The Garments of Caean

by Barrington J. Bayley

  The two animals squared off, their baffle-tubes rising and arranging themselves. The shouter’s sounding-horn gaped.

  And Peder was flung back among the trees by the shock wave that resulted.

  The monitoring speaker inside his suit let out a rasping noise. A strong, steady succession of peaks and troughs marched across the oscilloscope. He heard the sound generator coming into action, desperately trying to counteract the deadly, regular waves of compression and rarefaction.

  Peder felt that some of it was getting through. Something seemed to be seizing his guts and turning them inside out. But it was not altogether a painful experience and he was able to watch what was happening with full clarity of mind. The smaller animal had extended long bony flaps like a ruff about its neck and these ablated or broke off before the assault of lethal sound, carrying away the effect of it. Both animals, it seemed, simply stood their ground and shouted infra-sound at one another. Judging from the oscilloscoped trace and the sonic analogue (the speaker had recovered, now, and was giving him a regular ululating yowl), they constantly varied their pitch, each seeking the frequency that would shatter the other.

  Then the smaller, three-trumpeted animal began to sag. Cracks appeared in its armour; it trembled like jelly.

  And suddenly it collapsed to the ground, its skin rupturing and spilling blood and intestines through jagged rents in a dermal wall that must have been all of a foot thick.

  ‘What’s going on down there?’ came Mast’s insistent voice.

  ‘Quiet!’ hissed Peder, as though the shouter could hear them. He was, in fact, frightened out of his wits.

  Looking around itself once more, the shouter pointed its square horn to the sky and gave vent to a great infrasound roar of victory. Then it stamped its feet up and down and turned about, as if affirming that the area was its own. Peder guessed that he had just witnessed a fight over territory.

  Looking around itself once more, the shouter pointed its snout at a big boulder, perhaps ten feet high, some distance away. Its sound chute strained forward on its thick neck. Peder’s scope and speaker came through strong.

  And the boulder exploded into dust. With that demonstration of its might, the shouter lumbered back to its lair.

  As concisely as he could, Peder related what he had seen. ‘If I’m standing in the path of that sound beam,’ he concluded, ‘I’ve had it. You’ve chosen the wrong man for this caper, Mast. Send the lighter down. I want to come up!’

  ‘No lighter until you’ve finished the job,’ Mast answered firmly. ‘Take hold of yourself, now.’

  A cold wind swept through Peder’s vitals. In the humming, clicking suit, he realized he was sweating – a cold, clammy sweat.

  ‘But what if the shouter sees me?’

  ‘You’ve got your gun, haven’t you? Just make sure you get your shot in before it opens its mouth.’

  Peder’s hand moved unconsciously to the grip-hole that operated the heavy-duty energy rifle. He sighed.

  A rustling sound made him turn. Shouldering its way through the ground-level shrubs came an animal about the size of a rabbit. He was fascinated to see that it reproduced on a small scale the same baffle-tube and head-trumpet arrangement of its more massive cousins. It made him realize that he had not yet made a real inspection of his surroundings at close quarters. He extended an arm and carefully pulled away some of the brush.

  More small animals scurried away at his touch, some turning their heads momentarily to hurl at him beams of vibrations which were easily cancelled by his suit.

  Looking overhead, he glimpsed a winged creature squatting on a branch, heavily rigged with scale-like feathers and bearing a conical trumpet in place of a beak. It peered down at Peder, then launched itself into the air and flapped clumsily away.

  Peder’s gaze fastened on the bark of the tree itself; insects could be seen crawling about on it. Turning up the magnification he made out several varieties, many of them top-heavy with various devices for casting vibrations. The frequencies with which creatures of this size battled could scarcely be called infra-sound at all, of course; they would intrude into the sonic range.

  He reminded himself that he had not yet exploited all the suit’s capabilities. He considered opening the direct audio link for a brief listen, but almost immediately cancelled the thought. The scene looked peaceful enough; but to let into the suit, even for a few seconds, any of the stray vibrations of infra-sound that he suspected pounded at all times through this woodland could prove fatal, or at least cause him serious internal injury.

