The Light That Never Was

by Lloyd Biggle, Jr.

  “When I was three years old I watched one eat my mother and two sisters. Donov doesn’t know animaloids, because none of them are native here, but I could tell you a few things about them. Come to the meeting, and I will.”

  “Sure,” Brance said. “We’ll be there.”

  The artist hurried away. Milfro asked, “Who’s he?”

  “Wes Alof. Native of Xeniol.”

  “Any good?”

  “I haven’t seen his work. He has a wealthy patron, or so they say he’s never short of money.”

  “What kind of animaloids do they have on Xeniol?”

  “No idea. Animaloids come in all shapes, sizes, and dispositions, just like humans, and no doubt Xeniol drew a rather vicious sort.”

  “Will anyone pay attention to him?”

  “Half the artists on Zrilund owe him money and have every expectation of owing more. Of course they’ll pay attention. Whether they’ll do anything is another question.”

  “Are you actually going to the meeting?”

  “I’m curious,” Brance said. “And I’m liking this situation less and less.”

  They presented themselves at the theater door that evening, and the two artists in attendance there eyed them suspiciously. “You’re no artist,” one of them told Brance. “You’re a lousy towny.” He turned to Milfro. “This is for Zrilund artists. You don’t qualify.”

  “Nonsense,” Brance said. “We were invited.”

  “By whom?”

  “Wes Alof.”

  “He hasn’t been on Donov long enough to know all the spies and deadbeats. Both of you are on the list of artists that gave lessons to the meszs. Fine favor you did for Donov’s artists. Bust off.”

  Brance and Milfro exchanged glances, shrugged, and turned away. As they walked back to the oval Milfro said, “First the townspeople and now the artists. I’m beginning not to like this myself. Do you Suppose we ought to warn Jorno about what’s happening up here?”

  “I was wondering about that. In a sense we’re just as responsible for bringing the meszs here as he is, and I’ve never met anyone who was such a joy to work with. The question is what we’d warn him about. Right now all we could tell him is that some people on Zrilund don’t like him, and he’d probably answer that the whole world of Mestil doesn’t care for him either, and so what? All of this may be nothing but a loud noise in a small adde keg. If necessary, we’ll make a couple of artists drunk tomorrow and find out what went on at the meeting. Let’s go see Hylat.”

  They stayed late with Rearm Hylat, talking and sampling different kinds of adde, and when Brance boasted that a new keg he had from Nor Harbor was the best of the lot, Hylat decided to come along with them and have a mug. Along the way they encountered a group of artists.

  Brance halted them. “What happened at the meeting?”

  “They took up a collection,” one of the artists said. “Alof and some others are going to raid Jorno’s resort.”

  “Are you sober?” Brance demanded.

  “No, but I’m telling the truth. I don’t think the collection brought them much, but Alof wouldn’t need money anyway.”

  Brance exchanged worried looks with Milfro and Hylat. “What does Alof think a few artists could accomplish trying a foolish stunt like that?”

  “He knows someone who has access to explosives. They’re going to blow up Jorno’s resort and maybe the meszs along with it. At least, that’s the way they talked. There was a vote, but I don’t think anyone bothered to make a tally. They just thanked us for our overwhelming support.”

  “The fools!” Brance muttered.

  “When are they going?” Milfro asked.

  “Tonight. Alof hired a fishing boat to take them to the mainland, and they had their connections all worked out. They expected to have the job done before morning.”

  Hylat said disgustedly, “I’ve seen artists do a lot of stupid things, but I can’t believe they’d be so stupid as to vote support for anything as stupid as that.”

  “The vote didn’t matter anyway,” the artist said. “Alof already had the plans made. I didn’t think much of the idea myself, but it was none of my business.”

  “How many artists did Alof take with him?”

  “I dunno. At least a dozen.”

  The artists moved on. Brance said, “If there’s no warning, a dozen men with explosives could do a horrible amount of damage. We’d better get a message to Jorno, and fast.”

