Storeys from the Old Hotel

by Gene Wolfe

  He shook his head.

  “They showed this atoll where there had been a hydrogen bomb test years ago. The sea turtles come there every year to lay eggs, and when they came after the test the radiation made them forget, somehow, that they were supposed to go back to the ocean. They just kept crawling inland, crawling and crawling until they died in the jungle and their bodies rotted. The shells are still there, and the birds have build nests in some of them.” She looked intently for a moment at the spindly, white vine he showed her inside the maze. “It never blooms in there, does it?”

  “No,” he said, “it never blooms.”

  “I wonder what it looks like, to it, inside there.”

  “Like marble corridors, I suppose. As though it were walking down marble corridors.”

  The girl looked at him oddly, shifting her books on her hip.

  After she had gone he wondered why he had said what he had, even putting four plastic panels together and peering down the short passage they formed. The white plastic did not actually look a great deal like marble.

  On the bus he found himself still thinking of it, and forced himself to divert his attention, but everything he found to focus it on seemed worse. Newspaper headlines warned him of the air pollution he could see by merely looking through the windows of the bus, and the transistor radio of the man in the seat next to his told him that France, the world’s fifth-ranking nuclear power, had now joined the “total destruction club” by acquiring (like the United States, the Soviet Union; China, and Britain) enough hydrogen bombs to eliminate life on Earth. He looked at the man holding the radio, half tempted to make some bitter remark, but the man was blind and for some reason this made him turn away again.

  Once at home he worked on his book for an hour (Publish or Perish!), ate dinner, and spent the remainder of the evening watching television with his wife. They went to bed after the late news, but Smythe found he could not sleep. After an hour he got up, made himself a drink, and settled into his favorite chair to read.

  He was walking through an enormous building like a mausoleum, trailing behind him a sort of filmy green vapor insubstantial as mist. To either side of him doors opened showing gardens, or tables piled with food, or beds so large as to be nearly rooms themselves; but the doors opened only after he had gone a step beyond, and he could not turn back. At last he made a determined effort, turning around and flailing his arms as it if he were going to swim through the air back to one of the open doors—but the column of mist behind him which had seemed so insubstantial was now a green ram propelling him relentlessly down the corridor.

  He woke up sweating, and found that he had knocked his glass from the arm of his chair, spilling tepid water which had once been ice cubes over his crotch.

  He changed into dry pajamas and returned to bed, but he could not sleep again. When his wife got up the next morning she found him reading the paper, shaved and fully dressed. “You look chipper,” she said. “Sleep well?”

  He shook his head. “I hardly slept at all, really. I’ve been up most of the night.”

  She looked skeptical. “It doesn’t seem to have hurt you.”

  “It didn’t.” He turned a page of the paper. “I’ve got graduate counseling today—you know, suggesting topics for a thesis—and I’ve been thinking up ideas for them.”

  “You usually hate that,” his wife said.

  And he usually did, he reflected as he boarded his bus. But today, for almost the first time since that terrifying day (which he could not date) when he had wakened to find himself not only a man, but a man whose life had already, in its larger outlines, been decided in incompetency and idiocy by his father and the callow boy who had once been himself, he found he no longer regretted that his father had shattered forever the family tradition of diplomacy to become a small-town lawyer and leave his son a scholar’s career.

  What he was going to do he had decided in the dark hours while his wife and the city slept, but there were ramifications to be considered and possibilities to be guarded against. To propose a program was not nearly enough. He would have to sell it. To the head of the department, if at all possible. To as many of his fellow department members as he could; taking care to make no enemies, so that even those not in support were at least no worse than neutral. In time to the university administration and perhaps even to the public at large. But first of all to at least one intelligent graduate student. Two or three, preferably, but at least one; one without fail.

  He was ten minutes early reaching his office. He unlocked his desk and spent a few moments glancing over the list of prospective doctoral candidates who would be coming in to see him, but he was too excited to pay it proper attention—the names danced before his eyes and he threw it back into his in-box and instead arranged the chair in which the students would sit and squared the bronze plaque reading Dr. Smythe on his desk.

  Seated, he looked at the empty chair, imagining it filled already by an eager, and probably fearful, candidate. Graduate students complained eternally of the inattention, hostility, and indifference of their overloaded counselors, men who were expected to guide them, teach, do original research, write, and play faculty politics all at the same time; but his, he vowed, would have no reason to complain of him. Not this year. Not next year either. (He would not deceive himself about the time they would need.) Not the next. Nor the decade following.

  He did not have the slightest idea how it could be done. He admitted that honestly to himself, though he would never admit it to the student. But the student would. The student, the right student, would have a hundred utterly insane ideas, and he would talk them over with him, pointing out flaws and combining half-workable thoughts until they hit on something that might be tried, something to be guided by his experience and the student’s imagination.

