Project Pope (5 page)

“Maybe not,” said Tennyson. “While a lot of the humans who left Old Earth all those millennia ago also left Christianity behind them—or shucked it and probably other Earth religions as well, after a few centuries in space—the average human, almost any human, still would know something about it and have a sort of instinctive feeling for the religion his ancestors had left behind. They could spot a phoney faith and would have nothing to do with it.”

“That may be right,” the captain said. “Aliens, on the other hand, having no background to judge the concept of Christianity—however twisted that concept might be—may find themselves attracted to it. I suppose that it is from the aliens that the project gets its support. Some aliens are fabulously wealthy. That bunch of creeps now occupying my quarters practically stink of money.”

“I asked you about the planet,” said Jill, “and you haven't told me. We got off on something else.”

“It's terrestrial,” said the captain, “with some minor differences. The Vatican colony is the only settlement. All the rest is howling wilderness that's never been properly mapped; a few quick fly-overs by a survey ship and that is all. Only one settlement, as you know, is not unique. Many frontier planets boast only a single settlement, near the spaceport—both the planet and the settlement sharing the same name. Thus, Gutshot is the designation of both the planet and the colony surrounding the port, while End of Nothing means both the settlement and planet, as you choose. The thing is that no one except Decker knows anything about the planet farther than a few miles beyond the settlement, and I can't think Decker has traveled any great distance into the mountains. Gutshot, of course, is better known. It's littered with dinky little feudal holdings, but, even so, much of it is still wild and unexplored.

“As far as End of Nothing is concerned, it is virtually unknown. We suspect there is no intelligent creature native to the planet, although that is an assumption. No one has looked for an intelligence, and there just might be one, or more, tucked away somewhere. There is animal life—herbivores and carnivores that feed on the herbivores. Some of the carnivores, according to what one hears in the colony, are ferocious brutes. I asked Decker about them once and he shrugged me off. I never asked again. Now,” the captain said to Tennyson, quickly changing the subject, “how much time did you spend on Gutshot?”

“Three years,” said Tennyson. “A little less than three years.”

“You got into trouble there?”

“You might say I did.”

“Captain,” said Jill, “it is unseemly of you to be prying. No one saw him get on the ship. No one knows he did. It's no skin off your ass.”

“If it will ease your conscience any,” said Tennyson, “I can tell you that I committed no crime. I was a suspect. That was all. On Gutshot, being a suspect is enough to get you killed.”

“Dr. Tennyson,” said the captain primly, “when we land at End of Nothing, you can get off the ship with the understanding that I have never talked with you. I would think that might be the best for both of us. As I've said before, we humans stick together.”

Chapter Five

This was the time of day that he liked the best, Decker thought—supper done and the dishes cleared away, a good fire blazing, the world shut outside the door and Whisperer at the table in the corner, working at shaping the piece of topaz they had brought home on the trip of the week before. Decker settled more comfortably in the chair, kicking off his moccasins and putting his stockinged feet on the raised hearthstone. In the fireplace a log burned through and settled on the other logs in a shower of sparks. New tongues of flame leaped up and ran along the burning wood. The chimney throat mumbled and was answered by the moaning wind that nosed along the eaves.

Shifting in his chair, he looked toward Whisperer's corner, but there was no sign of him. Sometimes you saw Whisperer, sometimes not. Set on one corner of the table was the intricately carved piece of pale green jade. A piece of work, Decker told himself, that was hard to make out. It was confusing because there was too much in it, much of which was unhuman, nuances that had no parallel to the way a human thought or saw; start to follow the lines of it and one soon lost oneself. The line that first manifested itself became something else and the pattern that the viewer thought he'd puzzled out became another pattern and then another and another, each one more confusing than the last. There was no end to it. A man probably could spend the rest of his days sitting in front of it and staring at it, trying to puzzle out and resolve the flowing of it and in the end always getting lost.

On the front of the table stood the large topaz crystal, and there had been some progress in its shaping since the day before, although he never had been able to catch the actual shaping of anything that Whisperer did. In each instance, the piece changed from time to time and that was all. It wasn't carving, for there were no chips, no material that had been cut away to effect the shaping, and yet, despite this, it was not molding either, for the finished parts had sharp lines as if the material had been cut away—not rounded edges as if it had been molded. Whisperer used no tools, of course—there was no way in which he could use tools. He was as close to nothing as one could imagine. And yet he got things done. He talked mind to mind, he changed the shape of gems, he slithered in and out; he was, seemingly, everywhere at once.

Watching, Decker saw the slight flicker of the diamond dust that was Whisperer, hovering above the topaz crystal.

—You're hiding again, he said in his mind to Whisperer.

—Decker, you know well I do not hide from you. It's that you do not see.

—Can't you occasionally brighten up a bit? Can't you shine a little more? You're always sneaking up.

—Now you needle me, said Whisperer. I never do any sneaking up. You are aware of me. You know when I am here.

And that was right, thought Decker. He did know when he was here. He sensed him, although how he sensed him, he had no idea. It was just knowing he was there. An impression, knowing that this little puff of diamond dust (although he was certain there was much more to Whisperer than a puff of dust) was somewhere very close.

And the question—always the question—of what he was. He could have asked him, Decker thought, could even ask him now, but somehow it had always seemed a question that was inappropriate. He had wondered at first if his simply thinking it, wondering about it, might not be equivalent to asking, speculating that whatever lay in his mind might be apparent to Whisperer. But over long months, it had become apparent that it was not, that this strange being either could not, or would not, read his mind. To communicate with Whisperer, he had to bring the words up into a certain segment of his mind and there expose them to Whisperer. This constituted talking to him; thinking was not talking. But how he talked with him, how he communicated with Whisperer or read what he in turn should tell him was still a mystery. There was no explanation, no human explanation, of the process that made it possible.

