A Handful of Darkness (10 page)

“E.J.!” she said. “What’s the matter? Why are you home?”

“I don’t know. I took some leave. It’s all right.”

Liz put her packages down on the fence. “For heaven’s sake,” she said irritably. “You frightened me.” She stared at him intently.

“You took leave?”

“Yes.”

“How much does that make, this year? How much leave have you taken in all?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know? Well, is there any left?”

“Left for what?”

Liz stared at him. Then she picked up her packages and went inside the house, the back door banging after her. Elwood frowned. What was the matter? He went on into the garage and began to drag lumber and tools out on to the lawn, beside the boat.

He gazed up at it. It was square, big and square, like some enormous solid packing crate. Lord, but it was solid. He had put endless beams into it. There was a covered cabin with a big window, the roof tarred over. Quite a boat.

He began to work. Presently Liz came out of the house. She crossed the yard silently, so that he did not notice her until he came to get some large nails.

“Well?” Liz said.

Elwood stopped for a moment. “What is it?”

Liz folded her arms.

Elwood became impatient. “What is it? Why are you looking at me?”

“Did you really take more leave? I can’t believe it. You really came home again to work on—on that.”

Elwood turned away.

“Wait.” She came up beside him. “Don’t walk off from me. Stand still.”

“Be quiet. Don’t shout.”

“I’m not shouting. I want to talk to you. I want to ask you something. May I? May I ask you something? You don’t mind talking to me?”

Elwood nodded.

“
Why?
” Liz said, her voice low and intense. “Why? Will you tell me that? Why?”

“Why what?”

“That. That—that thing. What is it for? Why are you here in the yard in the middle of the day? For a whole year it’s been like this. At the table last night, all of a sudden you got up and walked out. Why? What’s it all for?”

“It’s almost done,” Elwood murmured. “A few more licks here and there and it’ll be—”

“And then what?” Liz came around in front of him, standing in his path. “And then what? What are you going to do with it? Sell it? Float it? All the neighbours are laughing at you. Everybody in the block knows—” Her voice broke suddenly. “—Knows about you, and this. The kids at school make fun of Bob and Toddy. They tell them their father is—That he’s—”

“That he’s crazy?”

“Please, E.J. Tell me what it’s for. Will you do that? Maybe I can understand. You never told me. Wouldn’t it help? Can’t you even do that?”

“I can’t,” Elwood said.

“You can’t! Why not?”

“Because I don’t know,” Elwood said. “I don’t know what it’s for. Maybe it isn’t for anything.”

“But if it isn’t for anything why do you work on it?”

“I don’t know. I like to work on it. Maybe it’s like whittling.” He waved his hand impatiently. “I’ve always had a workshop of some kind. When I was a kid I used to build model aeroplanes. I have tools. I’ve always had tools.”

“But why do you come home in the middle of the day?”

“I get restless.”

“Why?”

“I—I hear people talking, and it makes me uneasy. I want to get away from them. There’s something about it all, about them. Their ways. Maybe I have claustrophobia.”

“Shall I call Doctor Evans and make an appointment?”

“No. No, I’m all right. Please, Liz, get out of the way so I can work. I want to finish.”

“And you don’t even know what it’s for.” She shook her head. “So all this time you’ve been working without knowing why. Like some animal that goes out at night and fights, like a cat on the back fence. You leave your work and us to—”

“Get out of the way.”

“Listen to me. You put down that hammer and come inside. You’re putting your suit on and going right back to the office. Do you hear? If you don’t I’m never going to let you inside the house again. You can break down the door if you want, with your hammer. But it’ll be locked for you from now on, if you don’t forget that boat and go back to work.”

There was silence.

“Get out of the way,” Elwood said. “I have to finish.”

Liz stared at him. “You’re going on?” The man pushed past her. “You’re going to go ahead? There’s something wrong with you. Something wrong with your mind. You’re—”

“Stop,” “Elwood said, looking past her. Liz turned.

Toddy was standing silently in the driveway, his lunch pail under his arm. His small face was grave and solemn. He did not say anything to them.

“Tod!” Liz said. “Is it that late already?”