  There was a shuffle of feet in the reception room and he stood up, setting his face in the proper expression of reserved friendliness; a few minutes later he was saying to an earnest young man in his visitor’s chair, “I’m quite certain it’s never been done before. Never even been attempted. It would give you something quite different from the usual business of checking someone else’s bad work.” The young man nodded and Smythe leaned back, timing his pause like an actor. “You see, the idea of para-intelligence in plants is so new that re-education—therapy, if you like, to a radiation-damaged instinct—has scarcely been dreamed of. And if we can learn to help children by studying rats, what might we not learn from plants when plants are analogs of whole societies?” He gestured toward the window and the threatened and choking world outside. “What you learn”—he strove to strike the right note—“might be widely applicable.”

  The young man nodded again, and for a moment Smythe saw something, a certain light, flicker in his expression. The green fingers of Smythe’s mind reached toward that light, ready to grasp whatever support he found and never let go.

  Trip, Trap

  GIANTS WERE FIGHTING IN THE SKY; the roar and crash of their weapons and the wind-scream of their strokes reverberated even on the echoless steppe where there was nothing to fling back sound between the Rock of the Caranth-Angor and the gorge of the Elbanda-Rhun, where the waters made their own thunder always, whether the sky-giants fought or slept. And those were as far apart as a hard-riding traveler might go in three days.

  The warriors had drawn their thick cloaks across their faces to protect them from the driving rain which was blown horizontally into their eyes, but their mounts had no such protection and stumbled forward scarcely faster than their riders could have walked. All were wet to the skin, cold, and nearly numb with fatigue. On an ordinary journey they would have halted hours ago, pitched their tents and waited out the storm in their sleeping robes. They did not do so now because they were going home, and because their leader, hurrying home too after three years of war, would not have permitted it.

  Suddenly a spark struck from some giant ax lit up the sky from horizon to horizon and in the trembling instant the w
ar leader saw far ahead the figure of a single rider spurring down the road as though blown by the storm. The leader watched him for a moment by the light of the flashes, then wheeled his animal to face his command—shouting to make himself heard above the wind. The warriors freed their short lances from the straps holding them to their pommels and fanned out to form an arc across the road. There was a chance, if only a chance, that the rider was a straggler from the enemy horde, trying to reach the fastness of his own country. Besides, they were soldiers, led by a hero, and would not be met like a gaggle of pedlars.

  The stranger made no attempt to evade them. Instead he came galloping into the center of their crescent and reined up before their commander. From his cloak he drew a rolled parchment covered with writing … .

  At the same moment Dr. Morton Melville Finch, Ph.D. (Extraterrestrial Archaeology), paused in the act of setting a coffeepot on his galley stove as he heard the communicator in the main cabin begin to chatter. With the percolator still in his hand, he crossed the galley to see what message had been hurled at his little ship across light-years of space.

  FROM: Prof. John Beatty

  Edgemont Inst., Earth

  TO: Dr. M. M. Finch

  UNworld spcrft MOTH (Reg #387760)

  Congratulations again on attaining your degree!

  Morton, I know you have planned to make this trip of yours a pleasure cruise before taking up your teaching duties here, but I have come across something so extraordinary, and so perfectly in your line, that I feel sure you will forgive an old man for trying to interrupt your jaunt.

  There, I’ve given the whole thing away before I meant to. That is always the way with us old diggers; we turn up the funeral ornaments when we pitch the tents, then get nothing for years, like as not.

  I doubt if you’ve ever heard of Carson’s Sun, Morton; it is Sol type, but its habitable planet has been off-limits for colonization and trade because of a native race with too much intelligence to be counted mere animals (human-level intelligence in fact) and too little technology for their culture to hold its own in trade. It is open to scientific expeditions, however, although it appears that none have ever gone there.

  Now I have a correspondent, a W. H. Wilson, who is a captain in the merchant service. He is one of those enthusiastic amateurs who have contributed so much to our little corner of learning. Knows enough to spot a find when he comes across one and keeps his eyes peeled.

  Well, it seems that Wilson picked up a distress call from a life-craft on his last trip out. I doubt if I need tell you now, Morton, that it came from the habitable planet of Carson’s Sun.

  It seems that a spaceman who escaped the wreck of the Magna Vega (you may remember that it was originally thought that no one survived) was able to get his craft to Carson in. He spent a year and a half there before Wilson picked up his call. Naturally—or perhaps not so naturally, how many merchant skippers would have done as much?—Wilson questioned him about his experiences with the natives. I am forwarding Wilson’s full report to you, together with language tapes, but the important point is this: a number of the symbols used in writing the native language are identical with the ones found on those unclassifiable porcelain shards from Ceta II which furnished you with such fine material for your doctoral dissertation! The points of correspondence are too numerous and too complete for this to be coincidence. I truly feel that Man has at last found evidence of a preceding interstellar technology.

  Morton, I would never have thought it possible for me to be so happy for a man I envy as whole-souledly as I do you. A few months’ investigation on Carson III may furnish you with a reputation which will make you a department head at thirty-five. Don’t let this get past you.

  Yours in hope,

  J. Beatty

  JB/sl

  The war chieftain had watched with impassive patience while his followers erected a tent for him using poles whose terminals were skillfully carved and painted to represent the heads of beasts, and a soft leather covering impregnated with oil. Only when this was up and his chief lieutenant had kindled a fire using stone and steel and tinder from a hoarded packet near his skin was he able to read the scroll.

