Читать книгу Spiders' War - S. Fowler Wright - Страница 7

CHAPTER IV: A QUESTION IN THE NIGHT

When they had regained the inner room, Lemno turned and looked at her in a speculative way, and there were some silent moments before he asked: “You would be my wife?”

“Have I a choice?”

“You would prefer me to the pot?”

“Yes, I would.” As she said it, a fear came. Suppose he should think her to be too cold, too reluctant in her replies? Might he not reject her for that? Suppose he should say at last: “But I am now of another mind. It is to the pot you shall go.” Yet to profess desire for him, after the circumstances which had brought her there, might be going too far. She might be unable to give it a genuine sound. She said: “It is more than that. I am alone in a strange place. Who have I to look to but you? I might be of more use than you can yet see.”

“A strange place?” he repeated. “I should say the difference is much less than that.” She saw that he followed her words with a mind that was keen and alert, and that there had been something puzzling, less perhaps in the word than the tone in which it had been said. The partial consciousness of her earlier existence which had been allowed to remain had a treacherous side, which had nearly betrayed her now. Yet how dare she explain? She said weakly: “There are differences between the way I lived and what I have seen here.”

He conceded, fairly enough: “Well, there are some,” with no belief in his voice.

She thought it well to add: “There is the fact that I am here.”

He took this better. He said: “Where you will remain.” They both knew that a return to her own land would be most difficult to contrive. At the best, it would mean going far up the river, or below the falls, seeking a means by which it could be safely crossed, and her way, even before the main difficulties would be reached, would be through hungry and hostile men, who might think of her as a good meal, but, at the best, would spare nothing for her.

He went on, after a pause: “We will give it thought. For tonight, you can sleep here.” He pointed to a corner of the room, where there was a small heap of folded furs. He added: “I must work late, having wasted much time for you. If I move about, it will be to make up the fire, which is kept alight. It will not be to disturb you.”

She saw that that might be taken as a considerate remark, as perhaps it was, though it could be meant in another way. It was in an effort to establish a more personal contact that she asked: “Why must you work so late? Is it so urgent that it should not have been left?”

He answered readily enough: “You do not guess what I do. It is my toil to inspect, and largely to read, all the books which have been written upon the history of men, just as Relf studies religions and Rakna philosophy; and then I reduce them to what is reasonable to retain. Before the making of books was checked, men had accumulated more than it was possible for them to know, until they lost the ability to choose between a basic principle and a mere detail. Now we proceed in a wiser way, discarding much, and retaining only what can be coordinated on each subject by the mind of a finite man.”

She said doubtfully: “Well, it has a sensible sound.”

“It may be,” he answered, “that the changes we have been able to make will save us from the wreck which has ended all previous civilizations, of which the records are many.”

“Did the civilization of which you spoke tonight come to disaster?” she asked.

“So it must have done, or it would continue now. It was, in fact, succeeded by a time of very primitive barbarism, though of superior moral decency; but I have not yet come to that point. I examine all the records we have, going forward from year to year in an orderly way. It was a state of life which was monstrous beyond easy belief, so that its end, by whatever violence, must have been a blessing to those who survived.”

He turned away as he said this, and she became discreetly silent, but she thought, as she lay awake, that she had found a way of establishing a possible intimacy such as Destra might not have tried, or, perhaps, been competent to sustain. Her knowledge of the times which he was now studying would be of the greatest value to her in making discussions of intelligent interest to him, though she would have to be careful; it would be easy to reveal too much, and who could foresee what this strong, strange man might do then?

She thought that it was a coincidence of almost miraculous quality that she should have been captured by one whose studies were so engaged, and he being, if she had understood rightly, the only one who was occupied precisely in that way.

Yet was it coincidence? Might not even this have been of the magician’s design?

She tried to remember what her conversation with the magician had been, and was both annoyed and frightened to find that it could not be clearly recalled. Was the memory of the past (about which some bargain had been made: she was sure of that) to be no better than the recollection of a dream which a man may be unwilling to lose, but which becomes fainter even while he strives to recall it to waking thoughts?

She must endeavour to retain those memories, if necessary by deliberate recollections, when solitary opportunities might allow. But why should Lemno speak with such contempt of the civilization from which she came? She knew that it had developed some evil features: that its records, both of wickedness and folly, were black enough, especially in the incidence of its wars, but surely it had shown better qualities also? Vaguely, she had always thought of her own time as superior even to the centuries immediately preceding. And for him to talk so, with a steak from his wife’s haunch already cut for his morning meal!

From these interesting abstract reflections, her mind returned to the immediate future—a dubious prospect of very limited attractions. The position was not one which she could accept passively as beyond her control. Its issue might depend entirely upon her own conduct and her own wits. She had saved herself already by the opportune suggestion that she would be better used as a wife than a meal, but for which she had little doubt that her joints would be distributed now, as those of Destra already were. For the rest, she saw that everything must depend upon the success with which she could fulfil the duties of the job she had taken on.

There came a time when he rose to build up the fire, and as he went back to his place, he looked at her and their eyes met. She knew then, unmistakably, that his train of thought had been close indeed to hers.

Seeing that she was awake, he asked abruptly, though still in the toneless voice which she felt to be no compliment to her: “You are virgin?”

The question was more complicated than he could reasonably have been expected to understand. For a moment it reduced her to silence. Then she replied fatuously: “Yes, I suppose I am.”

He showed no sign of observing any ambiguity in this reply, and went back to his books.

Turning her mind to what we may call the left hand of her dual memories, she was glad to conclude that she had probably made a correct reply.

After that, she began to speculate upon what they would eat when Destra had done her part. She did not like the idea of ten nuts a day. It would be no better if she knew that those around her might be considering improvement of their own diet at her expense—and perhaps arguing the prudence of doing so before the meagre ration reduced her weight. She decided that she must aim to become a most desirable wife before that question should become acute. And, for the moment, the empty frying pan witnessed that she had had a good meal; on which thought she slept.