Toddy came across the grass to his father. “Hello, boy,” Elwood said. “How was school?”

“Fine.”

“I’m going in the house,” Liz said. “I meant it, E.J. Remember that I meant it.”

She went up the walk. The back door slammed behind her.

Elwood sighed. He sat down on the ladder leading up the side of the boat and put his hammer down. He lit a cigarette and smoked silently. Toddy waiting without speaking.

“Well, boy?” Elwood said at last. “What do you say?”

“What do you want done, Dad?”

“Done?” Elwood smiled. “Well, there’s not too much left. A few things here and there. We’ll be through, soon. You might look around for boards we didn’t nail down on the deck.” He rubbed his jaw. “Almost done. We’ve been working a long time. You could paint, if you want. I want to get the cabin painted. Red, I think. How would red be?”

“Green.”

“Green? All right. There’s some green porch paint in the garage. Do you want to start stirring it up?”

“Sure,” Toddy said. He headed towards the garage.

Elwood watched him go. “Toddy—”

The boy turned. “Yes?”

“Toddy, wait.” Elwood went slowly towards him. “I want to ask you something.”

“What is it, Dad?”

“You—you don’t mind helping me, do you? You don’t mind working on the boat?”

Toddy looked up gravely into his father’s face. He said nothing. For a long time the two of them gazed at each other.

“Okay!” Elwood said suddenly. “You run along and get the paint started.”

Bob came swinging along the driveway with two of the kids from the junior high school. “Hi, Dad,” Bob called, grinning. “Say, how’s it coming?”

“Fine,” Elwood said.

“Look,” Bob said to his pals, pointing to the boat. “You see that? You know what that is?”

“What is it?” one of them said.

Bob opened the kitchen door. “That’s an atomic powered sub.” He grinned, and the two boys grinned. “It’s full of Uranium 235. Dad’s going all the way to Russia with it. When he gets through, there won’t be a thing left of Moscow.”

The boys went inside, the door slamming behind them.

Elwood stood looking up at the boat. In the next yard Mrs. Hunt stopped for a moment with taking down her washing, looking at him and the big square hull rising above him.

“Is it really atomic powered, Mr. Elwood?” she said.

“No.”

“What makes it run, then? I don’t see any sails. What kind of motor is in it? Steam?”

Elwood bit his lip. Strangely, he had never thought of that part. There was no motor in it, no motor at all. There were no sails, no boiler. He had put no engine into it, no turbines, no fuel. Nothing. It was a wood hull, an immense box, and that was all. He had never thought of what would make it go, never in all the time he and Toddy had worked on it.

Suddenly a torrent of despair descended over him. There was no engine, nothing. It was not a boat, it was only a great mass of wood and tar and nails. It would never go, never never leave the yard. Liz was right: he was like some animal going out into the yard at night, to fight and kill in the darkness, to struggle dimly, without sight or understanding, equally blind, equally pathetic.

What had he built it for? He did not know. Where was it going? He did not know that either. What would make it run? How would he get it out of the yard? What was it all for, to build without understanding, darkly, like a creature in the night?

Toddy had worked alongside him, the whole time. Why had he worked? Did he know? Did the boy know what the boat was for, why they were building? Toddy had never asked because he trusted his father to know.

But he did not know. He, the father, he did not know either, and soon it would be done, finished, ready. And then what? Soon Toddy would lay down his paint brush, cover the last can of paint, put away the nails, the scraps of wood, hang the saw and hammer up in the garage again. And then he would ask, ask the question he had never asked before but which must come finally.

And he could not answer him.

Elwood stood, staring up at it, the great hulk they had built, struggling to understand. Why had he worked? What was it all for. When would he know? Would he ever know? For an endless time he stood there, staring up.

It was not until the first great black drops of rain began to splash about him that he understood.

“She just stands there,” Norton said nervously. “Captain, you’ll have to talk to her.”

“What does she want?”

“She wants a ticket. She’s stone deaf. She just stands there staring and she won’t go away. It gives me the creeps.”

Captain Andrews got slowly to his feet. “Okay. I’ll talk to her. Send her in.”

“Thanks.” To the corridor Norton said, “The Captain will talk to you. Come ahead.”