  They hurried to the com center, where they found the fat com agent hopping about in a frenzy of excitement. “Some artist I never saw before,” he blurted. “Walked in—just like that—and started cutting wires. Opened the cases and kicked and stomped. Then he walked out. The damage is terrible.”

  “You mean there’s no communications with the mainland?”

  The com agent raised both hands forlornly.

  “When will you have them fixed?” Brance demanded.

  “When the boat comes tomorrow morning, I’ll send a report to Nor Harbor, and then—”

  Brance turned to the others. “We’ve got to get a message to Jorno tonight.”

  “Alof hired a fishing boat,” Milfro said. “You’re the millionaire—why don’t you hire a fishing boat?”

  “I’ve already sent to Fish Town,” the com agent said. “The fleet is out, and there aren’t any boats available. If there were, I’d report this outrage tonight. How am I going to print the morning mail?”

  “Alof made his arrangements before the fleet left,” Brance said. “He planned this real well.”

  “That artist didn’t say what time they were leaving, did he?” Hylat asked. He went on apologetically, “Alof probably arranged for the boat to meet them at the ferry pier, and if they haven’t left yet—”

  Brance turned and ran. He heard footsteps pounding behind him, but he did not look back. He rushed up the path and past the wrranel-cart pavilion and halted at the top of the steps that led down to the ferry pier.

  The pier was deserted, and the gently heaving sea was empty to the horizon under the double light of Donov’s moons.

  14

  Brance took the morning boat to Nor Harbor and placed a call to Jaward Jorno. After an interminable wait Jorno’s face appeared, and Brance blurted, “Did anything happen last night?”

  Jorno eyed him perplexedly. “What was supposed to happen?”

  Brance explained. “It seemed too idiotic to be believed,” he said, “but I was afraid it might succeed for just that reason.”

  “No, nothing happened. We’ll be watching for them. Thanks.” Jorno paused. “Have you told anyone about this? Has there been a police report?”

  “There aren’t any police on Zrilund. I’m on my way to see the Nor Harbor commander, but I wanted to check with you first.”

  “I have a suggestion. Let me handle it from here. If word gets around Zrilund that you took this tale to the police, your popularity might suffer. Your life might be in danger. Equally serious, the next time those idiots plot something you’ll be the last to know about it. I’d rather you knew it first and told me.”

  “I hadn’t thought of that. All right, I’ll leave the police to you.”

  “Splendid. I think it might be a good idea to put you on my payroll.”

  “I’d rather you didn’t. Several of us—well, we got rather fond of your meszs, and we’re pleased to do what we can for them.”

  Jorno smiled. “I like it that way even better. I’ll send money for your expenses and keep in touch with you. If you have anything at all that you want me to know, place a call. If I’m not here, leave the message and your name with anyone who answers. Whatever action seems called for will be taken.”

  His image faded. Brance returned to Zrilund on the underwater ferry and cautioned Milfro and Hylat about speaking to the police.

  The police were already on the scene, along with com repairmen from Nor Harbor, and they were making fumbling efforts to identify the artist who assaulted the com equipment. Late that
afternoon they came to see Brance. He told them he knew nothing about it except that he’d gone to the com center to make a call and hadn’t been able to.

  Wes Alof and all but one of the artists who had accompanied him returned that day on the last ferry. They tread a tight-lipped path to their quarters, not even speaking to artists they met along the way, and it wasn’t until several days later that Brance found out what had happened.

  “It’s just that we got to thinking,” one of the conspirators told him. “We really couldn’t see that blowing up Virrab would help us. We weren’t complaining because Jorno started a new resort—the more resorts Donov has the better. We were complaining because there’d be a demand for Virrab paintings and we’d be shut out. Blowing the place up would spoil it for all the artists, including us. So we pooled all the money and bought the best camera we could find, and we sent Ezer Molm to Virrab for a week as a tourist. He’s taking all the Virrab Island walking tours, over and over, and he’s photographing every scenic view from every possible angle. When he gets back we’ll rent the theater and set up enlargements of his photographs, and anyone who wants to can paint Virrab scenes.”