—We didn't do too badly on the last trip, Decker said. The topaz made it worth our while. And you were the one who nosed it out. You showed me where to find it. There was nothing showing in the gravel. Not a single glint. Just water-worn pebbles. But you showed me where to reach in and find it. Damned if I can figure how you do it.

—Luck, said Whisperer. No more than luck. Sometimes your luck, sometimes mine. Time before, it was you who found the ruby.

—A small one, Decker said.

—But of the finest water.

—Yes, I know. It's a beauty. Small as it is, it is still perfect. Have you decided yet if you want to do something with it?

—I am tempted, yes. I'll have to think some more upon it. It would be so small. So small for you, I mean. You'd have to use a glass to see the beauty of the shaping.

—Small for me. Yes, of course, you're right. Small for me. How about yourself?

—To me, Decker, size is relative. Almost meaningless.

—We'll hang on to the ruby, said Decker. I have more than enough to hand over to the captain.

He no longer could see Whisperer. The small glitter of diamond dust was gone. Perhaps, he thought, it was not because of anything Whisperer had done. Rather, it was due to a subtle shift of light values in the cabin. He knew Whisperer still was in the cabin, for he sensed him. And what was it that he sensed? What was Whisperer, what kind of thing was he? He was here in the cabin, of course, but where else might he be? How large was he? How small? A tiny mote dancing in the firelight or an essence that spanned the universe?

An incorporeal being, not always invisible, but incorporeal, a drifting next-to-nothingness, perhaps, that was linked to this planet, or perhaps only to a sector of the planet. Thinking of that, Decker was certain, however, that the linkage was at Whisperer's discretion. For some reason, he wanted to be here. More than likely there was nothing to prevent him from going wherever he might wish—to exist in the upper atmosphere, or beyond the atmosphere, in space; to domicile inside a glowing star; to sink into the granite of a planet's crust. All space, and all conditions of space, must be the natural range of Whisperer. Or could it be, Decker asked himself, that the Whisperer he knew was only one small facet of a more encompassing Whisperer? Could the total Whisperer be a huge, sprawling presence that existed in all of space, and possibly in all of time as well, a true creature of the universe?

More than likely, he told himself, he would never know, or knowing, would not understand. Which probably was at least one of the reasons he had never asked. Why ask for information that was beyond his understanding, unresolved information that would plague him all his days, that would rouse him, sweating, from his sleep in the dead of night, that would never let him be, that would set him apart, an alien creature, from the universe?

Whisperer spoke to him again.

—There is tragedy in the forest, he said. Three members of Vatican are dead.

—In the woods? You must be mistaken, Whisperer. Vatican people don't venture into the woods. They stay close to home.

—These ones were hunting the Old One of the Woods.

—No one in their right mind would hunt the Old One. In the woods, it is well to pray most earnestly the Old One does not come hunting you.

—One of these was new to Vatican. He was full of arrogance. He had a powerful weapon that he thought was a match for anything. It was not a match for anything.

—And they found an Old One.

—No. The Old One found them. He knew they were hunting him.

—And now they're dead. All three are dead?

—Yes. Dead most horribly.

—When did this happen?

—Short hours ago. Vatican does not know as yet.

—Perhaps we should notify Vatican.

—Why? asked Whisperer. There is nothing can be done. In time, when they are gone overlong, others will set out to seek them and will bring them home.

—But the Old One will be there and waiting.

—Perhaps, said Whisperer, but he will not harm the seekers. They'll not be hunting him.

—He kills only those who hunt him?

—Yes. Did not you know that? You've tramped the woods for years.

—I've been lucky. I've never seen an Old One. I have never had to face one.

—Old Ones have seen you, said Whisperer. Many, many times. They do not bother you because you do not bother them.

—To bother them, said Decker, is the last thing I would do.

—You carry a weapon. What you call a rifle.

—That's right. I very seldom use it. Occasionally to get some meat to put into the pot.

—And not often even so.

—No, not often, Decker said.

He picked up a poker and engineered the fire, settling logs into more compact space for better burning. The chimney mumbled at him. The wind moaned underneath the eaves. The fireplace flames sent shadows chasing up and down the room.

—Vatican, said Whisperer, is very much excited.

—Because of the Old One?

—No, not because of the Old One. That is not known as yet. Something, it seems, has been found by a Listener.

—The Listeners are finding something all the time.

—But this finding is a special finding.

—Special in what way?

—I know not as yet. Everyone is excited. Some jubilant, some skeptical, some shocked. If true, I gather, something of very great import. The index of faith is running very high. An increase in devotion.

—They have their little triumphs, said Decker, and their small defeats. The place is in continual uproar.

—The triumph in this instance, said Whisperer, cannot be classified as small. There is great hope; many tellings of the beads.

Chapter Six

They stood on the landing field, staring in some dismay at the small grouping of nondescript buildings that made up the colony of End of Nothing. On a low ridge behind the town rose a sprawling structure, or a group of structures—from this distance it was impossible to tell—all gleaming white, stately despite the lack of height, with a comfortable, down-to-earth appearance despite the stateliness. And, behind the structure, a backdrop to everything, reared up mountains purple in the distance, with the hint of white-capped peaks seeming to float in the air above them.

Tennyson pointed at the structure on the ridge.

“Vatican, I take it.”

“I would think it might be,” said Jill.

“I've seen photographs of the Old Earth Vatican. That looks nothing like it.”

“You're taking the name too literally,” Jill told him. “It's nothing but a name. I doubt it has any real connection with the Vatican.”

“But a pope?”

“Well, maybe some connection. An imagined connection. But I doubt there's anything official, nothing that the Old Earth Vatican would officially recognize.”