There was motion outside the control room. A flash of metal. Captain Andrews pushed his desk scanner back and stood waiting.

“In here.” Norton backed into the control room. “This way. Right in here.”

Behind Norton came a withered little old woman. Beside her moved a gleaming robant, a towering robot servant, supporting her with its arm. The robant and the tiny old woman entered the control room slowly.

“Here’s her papers.” Norton slid a folio on to the chart desk, his voice awed. “She’s three hundred and fifty years old. One of the oldest sustained. From Riga II.”

Andrews leafed slowly through the folio. In front of the desk the little woman stood silently, staring straight ahead. Her faded eyes were pale blue. Like ancient china.

“Irma Vincent Gordon,” Andrews murmured. He glanced up. “Is that right?”

The old woman did not answer.

“She is totally deaf, sir,” the robant said.

Andrews grunted and returned to the folio. Irma Gordon was one of the original settlers of the Riga system. Origin unknown. Probably born out in space in one of the old sub-C ships. A strange feeling drifted through him. The little old creature. The centuries she had seen! The changes.

“She wants to travel?” he asked the robant.

“Yes sir. She has come from her home to purchase a ticket.”

“Can she stand space travel?”

“She came from Riga, here to Fomalhaut IX.”

“Where does she want to go?”

“To Earth, sir,” the robant said.

“
Earth!
” Andrews” jaw dropped. He swore nervously. “What do you mean?”

“She wishes to travel to Earth, sir.”

“You see?” Norton muttered. “Completely crazy.”

Gripping his desk tightly, Andrews addressed the old woman. “Madam, we can’t sell you a ticket to Earth.”

“She can’t hear you, sir,” the robant said.

Andrews found a piece of paper. He wrote in big letters:

He held it up. The old woman’s eyes moved as she studied the words. Her lips twitched. “Why not?” she said at last. Her voice was faint and dry. Like rustling weeds.

Andrews scratched an answer.

He added grimly:

The old woman’s faded eyes left the words. She gazed directly at Andrews, her face expressionless. Andrews became uneasy. Beside him, Norton sweated nervously.

“Jeez,” Norton muttered. “Get her out of here. She’ll put the hex on us.”

Andrews addressed the robant. “Can’t you make her understand. There is no such place as Earth. It’s been proved a thousand times. No such primordial planet existed. All scientists agree human life arose simultaneously throughout the—”

“It is her wish to travel to Earth,” the robant said patiently. “She is three hundred and fifty years old and they have ceased giving her sustentation treatments. She wishes to visit Earth before she dies.”

“But it’s a myth!” Andrews exploded. He opened and closed his mouth, but no words came.

“How much?” the old woman said. “How much?”

“I can’t do it!” Andrews shouted. “There isn’t—”

“We have a kilo positives,” the robant said.

Andrews became suddenly quiet. “A thousand positives.” He blanched in amazement. His jaws clamped shut, the colour draining from his face.

“How much?” the old woman repeated. “How much?”

“Will that be sufficient?” the robant asked.

For a moment Andrews swallowed silently. Abruptly he found his voice. “Sure,” he said. “Why not?”

“Captain!” Norton protested. “Have you gone nuts. You know there’s no such place as Earth! How the hell can we—”

“Sure, we’ll take her.” Andrews buttoned his tunic slowly, hands shaking. “We’ll take her anywhere she wants to go. Tell her that. For a thousand positives we’ll be glad to take her to Earth. Okay?”

“Of course,” the robant said. “She has saved many decades for this. She will give you the kilo positives at once. She has them with her.”

“Look,” Norton said. “You can get twenty years for this. They’ll take your articles and your card and they’ll—”

“Shut up.” Andrews spun the dial of the intersystem vidsender. Under them the jets throbbed and roared. The lumbering transport had reached deep space. “I want the main information library at Centaurus II,” he said into the speaker.

“Even for a thousand positives you can’t do it. Nobody can do it. They tried to find Earth for generations. Directorate ships tracked down every moth-eaten planet in the whole—”

The vidsender clicked. “Centaurus II.”

“Information library.”

