillsuits," Jessica said. "I'm told that only a fool would be caught in the deep desert wearing one of the man's suits."
"Who's the man with the scarred face ahead of Paul?" the Duke asked. "I don't place him."
"A late addition to the list," she whispered. "Gurney arranged the invitation. Smuggler."
"Gurney arranged?"
"At my request. It was cleared with Hawat, althought I thought Hawat was a little stiff about it. The smuggler's called Tuek, Esmar Tuek. He's a power among his kind. They all know him here. He's dined at many of the houses."
"Why is he here?"
"Everyone here will ask that question," she said. "Tuek will sow doubt and suspicion just by his presence. He'll also serve notice that you're prepared to back up your orders against graft--by enforcement from the smugglers' end as well. This was the point Hawat appeared to like."
"I'm not sure I like it." He nodded to a passing couple, saw only a few of their guests remained to precede them. "Why didn't you invite some Fremen?"
"There's Kynes," she said.
"Yes, there's Kynes," he said. "Have you arranged any other little surprises for me?" He led her into step behind the procession.
"All else is most conventional," she said.
And she thought: My darling, can't you see that this smuggler controls fast ships, that he can be bribed? We must have a way out, a door of escape from A rrakis if all else fails us here.
As they emerged into the dining hall, she disengaged her arm, allowed Leto to seat her. He strode to his end of the table. A footman held his chair for him. The others settled with a swishing of fabrics, a scraping of chairs, but the Duke remained standing. He gave a hand signal, and the house troopers in footman uniform around the table stepped back, standing at attention.
Dune Page 16