  Brance reported this development to Jaward Jorno, and Jorno all but laughed himself off the screen. “You mean you don’t care?” Brance demanded.

  “Why should I care? Souvenirs on sale at Zrilund can’t hurt the market for genuine art, and every painting they turn out will publicize my resort! But they do have a valid complaint. I only wish they’d come to me with it in the first place. We’ll have to set up accommodations for visiting artists.”

  Brance strolled back to his house and told Gof Milfro that Jaward Jorno was an immensely wise man.

  Milfro remained with Brance long enough to see the Virrab painting factory in operation, and then he left for Verna Plai shaking his head in disgust. The novelty of the new scenes produced a temporary rush of sales for all except the small coterie of artists led by Wes Alof, who refused to participate.

  Alof sought out Brance at the Zrilund Town Hostel one day and joined him uninvited. “I heard they wouldn’t let you in at the meeting, that night,” he said in a low voice.

  Brance shrugged. “They said I wasn’t an artist. I’m not.”

  Alof eyed him narrowly. He was a small man, and he had an unusual girth for an artist—the measure of a patron’s generosity was the artist’s waistline—and his round face carried a perennially angry Rush. “One of the boys told you about the meeting,” he said.

  Brance shrugged again.

  “Everyone was sworn to secrecy,” Alof said bitterly, “but there’s always one who’ll blab. Point is, you weren’t sworn to secrecy, you weren’t even at the meeting. The police talked with you the next day and you didn’t tell them a thing.”

  “Why should I? I don’t owe the police anything.”

  “I think you got the wrong idea about us. We weren’t going to harm anyone, or even do any damage except what we couldn’t help. The object was to make a big enough bang to draw people’s attention to the menace of animaloids on Donov. Very few people even know that they’re here.”

  “That’s true,” Brance agreed. “There’s been remarkably little public mention of them.”

  “That’s the whole point.” Alof pointed a finger scornfully. “You know, because you’re one of the artists that gave them art lessons. Does your conscience bother you?”

  “Why should it? Jorno isn’t the kind who’d tell his plans to a bunch of artists. He hired us to do a job, and paid us, and we earned our money. How were we to know why he wanted the meszs to have art lessons?”

  “I hadn’t thought of that,” Alof said. He got to his feet. “I’m glad I talked with you. We’re having a meeting tonight. Private room at the Swamp Hut. Will you come?”

  “What’s the meeting about?”

  “We want the Artists’ Council to blacklist the artists at Virrab Island.”

  “What do you have against the Virrab artists?”

  Alof’s flush deepened. “Working with animaloids. Helping Jorno put over this new resort that was built from top to bottom by animaloids.”

  “I see. When I accepted your other invitation, they wouldn’t let me in.”

  “They’ll let you in this time. There’s work to be done, and a hefty specimen like yourself will be useful. Also, you’ve proved you can keep your mouth shut.”

  “I’ll think about it,” Brance said.

  Alof left, and Rearm Hylat gloomily strolled over and took his place. “What are they plotting now?” he asked.

  “More of the same, only they’re trying to do it legally. They want the Artists’ Council to expel the Virrab artists.”

  Hylat said disgustedly, “Zrilund’s merchants are paying an attorney good money to look for an excuse to challenge Jorno’s resort licenses, and they’ve succeeded in holding up his application for membership in the League of Resort Operators. That kind of piddling harassment can’t hurt Jorno, and it won’t help them a bit. Any tourists they keep away from Virrab won’t necessarily come here.

  “So I wrote to Jorno. I told him maybe he wasn’t aware that his assistant was going about saying that Virrab would put Zrilund out of business, which has deeply disturbed people hereabouts. I told him the two resorts ought to be working together instead of knocking each other. They should be displaying each other’s brochures and pushing the fact that two art resorts are a better reason for visiting Donov than one would be.”

  “Very well put. Did he answer you?”