  Instead, he switched on the odour plate. Connected to a corresponding plate on the outside of the suit, it reproduced all the odours that struck that plate, automatically omitting any that could be poisonous. A resinous, fresh smell entered Peder’s nostrils. He was reminded vaguely of a pine forest, except that this was more tangy and contained many altogether foreign undertones, some sweet, some repugnant. It seemed odd that a world so lethal and alien could, at the same time, smell so natural and familiar.

  He switched off the plate. The smell, he decided, would become too cloying after a time, and besides he was here for something more serious. He began to consider how to cross the territory that apparently was guarded by the shouter.

  After some hesitation he decided that his best bet was to advance through the trees away from the beast’s lair, and make his way down the next step of the gorge behind the cover of some rocks. This he managed with only moderate difficulty, encountering some medium-sized animals which snarled low-frequency vibrations at him in a half-hearted manner, but desisted when he retreated. Only occasionally did he feel the protective capacity of his suit was being pressed to the limit, and he had no occasion to use the energy rifle.

  It was impossible to move stealthily in the baffle suit. He crashed through brush and, once or twice as he careened down the slope, lurched into a tree. Then he broke through a screen of matted creeper-like vegetation and found himself on the lip of the gorge’s deepest crevasse.

  And there it was.

  The crashed Caeanic spaceship had, he guessed, first hit the farther edge of the gorge a glancing blow, and then had bounced full-length into the crevasse where it now rested, filling it almost entirely. His eyes raked over the unfamiliar, alien lines – insofar as he could ascertain them amid the damage – and discerned a domed, semi-transparent guidance section, drive section, and a long, amply curved cargo section.

  The ship must have come down at least partly under its own power, for the damage from impact was not all that great. The fauna of Kyre had done all the rest. The whole structure of the vessel had been broken open, shattered and cracked, by infra-sound. Through the vents Peder could see its structured interior, also crumbled and broken. Its cargo, though, should be intact.

  ‘I’ve found it,’ he clipped tersely to the Costa. ‘It’s in the gorge, as I said. Pretty badly broken up. I’m going inside.’

  ‘That’s my boy,’ said Mast ingratiatingly. ‘I told you you could do it.’

  He picked his way down the overgrown slope and clambered through a rip in the hull large enough to take him. To his mind came the sketch that Mast had shown him (obtained, again, by some devious, unspoken means) of a typical Caeanic transport’s layout. This section of corridor he was in must be one of those running the length of the ship just under its skin. He had entered close to the nose; opening a door to his left, he found himself looking into the main astrogation dome. The crystal canopy was in shreds, of course; reclining in semi-lounge control chairs were the decaying bodies of the ship’s officers. Probably they had lost consciousness at the moment of impact and had been killed by infrasound before recovering.

  Peder cast an interested eye over their rakishly smart uniforms, so strange to him, and then withdrew. Decomposing human beings were not something his stomach could take too well.

  He lumbered sternwards. Any minute now, he told himself. His heart began to thump with excitement as he thought of what lay so close.
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  He entered the first cargo section.

  It was only a small hold, designed to store minor items. Its contents, now, had been thrown from their racks and were tumbled about in profusion. A little light entered through the broken roof. Peder switched on his suit lamp to provide more. His breath caught in his throat.

  Hats!

  Colours glowed; elegant shapes hypnotized his senses in the beam of the lamp. Hats of myriad descriptions: hats, caps, berets and bonnets; toques, trilbies and titfers; chaperons, chaplets, cornets and coifs.

  Soft-crowned hats, stiff-crowned hats, low-crowned and high-crowned; feathered, plumed, winged and gauzed; bicorne and tricorne; boaters and bowlers, homburgs and turbans; gorgets, cowls and hoods; helmets, galeas and aegeas.

  And these were just the hats!