Norton caught Andrews” arm. “Please, Captain. Even for two kilo positives—”

“I want the following information,” Andrews said into the vidspeaker. “All facts that are known concerning the planet Earth. Legendary birthplace of the human race.”

“No facts are known,” the detached voice of the library monitor came. “The subject is classified as metaparticular.”

“What unverified but widely circulated reports have survived?”

“Most legends concerning Earth were lost during the Centauran-Rigan conflict of 4-B33a. What survived is fragmentary. Earth is variously described as a large ringed planet with three moons, as a small, dense planet with a single moon, as the first planet of a ten-planet system located around a dwarf white—”

“What’s the most prevalent legend?” .

“The Morrison Report of 5-C2 1r analyzed the total ethnic and subliminal accounts of the legendary Earth. The final summation noted that Earth is generally considered to be a small third planet of a nine-planet system, with a single moon. Other than that, no agreement of legends could be constructed.”

“I see. A third planet of a nine-planet system. With a single moon.” Andrews broke the circuit and the screen faded.

“So?” Norton said.

Andrews got quickly to his feet. “She probably knows every legend about it.” He pointed down—at the passenger quarters below. “I want to get the accounts straight.”

“Why? What are you going to do?”

Andrews flipped open the master star chart. He ran his fingers down the index and released the scanner. In a moment it turned up a card.

He grabbed the chart and fed it into the robant pilot. “The Emphor System,” he murmured thoughtfully.

“Emphor? We’re going there?”

“According to the chart, there are ninety systems that show a third planet of nine with a single moon. Of the ninety, Emphor is the closest. We’re heading there now.”

“I don’t get it,” Norton protested. “Emphor is a routine trading system. Emphor III isn’t even a Class D check point.”

Captain Andrews grinned tightly. “Emphor III has a single moon, and it’s the third of nine planets. That’s all we want. Does anybody know any more about Earth?” He glanced downwards. “Does
she
know any more about Earth?”

“I see,” Norton said slowly. “I’m beginning to get the picture.”

Emphor III turned silently below them. A dun red globe, suspended among sickly clouds, its baked and corroded surface lapped by the congealed remains of ancient seas. Cracked, eroded cliffs jutted starkly up. The flat plains had been dug and stripped bare. Great gouged pits pocketed the surface, endless gaping sores.

Norton’s face twisted in revulsion. “Look at it. Is anything alive down there?”

Captain Andrews frowned. “I didn’t realize it was so gutted.” He crossed abruptly to the robant pilot. “There’s supposed to be an auto-grapple some place down there. I’ll try to pick it up.”

“A grapple? You mean that waste is inhabited?”

“A few Emphorites. Degenerate trading colony of some sort.” Andrews consulted the card. “Commercial ships come here occasionally. Contact with this region has been vague since the Centauran-Rigan War.”

The passage rang with a sudden sound. The gleaming robant and Mrs. Gordon emerged through the doorway into the control room. The old woman’s face was alive with excitement. “Captain! Is that—is that Earth down there?”

Andrews nodded. “Yes.”

The robant led Mrs. Gordon over to the big viewscreen. The old woman’s face twitched, ripples of emotion stirring her withered features. “I can hardly believe that’s really Earth. It seems impossible.”

Norton glanced sharply at Captain Andrews.

“It’s Earth,” Andrews stated, not meeting Norton’s glance. “The moon should be around, soon.”

The old woman did not speak. She had turned her back.

Andrews contacted the auto-grapple and hooked the robant pilot on. The transport shuddered and then began to drop, as the beam from Emphor caught it and took over.

“We’re landing,” Andrews said to the old woman, touching her On the shoulder.

“She can’t hear you, sir,” the robant said.

Andrews grunted. “Well, she can see.”

Below them the pitted, ruined surface of Emphor III was rising rapidly. The ship entered the cloud belt and emerged, coasting over a barren plain that stretched as far as the eye could see.

“What happened down there?” Norton said to Andrews. “The war?”

“War. Mining. And it’s old. The pits are probably bomb craters. Some of the long trenches may be scoop gouges. Looks like they really exhausted this place.”