  “Of course. Like you once said, he’s an uncommonly wise man. He agreed with everything I said, and he apologized for his assistant’s excessive enthusiasm. He even offered to finance a joint advertising venture, and he suggested a new association for resorts connected with art colonies. It’s a wonderful idea, it would help everyone, but do you think I can convince these idiots to co-operate? I get hooted down, and they go right ahead with their silly little harassments. None of this matters to you, I suppose. You’re neither an artist nor a businessman.”

  “I’m a resident of this lousy town, and I own a farm on this swampy island, and though I consider all tourists a damned nuisance, I have to admit that they’re essential to my comfort. I enjoy dropping in at a comfortable hostel for a good meal, and if it weren’t for the tourists this would be a ghost town. I wouldn’t even be able to laugh at these alleged artists.”

  “All right. You come to the meetings with me, and then there’ll be two votes for common sense—though I still can’t see that it makes any difference to you personally.”

  “You businessmen are too accustomed to measuring things with account books. The reason I want Zrilund to thrive is because I love the old place.”

  Arnen Brance had a caller, a neat, friendly-looking young man who handed him a note from Lester Harnasharn and said nothing at all.

  “Dear Arnen,” Brance read. “This introduces Karlus Gair. I assure you that he is completely trustworthy, and I have assured him that you are the same. Sincerely, Lester.”

  “Odd sort of communication,” Brance remarked. “Come in and sit down. Have some adde.”

  Gair accepted the chair but politely declined the adde, “I haven’t much time,” he said. “I think I got here without being seen, and I’d like to leave the same way. I’m connected with a special branch of the police. Certain things are happening here that have us highly concerned. We have no local agent, and if we were to send a professional to a place like this he’d be much too conspicuous to do us any good. We need a reliable local person who’ll keep us informed.”

  Brance kept a firm leash on his anger. “You want me to be a police spy. Sorry. I’m not against spying in a good cause, but I’m against police spying.”

  “Do you know an artist named Wes Alof?”

  “In Zrilund Town, everyone knows everyone.”

  “We have good reason to think that Wes Alof is a professional espionage agent of an alien power. Does your aversion to police spying include spyin
g on spies?”

  Brance did not answer. Gair took a folder from an inside pocket and began passing photographs to Brance. Brance scrutinized each one and shook his head. “Who are they?” he asked finally.

  “Employees of a woman named Ronony Gynth, who is in charge of espionage on Donov for the world of Mestil.”

  “And—you let her?”

  “Of course. We’d rather have spies who are old friends, they’re much easier to keep track of, and unless they do something flagrantly illegal we merely watch them carefully. This Mestil group may now be involved in something flagrantly illegal. You don’t recognize any of them?”

  Brance shook his head. “Of course if they came here as tourists—I never pay attention to tourists.”

  Gair nodded. “It also could be that they have nothing to do with it. Or it could be that Ronony Gynth has a large staff of people we don’t know and is clever enough to keep it that way. Have there been any rumors on Zrilund concerning artists stealing from townspeople?”

  “Certainly not! Nothing like that has ever happened here.”

  “Then you didn’t know that all over Donov there’s been a plague of thefts by people wearing artist clothing?”

  “No, and I don’t believe it. Artists aren’t thieves.”

  “No, but there’s nothing to prevent thieves from dressing like artists—which is what these thieves have been doing. We’ve caught a number of them, we know they aren’t artists. We also know that someone has sent them here to impersonate artists and cause trouble between artists and the citizens of Donov, and they’ve managed to make much of the rural population of Donov angry with our artists. Naturally we’d like to know what world is responsible. Mestil and Sornor are obvious possibilities, but Donov may have enemies it isn’t aware of—worlds whose resorts compete with ours, for example. There’s another factor. There were riots between humans and animaloids on twenty-four worlds. They followed a time sequence, and if you study a star chart you’ll see that Donov should have been the twenty-fifth world, except that Donov has no native animaloids. Donov does have artists. Frankly, these efforts to turn our citizens against the artists worry us.”