  Peder picked one up and held the sleek titfer at head level. He recognized the touch when he saw it. The cloth was like no other, the line, the design – the creativity – had the unmistakable flair found in only one part of the galaxy. This hat would do something for a man, would make him feel different, act different.

  ‘Send the lighter down,’ he said to the Costa. ‘I’m ready to start loading.’

  Mast had been right. The ship was loaded to the roof with freight of inestimable value: the clothes of Caean.

  At one time they had been called tailors. Peder’s father had been a tailor. And on Peder’s home world – Harlos – as indeed on many worlds of the Ziode Cluster they were still referred to as tailors. But that was because in Ziode vestments did not have the esteem that, in Peder’s view, they deserved. He, like others of his ilk, called himself a sartorial, and his was not a trade but a profession.

  Twice before he had been privileged to handle garments from that strange, clothes-conscious civilization, Caean. They had been a brief, damasked gipon, and a simple flowered cravat, no more. But even then he had been captivated, entranced, and had realized that all the legends concerning Caean were true.

  The Caeanic worlds occupied a section of a galactic spiral arm known as the Tzist Arm. It was a well-defined arm with a regular curve and nearly empty space on either side of it. The Ziode Cluster, looking like a sudden burst of sparks, was situated somewhere near the focus of this curve, but contact between the two political systems had been slight over the past few centuries and mostly confined to guarded hostility. The Cluster did not understand the ways of Caean; and Caean, for its part, was aloof and unyielding in its attitude towards raggedly dressed foreigners.

  In Caean clothes were not merely an adornment but a philosophy, a way of life – the way of life. Even Peder Forbarth knew that he failed to grasp the fullness of this philosophy, try as he might; officially, in the Cluster, the covering of the body was of no importance and it was even sanctioned to go naked. But even there, despite any amount of official disapproval, the love of clothing – one of man’s oldest arts – flourished and Caeanic articles were recognized for the consummate, sublime treasures that they were. In point of fact it was illegal to import, sell, or even possess a garment from Caean, and very few of them had ever crossed the black gulf of light years; but those few fetched fabulous prices.

  In crossing from one extremity to the other of Caeanic territory, trading vessels entered the gulf defined by the Tzist Arm and traced a chord between the two points. In doing so they were, at mid-point, about half-way to Ziode. And somewhere in that region, where one of these trading vessels had suffered some accident and elected to try for a planet-fall, the planet Kyre orbited its lonely primary.

  And Mast had heard about it.

  Legally the cargo still belonged to the Caeanic trading company that owned the ship, but none of them felt much concern over that. Peder pressed forward through the Hat Hold and nearly swooned at the delights that awaited him in the larger compartments: coats, trousers, breeches, shirts, shoes, and many garments that defied Peder’s vocabulary. Then Mast warned him that the lighter was on its way and he hurried outside to guide it down to a spot where he could most easily carry the merchandise aboard.

  In his enthusiasm, Peder once more began to feel admiration for Mast. He had managed everything superbly. For one thing, bringing Peder along was a master stroke; they couldn’t possibly carry away the whole hoard and only someone of Peder Forbarth’s knowledge and experience – he flattered himself that, though little-known, he was perhaps the best sartorial on Harlos – could choose the best prizes from this feast of splendour.

  Having guided down the lighter he began selecting garments from the racks, scurrying with armloads to the dumpy little craft and piling them neatly in the small hold. His brain was forced to work as quickly as his hands, discarding the merely superb and taking only the super-excellent. Raiment that otherwise would have had him gasping with pleasure was now carelessly thrust aside, making him feel almost as though he was despoiling something sacred.

  He sent up three lighter loads and then entered a compartment that, after a brief examination, had him wishing that he had examined the whole cargo before beginning the selection. At first he doubted his judgement; but then, feeling the material, its texture that seemed to bring the nerves and blood more alive than before, the dazzling twills, damasks, displays and culverts into which it could be woven, he decided that there could be no other explanation. This was the fabled fabric which no one in Ziode was absolutely sure existed. Even of those who had heard of it, not all knew its name. Peder had heard it called ‘Prossim’.