A crooked row of broken mountain peaks shot past under them. They were nearing the remain of an ocean. Dark, unhealthy water lapped below, a vast sea, crusted with salt and waste, its edges disappearing into banks of piled debris.

“Why is it that way?” Mrs. Gordon said suddenly. Doubt crossed her features. “Why?”

“What do you mean?” Andrews said.

“I don’t understand.” She stared uncertainly down at the surface below. “It isn’t supposed to be this way. Earth is green. Green and alive. Blue water and…” Her voice trailed off uneasily. “
Why?
”

Andrews grabbed some paper and wrote:

Mrs. Gordon studied his words, her lips twitching. A spasm moved through her, shaking the thin, dried-out body. “Exhausted…” Her voice rose in shrill dismay. “It’s not supposed to be this way! I don’t
want
it this way!”

The robant took her arm. “She had better rest. I’ll return her to her quarters. Please notify us when the landing has been made.”

“Sure.” Andrews nodded awkwardly as the robant led the old woman from the viewscreen. She clung to the guide rail, face distorted with fear and bewilderment.

“Something’s wrong!” she wailed. “Why is it this way? Why…”

The robant led her from the control room. The closing of the hydraulic safety doors cut off her thin cry abruptly.

Andrews relaxed, his body sagging. “God.” He lit a cigarette shakily. “What a racket she makes.”

“We’re almost down,” Norton said frigidly.

Cold wind lashed at them as they stepped out cautiously. The air smelled bad—sour and acrid. Like rotten eggs. The wind brought salt and sand blowing up against their faces.

A few miles off the thick sea lay. They could hear it swishing faintly, gummily. A few birds passed silently overhead, great wings flapping soundlessly.

“Depressing damn place,” Andrews muttered.

“Yeah. I wonder what the old lady’s thinking.”

Down the descent ramp came the glittering robant, helping the little old woman. She moved hesitantly, unsteady, gripping the robant’s metal arm. The cold wind whipped around her frail body. For a moment she tottered—and then came on, leaving the ramp and gaining the uneven ground.

Norton shook his head. “She looks bad. This air. And the wind.”

“I know.” Andrews moved back towards Mrs. Gordon and the robant. “How is she?” he asked.

“She is not well, sir,” the robant answered.

“Captain.” the old woman whispered.

“What is it?”

“You must tell me the truth. Is this—is this really Earth?”

She watched his lips closely. “You swear it is? You
swear?
” Her voice rose in shrill terror.

“It’s Earth!” Andrews snapped irritably. “I told you before. Of course it’s Earth.”

“It doesn’t look like Earth.” Mrs. Gordon clung to his answer, panic-stricken. “It doesn’t look like Earth, Captain. Is it really Earth?”

“Yes!”

Her gaze wandered towards the ocean. A strange look flickered across her tired face, igniting her faded eyes with sudden hunger. “Is that water? I want to see.”

Andrews turned to Norton. “Get the launch out. Drive her where she wants.”

Norton pulled back angrily. “Me?”

“That’s an order.”

“Okay.” Norton returned reluctantly to the ship. Andrews lit a cigarette moodily and waited. Presently the launch slid out of the ship, coasting across the ash towards them.

“You can show her anything she wants,” Andrews said to the robant. “Norton will drive you.”

“Thank you, sir,” the robant said. “She will be grateful. She has wanted all her life to stand on Earth. She remembers her grandfather telling her about it. She believes that he came from Earth, a long time ago. She is very old. She is the last living member of her family.”

“But Earth is just a—” Andrews caught himself. “I mean—”

“Yes, sir. But she is very old. And she has waited many years.” The robant turned to the old woman and led her gently towards the launch. Andrews stared after them sullenly, rubbing his jaw and frowning.

“Okay,” Norton’s voice came from the launch. He slid the hatch open and the robant led the old woman carefully inside. The hatch closed after them.

A moment later the launch shot away across the salt flat, towards the ugly, lapping ocean.

Norton and Captain Andrews paced restlessly along the shore. The sky was darkening. Sheets of salt blew against them. The mud flats stank in the gathering gloom of night. Dimly, off in the distance, a line of hills faded into the silence and vapours.