  His Supremacy the Protector of the West Lands bids this be written to Garth the Son of Garth, Holder of the High Justice:

  Know that there came some days ago to our court a party of traders returned from the north. Their leader tells us that in passing through some deserted vales of that land he beheld scratched upon boulders appeals for aid from any of the West People who should pass that way. Proceeding, as the scratchings directed him, to a cave in those hills he found a poor waif once apprenticed to the scribe of the Lord Naid the Son of Kartl who, as you know, rode into that country three seasons ago and has never returned or sent any word to us who loved his valor.

  This boy recounts that his master’s party was set upon by one of the wild tribes who rove that land, and that his master and all save himself were slain. The lad’s tale grieves us much, though we had feared the Lord Naid had deserted our cause, taking the gifts we had given him to bear to the Protector of the Grey Lands as our pledge of friendship.

  This ill news came only as another knot in the tangle of that land. While our swords have been hot with war here the evils in the north have grown bold. The lesser Protectors of that land have been loud in lamentations to us of late.

  Those who pay us tribute have a right to our protection, and no warriors of the West Men have been seen in those lands now for many seasons. Thus the gold and enamel work due us have been slow to come. Now that the West Lands are again at peace it comes to us that it is time the north country feel again the strength of the West People’s hand. Nay, that our grasp stretch farther than ever before. Thus it would be well for you to take up the dignity of Watcher of the North Marches, which you have earned by the blows you have struck for us, and go to that land with such of your people as seem well to you and hold the land for your Protector. Aid our tributaries and prove our strength to such as may dispute you. Accept no excuses from those who owe us for past years; rather urge that payment be sent at once, nor should you leave their domains until it is forthcoming.

  Should you chance upon that hoard which the Lord Naid bore for us—such chances often come to the brave——or should you discern the spoor it has left in passing—as the astute may sometimes do—take it; use force always when force is needed.

  Go then quickly as you may. Work our will as we have told you and your reward shall be just.

  Let not your scribe be idle, but send couriers to teach us how you fare.

  Klexo the Scribe hath written this for the PROTECTOR.

  When the scroll was rolled again and tied, the war chieftain spoke briefly to his waiting lieutenants, his voice almost lost in the howling wind and pounding rain outside. The scarred faces in the firelight looked pleased in a grim fashion.

  Garth, the Son of Garth, Holder of the High Justice, Watcher of the North Marches, bids this be written to the Protector of the West Lands:

  Know that as you commanded I have removed myself and the braver of my people to these northern hills. Many of my people were unwilling to go, owning to the evil repute of these lands, but the braver have followed me as I say, and it is them I shall have need of. Now hear me say as I have seen.

  After fording the bitter waters of Elbanda-Rhun and tramping the wastelands ten days we came to the lands of Your Supremacy’s tributary the Protector of Jana. The city is of goodly size with a wall well built and a good strong-house on an eminence overlooking all. The Protector (so he styles himself)) boasts he could call full five hundred men to his banner at the last extremity, though it may be he draws the bow over far.

  We were welcomed with much joy by the Protector and entertained with feasting and hunting for several days. It soon came to me, however, that he wished more of us than our merry company. Often I sought to draw him out, but he resisted me politely and seemed to await his own time to tell his thought. While we thus tarri
ed I exercised myself to discover all the ways of this Northland, where many things differ from our own country and there are a thousand old family blood-wars and tangled allegiances which must be known and considered ere one act. On the eighth day that we were at Jana, when we were riding back after a hunt I began to question the Protector about these and other things and found him well disposed to talk. He told me of the wildness of the country and the many evil things that still inhabit it; then, just as he seemed ready to tell his own tale, whatever it might be, we came upon a strange, uncouthly clad person perched on a stone beside the road …

  FROM: M. M. Finch Ph.D.

  TO: Prof. John Beatty, Edgemont Inst. Earth.

  Professor, it is with feelings of triumph that I transmit this, my first communication to the scientific world as represented by yourself from an actual site. And a promising one too. Not a full-fledged digging site as yet, but that is sure to come in time. Meanwhile, let me tell you what I have found thus far.

  After completing an aerial survey of the planet I decided to land Moth in an unfrequented area and conceal it as well as I could. It was a temptation, of course, to use it to impress the natives in order to secure their cooperation; however, I knew that I would have to leave it eventually, and the prospect of having it cast into some lake as a devil’s carriage was not attractive. Also, I thought it best to get some first-hand knowledge of the natives and their customs before I demonstrated all the power of Confederation technology.

  My survey had shown that the northwest edge of the principal continent was sparsely settled, so I landed there in a clearing surrounded by dense vegetation; before coming down I had noted carefully the position of a crude village within walking distance. Upon landing I hid Moth and set the cabin communicator to relay the signals of my handset. A vigorous hike brought me to an unpaved road and after following that for about a mile I encountered a party of mounted natives.