  If this was Prossim – Peder was sure now that it was – then he must take every scrap of it that the ship contained, even if it meant throwing out the loads he had already ferried up to the Costa. He didn’t think that would be necessary, though. This compartment probably held all there was. Even in Caean Prossim was reputed to be rare, fine and costly, the stuff of kings, of arcane, mystic dressers. An aura of Caeanic occultism surrounded it, although Peder was not sure why. He only knew that a garment made of Prossim, whoever the maker, was ten times the garment that was made of anything else.

  He said nothing to Mast immediately, but got busy emptying out the compartment. Its contents made up barely one lighter load, but when he was gathering up the last armful he noticed a small door in one corner which was unlabelled. Thinking that it might be a cupboard with a few more small items, he opened it, and despite his haste stood stock still for at least five minutes.

  The chamber semed, at first, out of proportion to its content. It was a largish chamber, almost a room, and hanging in it was a single suit.

  And yet, as one gazed at it, the arrangement was not so disproportionate after all. The suit seemed to command the space around it, to require it, much as a person requires space for comfort. Peder chuckled to himself softly. Some personally valued set of apparel, perhaps, or the private attire of an exalted personage. There was no knowing what customs the Caeanics observed in such matters.

  For some reason he did not merely take the suit but continued to stand gazing at it. To begin with it looked like an unpresumptuous suit, the colours muted, the cut consummate but modest. And yet, while he stood there, the impression it made upon him grew. He realized that the subtle flares in trousers and jacket were executed with genius and displayed, to those who could see it, an electric, confident élan. The coloration seemed no longer matt, but to be radiant with eye-defying patterns. The more he looked, the harder he found it to brush aside a stupefying possibility. Finally he stepped forward, extended a waldo arm reverently, and lifted the skirt of the jacket.

  On the rich inner lining was woven an intricate design of loops and whirls. Peder snatched away the arm with a gasp. He knew that design; his suspicion was confirmed.

  It was a Frachonard suit!

  Never in his wildest dreams had he imagined that he would ever behold, let alone possess such a suit. Frachonard, the crowning genius of Caean’s sartorial art!

  The great master, so he heard, had died but recently. He had never been profligate in his creations, and he believed that since his d
eath all items that had come from his hand were known, numbered and named, and viewed in the same light that great paintings had once been. But Peder’s good fortune was even more extraordinary; the use of the fabulous new cloth, Prossim, had but lately been perfected. Peder had been told, by a sartorial who claimed to have visited a planet within communicable distance of Caean, that Frachonard had completed five known suits in the new material.

  ‘Peder!’ Mast’s voice said fretfully. ‘What’s keeping you?’

  Steeling himself, Peder took the suit off its hook. ‘Just finishing this batch,’ he said.

  He stepped carefully out to the lighter and stowed the suit aboard, closing the hatch to the hold. He was about to return to the cargo ship when his speaker gave him a warning squawk and the sound generator warmed up ominously.

  Turning, he saw that the shouter was easing itself down the slopes of the gorge.

  ‘Hold it,’ he said, ‘I think I’ve got trouble.’

  The shouter seemed to have spotted him. Its long tail threshed the air for balance; its square sound-chute was aimed at the Caeanic ship, and suddenly Peder knew by the howl of his speaker that the chute was in operation. Frantically he reached for the hand-grip that operated the energy rifle. On the suit, baffle-tubes were fracturing and breaking off; something slow and rolling seemed to be grinding up his insides.

  The energy rifle sent out a barely visible pale blue flame, like a wavering gas jet except that it went in a dead straight column to its target. It hit the shouter just below the snout. The beast squirmed to one side, injured but by no means dead, slithered farther down the slope and endeavoured once again to aim its beam of infra-sound towards Peder and the lighter. Peder fired again, taking more care over his aim this time. The energy column demolished the shouter’s chute, bored through its dermis and apparently struck a vital organ, for it rolled on to its side and wallowed in agony.